David Hare has recorded a performance of his 2020 solo play Beat the Devil, which will be released as an Audible Original October 24. Audible founder Don Katz is executive producing. Go into the recording studio and behind the scenes in the video above.
The work is inspired by Hare's own experience contracting COVID-19 in the early days of the pandemic, when we lacked vaccines, robust treatment options, and even general information. Hare was diagnosed with the disease, in fact, the very day the U.K. government made the first of two interventions that would lead to a conspicuously late lockdown.
The play made its world premiere at London's Bridge Theatre in August 2020, part of the first slate of live, socially distanced indoor theatre offerings following the COVID-19 shutdown in the U.K. Ralph Fiennes starred as Hare, a performance he reprised for a 2021 screen version. Hare previously performed the solo play live in a two-night engagement at Off-Broadway's Public Theater in 2023.
"In early 2020, there was no prediction of what one day might look like, and how it might differ from the next, when experiencing COVID-19," says Hare—the stage and screen writer of such works as Skylight, Straight Line Crazy, The Hours, and more—in a statement. "The best way I knew how to explore this time was to write what became Beat the Devil. When this piece was first performed, it was for a socially distanced audience, and I’m grateful to Audible that this story will now be available to so many more. I hope listeners empathize with the rage and urgency I felt during this harrowing time, and find catharsis in the ultimate recovery.”
“David Hare created an artful, historically profound monologue that provides a necessary revisit of the societal impact of the COVID-19 pandemic," adds Katz. "As one of the world’s greatest living playwrights, David brings humor and humanity to a time of tragedy and within the intimate format of an Audible Original, listeners can peer deeply into the human condition. I believe David’s story could heal the broad disassociation left by the COVID-19 pandemic, especially now when we are still feeling the societal effects of that time.”
The release will be Audible's latest in a growing library of theatrical titles. Recent releases include The Sign in Sidney Brustein's Window, featuring the cast of the Broadway revival; Colman Domingo's Wild With Happy; Laura Benanti: Nobody Cares; Yellow Face starring Daniel Dae Kim and Ashley Park; Pulitzer winner Fat Ham; and Summer, 1976.
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