About the Play:

Racing Demon was one of Royal National Theatre of Britain's top 100 plays of the 20th century.

Winner of four awards for best play: the Olivier Award, the London Critics Circle Award, the Play & Players Critics Award, and the Time Out Award.

Racing Demon is a full-length drama by David Hare. An older, spiritually doubting member of the Church of England's clergy competes with a brash young evangelical for the souls of the people in a working-class neighbourhood in South London.

Racing Demon reveals the struggle of four clergymen who are attempting to make sense of their mission. In this drama, the Church is attracting unwanted publicity, racked by dissension on matters of doctrine and practise, and at odds with the government. Four clergymen seek to make sense of their mission to minister to an economically and racially mixed parish in inner-city London whilst facing their own personal crises. There's Lionel Espy, a cleric whose faith is wavering as his parishioners dwindle; tabloid-hounded gay vicar Harry Henderson; 'Streaky' Bacon, a genial reverend with a taste for tequila, and a charismatic young curate, Tony Ferris whose arrival is set to fan the flames, whilst his sexual relationship with his lover turns to ash. The day of judgment is at hand for all. The first play in his trilogy dealing with British social institutions in the aftermath of Thatcherism; Murmuring Judges and The Absence of War completed the trilogy.

Racing Demon was first presented at the Royal National Theatre in London and at Lincoln Center in New York.

Cast: 3 female, 8 male

What people say:

"As rivetting as a boxing match." — New York Magazine

"A crackling jolt of dramatic indignation and moral complexity from one of the most persuasive playwrights of conscience in the English speaking world." — New York Newsday

"Provocative. You can sink your teeth into the ideas." — New York Times

"Bracingly intelligent and highly entertaining." — Guardian (London)

"Brilliant and funny." — Observer (London)

"David Hare shows he can do more than write an intelligent and noble play; he can shake a soul ." — Time Magazine

About the Playwright:

Sir David Hare is one of Britain's most internationally performed playwrights. He was born in Sussex in 1947. A writer of social themes, David Hare has been Associate Director of the National Theatre in London since 1984. He was knighted in 1998 and is a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature.