The Cherry Orchard now playing at the Harold Pinter Theatre: cast, dates and tickets

The Cherry Orchard is now in previews at the Harold Pinter Theatre, with Kristin Scott Thomas as Lyubov Ranevskaya and Stephen Mangan as Lopakhin. Ian Rickson directs a new version of Anton Chekhov’s final play by Conor McPherson, playing a strictly limited run until 9 January 2027. Tickets on British Theatre are on sale for performances through to the final show on 9 January 2027: see The Cherry Orchard tickets.

The staging is presented in the West End by Sonia Friedman Productions and Winkler & Smalberg, and it brings together a starry cast, a leading Irish playwright and a director with a long history with Chekhov.

Kristin Scott Thomas returns to Chekhov

The BAFTA and Olivier Award winner has a close bond with the Russian dramatist. Scott Thomas made her West End debut as Masha in Three Sisters, and she won the Olivier Award for Best Actress for her Arkadina in Ian Rickson’s staging of The Seagull in 2007. Ranevskaya, the warm, impulsive and hopelessly extravagant landowner at the heart of this play, reunites actor and director on Chekhov for the latest time.

Ranevskaya is a richly contradictory part: charming and generous, funny and infuriating, unable to accept that the world she grew up in is disappearing. With Scott Thomas back on a West End stage in the part, this is set to be a highlight of the autumn.

Mangan plays Lopakhin, a local businessman descended from serfs who worked the estate, who has made his fortune and now holds the family’s future in his hands. The part also reunites him with Rickson, who directed him in Harold Pinter’s The Birthday Party in 2018, on this very stage.

The full cast

Joining Scott Thomas and Mangan are Peter Wight as Gaev, Vinette Robinson as Varya, Anastasia Martin as Anya, Jack Riddiford as Trofimov, Karl Johnson as Firs, Noof Ousellam as Yasha, Megan Cusack as Dunyasha, Shubham Saraf as Yepikhodov, Ruby Bentall as Sharlotta and Jeff Rawle as Pishchik.

Kathleen Cranham, Rachel Dawson and Fergus Murphy complete the cast as onstage musicians and understudies, with Philip Bosworth, Alex Childs, Paul Easom and Miles Paloma as understudies.

The creative team

Conor McPherson, the acclaimed Irish playwright and director, has written this new version of the play for Rickson, his longstanding collaborator. The design team brings together set designer Chloe Lamford, costume designer Sussie Juhlin-Wallén, lighting designer Bruno Poet, sound designer Tom Gibbons and composer Stephen Warbeck, with movement and intimacy direction by Shelley Maxwell and casting by Amy Ball CDG.

Previews began on Saturday 3 October 2026, and the official opening is on Tuesday 13 October.

What is it about?

Lyubov Ranevskaya returns to her childhood estate after years abroad, to find the property drowning in debt and her beloved cherry orchard under threat. Unless the family acts, the estate will be sold at auction. Lopakhin offers a practical solution: fell the orchard and lease the land for summer cottages. Ranevskaya and her brother Gaev cannot bring themselves to face the choice, and as old loyalties falter and new ambitions take hold, a whole world begins to slip away.

Chekhov wrote the play in 1903, and it premiered at the Moscow Art Theatre in January 1904 under Konstantin Stanislavski, months before the writer’s death. He called it a comedy, and it can be very funny, but it is also a bittersweet study of a family and a society on the brink of change, and it remains as timely as ever.

Booking and planning your trip

The show plays at the Harold Pinter Theatre until 9 January 2027. Evening performances are Monday to Saturday at 7.30pm, with matinees on Wednesday and Saturday at 2.30pm. The running time is 2 hours 30 minutes including an interval, and the age guidance is 11+. The play includes a scene in which a character threatens self-harm with a gun.

British Theatre has tickets on sale for performances through to the final show on 9 January 2027. With Scott Thomas and Mangan heading the cast and a run of just over three months, demand is likely to be high, especially around Christmas, so it is worth booking early if you have a particular date in mind. You can compare dates on The Cherry Orchard at the Harold Pinter Theatre.

The Harold Pinter Theatre is at 6 Panton Street, London SW1Y 4DN, between Leicester Square and Piccadilly Circus. Both Underground stations are a few minutes’ walk away, and Charing Cross is the nearest mainline station. The theatre opened in 1881 as the Royal Comedy Theatre, was known for many years as the Comedy Theatre, and took its current name in 2011 in tribute to the playwright Harold Pinter. Find more on our Harold Pinter Theatre page.

With a great play, a new version by a leading writer and two much-loved actors at its centre, this is a West End event worth making time for. Book The Cherry Orchard tickets and choose your date.