Suddenly Last Summer Tickets

In Tennessee Williams's 1957 play, wealthy widow Violet Venable will do anything to protect her late son Sebastian's reputation - down to bribing Dr John Cukrowicz, a brain surgeon who specialises in lobotomies, into performing a lobotomy on her niece Catharine Holly. Catharine was institutionalised after a disastrous summer trip in Europe which resulted in the death of her cousin Sebastian. Catharine can't remember exactly what happened last summer, but she knows a dark secret about Sebastian that Violet is determined to cover up. As the two women give their different versions of the events of the last summer, the doctor must decide which one is true.

Tennessee Williams's rarely performed masterpiece is a haunting story about family, trauma, and truth, adapted for film in 1959 with Elizabeth Taylor and Katharine Hepburn playing Catharine and Violet. Now audiences can experience this cleverly written mystery filled with dark twists onstage once again, directed by Michael Grandage, who returns to the National Theatre after more than 15 years. Emma Corrin (The Crown) and Harriet Walter (The House of Bernarda Alba) star as Catharine and Violet. A sharp and brutal one-act play built on extended, poetic monologues that culminate in a devastating gut punch, Suddenly, Last Summer will have you on the edge of your seat throughout the performance.

Don't miss this rarely seen but deeply gripping play from one of the greatest American dramatists.