Alex Kingston and Richard Schiff to star in Michael Frayn's COPENHAGEN at Hampstead Theatre

Michael Frayn’s Copenhagen will receive its first London staging since its 1998 premiere in a new production directed by Michael Longhurst, which will run at Hampstead Theatre from 27 March-2 May.

The modern classic will star Alex Kingston (Doctor Who, ER) and Richard Schiff (The West Wing, The Good Doctor), with further casting to be announced.

Inspired by real events that have fascinated historians for decades, the multi-award winning Copenhagen centres on a meeting between two great physicists, Niels Bohr and Werner Heisenberg. In 1941, at the height of the Second World War, Heisenberg made a strange trip to Copenhagen to see his former mentor and friend, Bohr. Their brilliant collaboration in the 1920s had begun to lay bare the mysteries at the heart of the atom, but with Denmark now under German occupation this meeting was fraught with danger and embarrassment – and Heisenberg was burdened with a terrible secret.

Producer and Chief Executive of Hampstead Theatre, Greg Ripley-Duggan, said: “Hampstead Theatre owes an enormous amount to Michael Frayn: he served on our Board for an amazing 25 years, and was the shrewd and perspicacious leader of the Foundation that created the astonishing building we now occupy. Over the years we’ve premiered four of his works and revived two more, and I’m delighted to have persuaded Michael Longhurst to create a fresh production of Copenhagen, last produced in London in 1998.”

Public booking for Copenhagen opens on Tuesday (10 February) at 10.30am, with further info here.