Olivia Wilde in 1984 Actress stars in Broadway adaptation of 1984 and au...

Olivia Wilde in 1984 Actress stars in Broadway adaptation of 1984 and audiences are struggling



OLIVIA Wilde has a new acting role — and not everyone is loving it.

The 33-year-old actor, who is married to fellow actor Jason Sudeikis, is starring in the stage adaptation of George Orwell’s hit novel 1984 on Broadway and the play seems to have taken things to a jarring new level.

According to The Hollywood Reporter, when the show previewed in London numerous audience members fainted, vomited and screamed at the actors from their seats.

The police were even called to one show after audience members were so riled up they got into a heated argument. Charges were laid.



And the show isn’t just taxing on the audience.

Speaking to the US version of The Today Show, Wilde revealed the role has been her most extreme to date. The preview shows alone gave her a broken tailbone, split lip and fractured rib. Her co-star Tom Sturridge broke his nose.

“We’re doing everything necessary to tell the story right, and it’s an intense story,” she said.

“We’re throwing ourselves into it, and it’s worth it,” she added.

The show is full of special effects including strobe lights and jackhammer sounds and also features torture scenes in the book’s notorious Room 101.



Actor Reed Birney, who plays a torturer in 1984, told THR he has yelled back at audience members who have stood up out of the seats to try and plead with him to stop the torture.

Sturridge, whose character bleeds profusely while being electrocuted, told the publication he makes sure he stares into the eyes of an audience member while he is being tortured.

Children under 13 have also been banned from watching the show after Sturridge and Birney spotted a seven-year-old in the audience.

“Tom and Reed were aware of what they were about to do, and they weren’t in a position to stop the play, and they were quite distressed by it,” the show’s director Duncan Macmillan said.

Orwell’s dystopian book Nineteen Eighty-Four hit bookshelves in 1949 and became a bestseller again in 2017 after the 2016 US election.

The stage adaptation of 1984 will play in New York’s Hudson Theatre for a limited engagement until October 8.