The Lodger (NHB Modern Plays)

Sisters Dolly and Esther grow up in ultra-conservative Harrogate in the 1960s. Fifty years later, following the death of their mother, Dolly comes to stay with Esther – now a successful novelist and living in Little Venice with her younger, inscrutable lodger, Jude.

The three go to Norway to meet the rock-star grandfather Jude has only ever heard about. Instead, he meets Anila who changes his world. To make a new future, these four people will have to be honest, heal old wounds – and two sisters learn to laugh together again.

The Lodger by Robert Holman is an enlightening, cathartic and acerbic play about identity, maturity and reconciliation. It premiered at The Coronet Theatre, London, in September 2021.

'Great riches… A story of sisters and midlife reckonings, [Robert Holman's play] puts two older women centre stage and comes with a seismic sibling betrayal… stuffed full of wise statements about life, love and death' – Guardian

'Robert Holman [is] the most instinctive and humane of British playwrights' – Evening Standard