The Traitors Stage Adaptation to Offer Five Different Outcomes

In keeping with the atmosphere of secrecy and suspicion that has defined the hit gameshow, the stage adaptation of The Traitors will give audiences a different version of the story depending on the performance they attend.

The Traitors: Acts of Betrayal will be staged as a five-play cycle, allowing weekend audiences to see different dramatisations of the BBC series. On Saturdays, theatregoers will also take part in deciding which of the five versions is performed.

The production is being developed by Studio Lambert, the company behind the television series, and Neal Street Productions, the production company co-founded by Sam Mendes.

Stephen Lambert, head of Studio Lambert, said the stage version would capture the feel of the BBC show, which has become one of British television’s biggest recent successes. The finale of the celebrity edition attracted an overnight average audience of more than 11 million viewers.

Lambert said the programme already had a theatrical quality, pointing to its cloaks, fires, banishments and murders as elements that naturally suggested a stage adaptation.

He had originally considered a version set inside a fictionalised production of the show, told from the perspective of the crew behind it. That approach was later abandoned in favour of a more ambitious interpretation of the series, which launched in 2022 and has proved especially popular with younger viewers. Among 16- to 24-year-olds watching linear television on the night of the celebrity finale, 81% tuned in to see the outcome.

The idea for the rotating structure came from the play’s writer, John Finnemore, who proposed five separate versions of the story. In each one, different characters are banished, murdered or ultimately emerge as the winner.

Each performance will stand alone, but anyone who attends more than one will encounter a different path through the story. Finnemore said he was partly inspired after watching the second series and wishing fan favourite Aubrey Emerson, who became the first murdered Faithful, had survived longer.

He said the format allows characters who may be killed early in one version to become central figures in another, or return in a different role later in the cycle.

Lambert said audiences who see one performance will still have a complete night at the theatre, while those who return for more versions will become increasingly invested in the characters and the world of the play.

The show is scheduled to open on 11 May at the Gillian Lynne Theatre in London.

Director Robert Hastie, deputy artistic director of the National Theatre, said the production would use the same “rules” as the television show, though he gave few further details. He said the creative team had set themselves the challenge of telling a story within the universe of The Traitors.

The franchise remains one of the strongest draws on British television. Richard E Grant, Michael Sheen and Bella Ramsey have been announced as contestants in this year’s The Celebrity Traitors, following the previous celebrity edition won by Alan Carr, which broke viewing records.

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