Atri Banerjee directs the UK premiere of Branden Jacobs-Jenkins' Everybody at Jermyn Street Theatre from 28 January 2027, with the 70-seat studio turned into an in-the-round space for the first time in more than a decade.
For the first time since its 2015 production of Lesere, Jermyn Street Theatre will rearrange its 70-seat auditorium so that the audience sits on every side of the stage. The occasion is the UK premiere of Everybody by Branden Jacobs-Jenkins, directed by Atri Banerjee, which begins previews on Thursday 28 January 2027.
Jacobs-Jenkins took the 15th-century morality play Everyman as his model. His central figure, Everybody, is about to be taken to the afterlife and goes looking for someone among friends and family willing to make the trip too. The twist is in the casting: the principal roles are decided by a lottery held at each performance, so an actor may play a different part from one night to the next. Every member of the company learns the entire script, and the theatre counts 120 possible combinations of cast.
Banerjee said he had admired the playwright's work "for a long time - his wit, his mischief, his extraordinary theatrical imagination". He went on: "Everybody takes on one of the oldest questions there is: what is the meaning of life, and what, in the end, really matters? Its answer unfolds in a form that is gloriously, unpredictably alive."
Banerjee was formerly Artistic Lead at the Gate Theatre, having joined it as Creative Associate in 2023. His productions include A Midsummer Night's Dream at Regent's Park Open Air Theatre, Look Back in Anger at the Almeida Theatre, Julius Caesar for the RSC and Hobson's Choice at the Royal Exchange Theatre, which won him The Stage Debut Award for Best Director.
Jacobs-Jenkins won both the Tony Award for Best Play and the Pulitzer Prize for Drama with Purpose. His other plays include Appropriate, winner of the Obie Award for Best New American Play, An Octoroon, Gloria and The Comeuppance, and he has received a MacArthur Fellowship.
The announcement arrives while Kwame Owusu's staging of Richard Eyre's version of Ghosts finishes its run, which ends on 14 November, and while It's a Wonderful Life!, adapted by Anthony E. Palermo, is in rehearsal ahead of performances from 19 November 2026 to 3 January 2027.
Everybody runs at Jermyn Street Theatre, 16B Jermyn Street, from Thursday 28 January to Saturday 6 March 2027, with its press performance on Wednesday 3 February 2027 at 7.30pm. Performances are Monday to Saturday at 7.30pm, with 3pm matinees on Tuesdays and Saturdays, and tickets start at £20.
