The Devils

Directed By: Nick Moutoun
Written By: John Whiting
Presented By: Sedos

Father Urbain Grandier is a young, educated, charming priest. People are drawn from around the country to the small city of Loudun in France to hear him speak. His reputation leads to him being offered the position of head priest at St Ursula’s Convent, which he turns down. The convent’s prioress takes umbrage to this, so she avenges herself by claiming possession by devils whom were set upon her by Grandier. The hysteria becomes widespread giving Grandier’s enemies the opportunity to make an example of him by putting him to trial for consorting with the Devil. “The assertion of self is the ascendancy of the Devil.”

Commissioned by Sir Peter Hall for the Royal Shakespeare Company, the play is based on Aldous Huxley's book The Devils of Loudun that centres on the real circumstances that befell Father Grandier. It was famously re-imagined by Ken Russell in the cult movie The Devils starring Oliver Reed and Vanessa Redgrave.