Tom and Viv
Opened: September 2006
Almeida Theatre
Co-produced
‘A magnificent piece of theatre’
The Sunday Times
Written by Michael Hastings.
Tom and Viv centres on the troubled marriage of American poet TS Eliot to the wealthy English socialite Vivian Haigh-Wood. It was to be a haunted union that began in haste and ended in Viv being institutionalised. By turns funny, moving and harrowing, the play is also an exploration of the primitive treatment of mental illness, the condition of the Edwardian upper classes and the nature of shared poetic inspiration.