Mark Rylance Leads World Premiere of Tartuffe (Remixed) at Marylebone Theatre
Rehearsal images released on 13 August 2026 offer the first glimpse of Mark Rylance back onstage at the Marylebone Theatre, leading the world premiere of Tartuffe (Remixed) — a new adaptation of Molière's 1664 comedy that relocates the story into a contemporary Nigerian-Jamaican family. Rylance, an Oscar, Tony and Olivier Award winner, plays Pastor Terrance Blake, the production's counterpart to Molière's original conman (WhatsOnStage; Playbill).
The play is adapted and directed by Darren Raymond, whose version reimagines Tartuffe through the Afolabi-Williams family as they gather for a wedding celebration. The text combines spoken word, music and rhyming verse — a departure from the neoclassical alexandrines of the original French. Raymond's approach keeps the bones of Molière's plot, in which a charismatic outsider inveigles his way into a household, but reframes it through the rhythms and preoccupations of a modern diaspora family.
The seven-week limited season runs from 4 September to 24 October 2026 at the Marylebone Theatre, a relatively new venue in the shadow of Baker Street. Rylance returns to the house after a previous engagement there.
The company around Rylance is largely drawn from theatre, spoken-word and music backgrounds. Blanche Williams plays Grandma, with Sara Mokonen as Adanna, Christopher Mbaki as D-Miz, Morenike Onajobi as Kemi, Ivandro Da Cruz Leite as Sinclair, Nakeba Buchanan as Elmire, Craig Blake as Delroy and Usifu Jalloh as Oga.
What makes this production unusual is the scale of its producing coalition. Tartuffe (Remixed) is presented by Marylebone Theatre, Patrick Myles and David Luff, and Shakespeare Road in partnership with Intermission — a youth-led arts organisation. The co-producer list runs further: Alexander "Sandy" Marshall, Anthology Theatre, Glass Half Full, Rupert Gavin and Mallory Factor, Tulchin Bartner Productions and Wild Yak. That many names on a single production is a sign of how the capital was assembled; in commercial theatre, multiple backers sharing risk on a new play is common, and the breadth here suggests a production brought together across several networks rather than from a single producer's slate.
For audiences, the draw is straightforward: Rylance, whose stage appearances are infrequent enough to count as events in themselves, working on a brand-new text in an intimate house. The seven-week window means the run is short by design. Tickets are on sale through the Marylebone Theatre website.
