Young Vic announces London premiere of documentary play The Pelicot Trial

The Young Vic has announced a one-off UK premiere of The Pelicot Trial at London County Hall on 30 November 2026. The documentary theatre work by Milo Rau and Servane Dècle draws on records from the French criminal case involving Gisèle Pelicot. For London audiences, the announced performance will bring material from a trial that attracted international attention to the stage.

The performance is listed for The Chamber at County Hall, on London’s South Bank, rather than the Young Vic’s own theatre. The company says 30 actors and public figures will take part. Its announcement describes the planned group but does not name individual performers, so the final casting has yet to be established by the information released.

What the production will use

According to the Young Vic’s season announcement, the work comprises testimony and written accounts from the trial, police files, social commentary and psychiatric reports concerning the 51 men prosecuted in Pelicot’s case. Those are the materials the theatre says underpin the production; the announcement does not provide a scene-by-scene account of what the London audience will see.

The theatre presents the piece as documentary theatre and frames it as a statement about sexual violence and its treatment by the legal system. That description sets out the producers’ intention. The London performance is still scheduled for the future, and its reception cannot be known from the announcement.

The BBC reports that the London presentation is planned as a four-hour performance. The Young Vic announcement confirms the date and venue in the available text, but gives no running time there. It calls the event a UK premiere and describes it as one-off, making 30 November the only London performance identified in the announcement.

The case behind the work

Gisèle Pelicot waived her right to anonymity as a survivor of sexual abuse during the French proceedings. The BBC reports that her former husband, Dominique Pelicot, was sentenced to 20 years in prison for drugging and raping her and allowing other men to rape her while she was unconscious. The abuse lasted nearly a decade, according to the BBC’s account.

The BBC says 50 men were found guilty of rape or sexual offences after a trial lasting three and a half months. The Young Vic’s reference to psychiatric reports concerning 51 men describes the group prosecuted in the case; it is a different figure from the BBC’s count of men found guilty. The production’s announced source material includes records generated during those proceedings.

Pelicot’s decision to be identified publicly was part of how the case became known beyond the courtroom. The BBC reports that she said shame should fall on her abusers rather than on her. The theatre says its work pays tribute to her, while its choice of testimony, files and commentary places the court record at the centre of the performance.

From Avignon to London

The London date follows an earlier staging in Avignon, France. Reporting on that performance in July 2025, Le Monde’s Fabienne Darge said it lasted four hours and condensed four months of trial proceedings. That account describes the Avignon version; it does not establish that every element or the running time will be identical at County Hall.

Le Monde reported that Rau and dramaturge Dècle worked with journalists’ notes and with lawyers, researchers, members of feminist advocacy groups and Avignon residents who had attended the trial. Its account said the staging combined moments from the proceedings with commentary on rape culture and patriarchy. The Young Vic’s London announcement identifies its own planned source materials but does not specify how that earlier structure will be carried over.

The Young Vic says general booking for The Pelicot Trial is scheduled to open at 11:00 on 7 October 2026. That is a planned opening time, not confirmation that tickets are currently on sale. The announced venue, date and participating group establish the intended London event; individual casting and the performance itself remain ahead.