Harry Potter and Slow Horses star Gary Oldman to perform on stage in Yorkshire

Gary Oldman will return to York Theatre Royal in Samuel Beckett’s Krapp’s Last Tape from April 14 to May 17 2025. 

The 66-year-old is an actor and filmmaker best known for his roles as Sirius Black in the Harry Potter film series and James Gordon in The Dark Knight trilogy.

With a career spanning more than 30 years and multiple awards including a BAFTA, Oldman is one of the highest grossing actors in film history.

One of his first stage roles after leaving drama school was starring in Ben Travers's Thark at York Theatre Royal in 1979. He worked in the theatre for several years, from 1985 through 1989 working extensively at the Royal Court Theatre. 

In 1995 he co-founded a production company and produced the highly acclaimed Nil by Mouth which won nine major awards.

It was selected to open the main competition for the 1997 50th Anniversary of the Cannes Film Festival. The same year Oldman won the prestigious Channel Four Director’s Prize at the Edinburgh Film Festival in addition to winning the British Academy Award for Best Film and the BAFTA for Best Original Screenplay.

Currently Oldman appears in the acclaimed Apple TV+ series Slow Horses for which he has been nominated for a BAFTA, the SAG Award and a Golden Globe.

York Theatre Royal CEO Paul Crewes said: “When Gary visited us at the beginning of the year it was fascinating hearing him recount stories of his time as a young man in his first professional role on the York Theatre Royal stage.

“In that context when we started to explore ideas, we realised Krapp’s Last Tape was the perfect project. I am very happy that audiences will have this unique opportunity to see Gary Oldman return to our stage in this brand-new production.”

Krapp’s Last Tape is a one-act play written by Nobel Prize winning Samuel Beckett about a man who records a new tape each year on his birthday reflecting on the year gone by.

On his 69th birthday he is now a lonely man ready with a bottle of wine, a banana and his tape recorder. Listening back to a recording he made as a young man, Krapp must face the hopes of his past self. 

Krapp’s Last Tape completes York Theatre Royal’s Spring Season joining the previously announced co-production with Wise Children of North by Northwest.

Tickets start at £25 and priority booking for the YTR Director’s Circle opens on November 6. YTR Members priority booking opens on November 11 and public booking opens on November 16.