John Proctor is the Villain is headed across the pond!
The play, which completed its thrice-extended Broadway run at the Booth Theatre September 7, will play London's Royal Court Theatre in the Spring of 2026: running March 20 through April 25, the production will officially open March 26.
Directed by Danya Taymor, this will be a direct transfer of Kimberly Belflower's play as seen last season on Broadway, produced by Wagner Johnson Productions, Wessex Grove, Sonia Friedman Productions, Runyonland and John Mara Jr.
The work, a modern reexamination of Arthur Miller's The Crucible set at a rural Georgia high school, was commissioned by The Farm Theater in 2017. Following workshops at Farm Theater and Ojai Playwrights Conference, the play premiered at Centre College in 2018, and became a cult favorite due to numerous regional and college productions, including productions at Furman University, Rollins College, Washington D.C.'s Studio Theatre, and Boston's Huntington.
Said Taymor and Belflower, “We are thrilled and honored to bring John Proctor is the Villain to the iconic Royal Court Theatre where so many brilliant and audacious artists have created. It feels like special witchcraft that Arthur Miller’s The Crucible also made its English debut at the Royal Court exactly 70 years ago, and we can’t wait to present our production on the very same stage.”
Original star Sadie Sink was instrumental in bringing the work to Broadway, where it particularly resonated with younger theatregoers, becoming a certified hit. (Sink is also part of the starry team bringing the play to the screen.) It is unknown at this stage if Sink will be a part of the play's London run.
John Proctor is the Villain was nominated for seven 2025 Tony Awards, including Best Play, Direction of a Play, Lighting Design of a Play, Sound Design of a Play, and three performance categories, including Leading Actress in a Play for Sink, Featured Actor in a Play for Gabriel Ebert, and Featured Actress in a Play for Fina Strazza.
The play is part of Royal Court Theatre's newly announced 2026 season, the company's 70th. The offerings also include York Theatre Royal's staging of Beckett's Krapp's Last Tape, directed by Gary Oldman; Leo Simpe-Asante's Godot's To-Do List, directed by Aneesha Srinivasan; Rajiv Joseph's Archduke, directed by Lyndsey Turner and designed by Es Devlin; Manfred Karge's Man to Man, starring Tilda Swinton (reprising her 1988 performance in the work), directed by Stephen Unwin, and designed by Bunny Christie; Ryan Calais Cameron's The Afronauts; Jack Nicholl's The Shitheads, directed by David Byrne and Srinivasan; Yousef Sweid and Isabella Sedlak's Between the River and the Sea, directed by Sedlak; Georgie Gettmer's Are You Watching?; Joy Nesbitt's Blood of My Blood, directed by Tatenda Shamiso; and Rhys Warrington's Monument, directed by Francesca Goodridge. A full schedule is at RoyalCourtTheatre.com.
