Orange is the New Black star Uzo Aduba, Downton Abbey’s Laura Carmichael, and Fresh Meat’s Zawe Ashton cast.

Earlier this year former Artistic Director of the Sydney Theatre Company, Andrew Upton, was the toast of London, when his production of Samuel Beckett’s Waiting for Godot, starring Hugo Weaving and Richard Roxburgh, received a rapturous reception during its brief season at the Barbican. It’s a success that Upton will be hoping to replicate when his gritty 2013 adaptation of Jean Genet’s The Maids receives its London premiere by the Jamie Lloyd Company in February at the Trafalgar Studios.

The world premiere of Upton’s contemporary take on Jean Genet’s dark, psychological thriller, directed then by Benedict Andrews, was delivered by Sydney Theatre Company with Cate Blanchett and Isabelle Huppert as Claire and Solange, two homicidal housemaids plotting their revenge on their cruel and snobbish Mistress, portrayed by Elizabeth Debicki. The London production is set to be even more star studded, as double Emmy Award-winning actress Uzo Aduba, who fans of the hit Netflix series Orange is the New Black will recognise as the sweetly psychotic Suzanne ‘Crazy Eyes’ Warren, makes her London stage debut starring opposite Laura Carmichael, best known for playing Lady Edith in the globally successful early 20th-century period drama Downton Abbey. Completing the trio is actress and playwright Zawe Ashton, who as well as appearing on television comedies Fresh Meat and Not Safe for Work, is also a familiar fixture on the London theatre scene, most recently appearing in the Donmar Warehouse’s all-star production of Abi Morgan’s Splendour.

In an interview with the Official London Theatre website, Aduba spoke of her excitement to be appearing for the first time on a West End stage. “I wanted to be a part of The Jamie Lloyd Company because they’re interested in doing exciting work that is new, with a twist to it. It’s work with a fresh edge,” she said. “Jamie reinvents classic plays in a way that we’ve never seen before or have explored before. That’s exciting as an actor. To be part of a play that allows for three women to mine such complex characters inside of an already rich and thrilling story, is the stuff that acting dreams are made on.”