JEEVES TAKES CHARGE - OLIVIER AWARD-WINNING SHOW RETURNS TO LONDON

SAM HARRISON TO STAR IN A DAZZLING ONE-MAN CELEBRATION OF P.G. WODEHOUSE

 CHARING CROSS THEATRE

THURSDAY 13 AUGUST – WEDNESDAY 16 SEPTEMEBER

TICKETS AVAILABLE – www.charingcrosstheatRE.co.uk

Jeeves takes Charge - images

First seen 45 years ago, the Olivier Award-winning and much-loved Jeeves Takes Charge returns to London for a strictly limited season at Charing Cross Theatre from Thursday 13 August – Wednesday 16 September 2026, with a national press night on Tuesday 18 August, before transferring to Mayflower Studios, Southampton from Tuesday 29 September – Saturday 3 October, ahead of a UK tour in 2027. 

Adapted by James Duke, Edward Duke and Hugh Wooldridge, and starring West End, Chichester and RSC favourite Sam Harrison, this dazzling one-man adaptation of P.G. Wodehouse’s beloved Jeeves and Wooster stories sees Harrison play all twenty-two characters, including the indefatigable Jeeves, the much-loved Bertie Wooster, Florence Craye, Gussie Fink-Nottle, Bingo Little, Uncle Willoughby and Aunt Dahlia, in a bravura tour-de-force performance.

Set in Wodehouse’s gloriously absurd world of country houses, terrifying aunts, engagements gone wrong and gentlemanly panic, Jeeves Takes Charge follows the hapless Bertie Wooster as his brilliantly resourceful valet Jeeves attempts to steer him away from disaster — and matrimony — at every turn.

First premiering in London in 1980, Jeeves Takes Charge became an unexpected theatrical phenomenon, produced at the Fortune Theatre in the West End by Andrew Lloyd Webber, Cameron Mackintosh, Barbara Dickson and Bernard Theobald.  Edward Duke won the Olivier Award for Most Promising Newcomer for his original performance in the production.

Sam Harrison said, “P.G. Wodehouse created one of the great comic worlds, and stepping into it each night is pure joy. The challenge of playing twenty-two wildly different characters is exhilarating, but what audiences really respond to is the warmth, silliness and sheer brilliance of the writing. People leave grinning.”

Director and co-adaptor Hugh Wooldridge said: “Having first directed the Olivier Award-winning Edward Duke in Jeeves Takes Charge in 1980, it is wonderful to find another totally brilliant actor to take on the roles of all of PG Wodehouse’s 22 characters. Sam Harrison is a marvel and brings the house down with his energetic and charismatic portrayals of Jeeves and Bertie Wooster. And all the others…”

Hal Cazalet, step great grandson of P.G. Wodehouse, said, “My step great grandfather, PG Wodehouse, would be thrilled to see his characters brought so vivaciously to life by Sam Harrison in this brilliantly original production by Hugh Wooldridge.”

Sam Harrison theatre credits include The Magician’s Elephant for the Royal Shakespeare Company, Les Misérables at the Sondheim Theatre, Eastward Ho! at Shakespeare’s Globe, Chitty Chitty Bang Bang, Crazy For You at the London Palladium and, in 2014, the musical, By Jeeves, in which he also played Bertie Wooster. 

Widely regarded as one of the greatest comic writers in the English language, P.G. Wodehouse wrote more than seventy novels and over three hundred short stories across an extraordinary literary career spanning seven decades. His Jeeves and Wooster stories still remain among the most beloved comic works ever written.

Jeeves Takes Charge is directed by Hugh Wooldridge, with scenic design by Caite Hevner, lighting design by Tim Mitchell and sound design by Paul Groothuis.