Charlie's Dark Angel

An original new stage play written and directed by the renowned film and theatre critic James Christopher (the former chief film critic of The Times, Deputy Theatre Editor at Time Out, and chief theatre critic of the Sunday Express), Charlie’s Dark Angel tells a twisted story of denial and repression spurred on by an encounter between two old school friends.

A disturbing memory resurfaces when Eric and his wife Susan realise an accidental meeting with wealthy playboy, Charlie, and his young Ukrainian girlfriend, Ella, is not as it seems.

Set in a sinister farmhouse on the border between Suffolk and North Essex, this psychological drama is partly inspired by the fateful motifs of film noirs. Presented by The Company of Strangers, Charlie’s Dark Angel is a realm of half-forgotten memories which haunts these characters like ghosts. This rich drama deals with the complexities invoked by identity issues and personal childhood drama.

Phoebe Pryce (RADA’s There and Back and Twelfth Night, Martha’s Plus One) will make her exciting off-West End debut in the role of Ella, following in the footsteps of her distinguished parents, Kate Fahy and Jonathan Pryce, CBE.

Taking on the role of protagonist Eric is Kieran Gough (BBC’s The Tudors, Phoenix Theatre’s Blood Brothers), whose character has a sombre past full of disturbing sexual secrets, soon to be unearthed as a ‘chance’ meeting drags up the past.

Joannah Tincey, who boldly adapted the Austen classic Pride and Prejudice last year - taking on a tremendous 21 characters with her only other cast member and real-life husband Nick Underwood - will play Eric’s frustrated girlfriend Susan, whose idyllic country life is left in tatters as Charlie becomes part of the furniture.

Having appeared in such iconic TV dramas as The Bill and Casualty, Ben Porter joins the cast as pleasure-seeking Charlie, whose decision to invade the happy couple’s farmhouse space certainly ruffles some feathers.

The Company of Strangers is a brand new venture exploring contemporary theatre noire to terrorise the modern imagination. Working with dark, uneasy spaces they put spiritual truths to the test with a far more authentic and visceral reach of live performance.