Accidental Death of an Anarchist

Accidental Death of an Anarchist guarantees you a hilarious night out.

Dario Fo and Franca Rame wrote this dazzlingly funny and biting satire on police corruption in response to the 1969 death of an Italian railway worker who was falsely accused of a series of railway-station bombings and mysteriously “fell” out of a fourth-floor window at police HQ in Milan.

Today, its theme is no less relevant than when it premiered in 1970. It’s been translated into dozens of languages and performed in over 41 countries. This adaptation, by Tom Basden, is set in a present-day London police station.

This year is the 100th anniversary of Fo’s birth. He and his wife Franca Rame were both actors, comedians and writers, and gained an international reputation for their courageously subversive and furiously funny scripts. When he was awarded the 1997 Nobel Prize in Literature, the Swedish Academy praised him as a writer "who emulates the jesters of the Middle Ages in scourging authority and upholding the dignity of the downtrodden".

Tom Basden is also an actor, comedian and writer, best known for his film and TV work, but with a few very well-received plays to his name as well.

His modern-day adaptation of Accidental Death of an Anarchist is a not-to-be-missed slapstick comedy with a serious message.

This is a community theatre production by arrangement with Nick Hern Books and The Play Bureau.