Doctor Foster writer Mike Bartlett takes on big data with new play inspired by Snowden leaks

The award-winning writer, whose breakthrough TV drama Doctor Foster pulled in an audience of more than 10 million last year, will premiere his new play, Wild, in June
Master of drama: Mike Bartlett also wrote hit play King Charles III
Daniel Hambury
Robert Dex @RobDexES18 February 2016

He has explored workplace bullying, adultery and the future of the royal family — and now playwright Mike Bartlett has turned his sights on whistleblower Edward Snowden.

The award-winning writer, whose breakthrough TV drama Doctor Foster pulled in an audience of more than 10 million last year, will premiere his new play, Wild, in June.

The play, which will be staged at the Hampstead Theatre, is the story of a young man called Andrew who ends up on the run in Moscow after becoming “America’s Most Wanted: a man who humiliated his country with one touch of a button”.

Snowden, 32, an ex-CIA employee, received asylum in Russia in 2013 after leaking thousands of classified documents from the files of the US National Security Agency. However, Bartlett said the play is not just a simple retelling of the story.

‘It looks at the amount of information held about us and how it can be used to affect our world’

&#13; <p>Bartlett on his new play, Wild</p>&#13;

He said: “It looks at the amount of information that is held about us and why and how that information can be used to affect the world we live in. That online world is not governed by any of the usual rules and restrictions — ‘wild’ is the best description for it.

“When big corporations have access to so much data and can know us better than we know ourselves, how do we behave and how do we live when we are dwarfed by this massive amount of data?”

Bartlett, 35, is also writing a second series of Doctor Foster, which starred Suranne Jones as the title character who suspects her husband of having an affair. The final episode was seen by more than 10 million viewers and Bartlett admitted he was surprised by its success. “We hoped it would do well and it was written for a prime BBC1 drama slot, but it wasn’t a crime drama and didn’t have a dead body in it, so it did really well.”

Latest theatre reviews

1/50

His theatrical hits include Bull, which was described as a “nasty, brutish and short” expose of bullying and won him an Olivier award last year. He also picked up the best new play award for King Charles III, which imagined the heir to the throne’s turbulent reign. His latest play follows another premiere at the Hampstead Theatre, which is staging Howard Brenton’s Lawrence After Arabia. The work looks at what happened to T E Lawrence after he found worldwide fame as the leader of the Arab revolt during the First World War.

It is not the first time Brenton has delved back into 20th-century history for inspiration. His play Never So Good, at the National Theatre, explored the life and career of Conservative prime minister Harold Macmillan.

Lawrence After Arabia runs from Thursday, April 28 to Saturday, June 4. Wild runs from June 10 to July 16.

Follow Going Out on Facebook and on Twitter @ESgoingout

Create a FREE account to continue reading

eros

Registration is a free and easy way to support our journalism.

Join our community where you can: comment on stories; sign up to newsletters; enter competitions and access content on our app.

Your email address

Must be at least 6 characters, include an upper and lower case character and a number

You must be at least 18 years old to create an account

* Required fields

Already have an account? SIGN IN

By clicking Create Account you confirm that your data has been entered correctly and you have read and agree to our Terms of use , Cookie policy and Privacy policy .

This site is protected by reCAPTCHA and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.

Thank you for registering

Please refresh the page or navigate to another page on the site to be automatically logged in

MORE ABOUT