First look in rehearsals at Michelle Dockery and Laura Aikman in Bloodsport: After Helen of Troy

Rehearsal photography released today gives a first look at Bloodsport: After Helen of Troy, the new play by Ava Pickett that has its world premiere at Stratford East from 3 September to 10 October 2026. Michelle Dockery plays Helen and Laura Aikman plays Cee, with Lisa Spirling, Stratford East's artistic director, directing.

The premise picks up where the myth usually stops. Helen comes home years after walking out on her family, a war having been fought in her name; her husband treats it as a homecoming worth celebrating, and her childhood friend Cee does not. Across one uneasy first night of peace, old wounds are reopened and loyalties give way, until what it actually cost this woman to leave her life is impossible to avoid. The production puts its own line more bluntly: "GIVE IT BACK. GIVE IT BACK NOW. GIVE IT BACK OR I'LL TAKE IT BACK."

Dockery is best known on screen for Downton Abbey, with the film The Queen of Fashion to come; Aikman's credits include Gavin & Stacey and a new series of Line of Duty. They are joined by Olivier Award winner Maimuna Memon (Standing at the Sky's Edge) as Dani, Gerard Monaco as Mario, Ethan Moorhouse as Messenger, Emma Monnickendam as Hermione, Jay Taylor as Marcus, Ellie Turner (2:22 A Ghost Story) as Chloe and Joshua-Alexander Williams (Romeo & Juliet for The Jamie Lloyd Company) as Luke.

Pickett arrives at Stratford East on a considerable run of form. Her debut 1536 was nominated for the Olivier Award for Best New Play 2026, took the 2024 Susan Smith Blackburn Prize and the Stage Debut Award for Best Writer 2025, and has just finished a West End run at the Ambassadors Theatre after opening at the Almeida. She is the National Theatre's Writer in Residence for 2025/26.

Spirling's creative team is Polly Sullivan (set and costume), Zeynep Kepekli (lighting), Nicola T. Chang (sound design and composition), Kloé Dean (movement), Enric Ortuño (fight and intimacy), Claudette Williams (voice and dialect), Sophie Fuller (costume supervisor), Ed Madden (dramaturg), Ariana Xeno (assistant director) and casting by Juliet Horsley CDG.

Bloodsport: After Helen of Troy runs 3 September - 10 October 2026 at Stratford East, Gerry Raffles Square, London E15 1BN. Tickets start at £10 and the age guidance is 14+. The production is presented by Stratford East and supported by Eleanor Lloyd Productions, Eilene Davidson Productions, Mark Gordon Pictures and Cockayne Grants for the Arts.