Actor Mark Strong is returning to the stage after 12 years in film — and admits wondering if anyone will remember that is where he started.
The star of Zero Dark Thirty and Kick-Ass will appear with Nicola Walker, from TV’s Last Tango In Halifax, in Arthur Miller’s A View From The Bridge at the Young Vic this summer.
His last play was the double bill of Uncle Vanya and Twelfth Night, as part of Sam Mendes’s farewell season at the Donmar.
Speaking as he finishes a spy spoof movie, The Secret Service, with Colin Firth and Michael Caine, Strong said he was very excited to be returning to theatre. The 50-year-old said it was Arthur Miller’s brilliant play that lured him back, adding: “I never intended to be away so long.”
He forged his career with the Royal Shakespeare Company and the National Theatre before award-winning 1996 series Our Friends In The North led to film offers, including the recent Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy and forthcoming Before I Go To Sleep with Nicole Kidman.
“It was a new environment for me and I just wanted to see what it was like doing movies,” he said.
But he added: “I miss being able to go into a rehearsal room and think about what you’re saying.”
Strong said the play, in which he takes on the role of tragic hero Eddie Carbone, reminded him of another Miller classic, Death Of A Salesman, in which he appeared with Alun Armstrong at the National in 1996.
The pair enjoyed a week of rehearsals with Miller himself, who allowed them to video record his advice.
“Somewhere up in the attic I’ve got the footage. Maybe now is a good time to get it down,” Strong said.
The Young Vic show is directed by Belgian Ivo van Hove in his first London production. But Strong has one more film first — Ad Inexplorata, about a mission to Mars.
A View From The Bridge runs April 4 to June 7.
