Tony Award nominated actress Jennifer Westfeldt will star alongside Tracy-Ann Oberman in the European premiere of Richard Greenberg’s The Assembled Parties this October. Directed by Blanche McIntyre the production plays the Main Stage at Hampstead Theatre from 17 October to 22 November 2025 with a press night on Thursday 23 October.

Jennifer Westfeldt is an award-winning actor, writer and director best known for her starring role in the hit film Kissing Jessica Stein, which she also co-wrote. On Broadway, she received a Tony Award nomination for her performance in Wonderful Town, and has appeared in numerous celebrated Off-Broadway productions. She also wrote, directed and starred in the rom-com Friends With Kids (alongside co-stars Kirsten Wiig, Maya Rudolph, Jon Hamm and Chris O’Dowd). Her other credits include Grey’s Anatomy, 24 and Ira & Abby. The Assembled Parties is her London theatre debut.

Talking about the play, Jennifer Westfeldt said: “I can’t possibly express how honoured I feel to be playing ‘Julie' in Richard Greenberg’s brilliant, beautiful play, The Assembled Parties. To have the opportunity to dig into a character with as much light and ebullience and wit and compassion and deep, visceral humanity as she has... is a precious gift.

“Richard Greenberg’s gorgeous play — and indeed, his entire body of work — is filled with sparkling wit, a symphony of glorious words and rhythms, and an uncanny depth of feeling that somehow never becomes maudlin.

“He had an utterly original, singularly brilliant voice, yet somehow he simultaneously conjured the greatest playwrights of the modern era: he had the wit of Noël Coward, the verbal dexterity of Shaw, the poetry of Tennessee Williams, and the bittersweet pathos and searing humanity of Chekhov.

“Working on this play feels like an absolute dream come true for me. And to be a small part of bringing this play to London for the first time feels like a double blessing.”

Jennifer joins the previously announced Tracy-Ann Oberman. Known to millions as the formidable Chrissie Watts in Eastenders and for Friday Night Dinner, Toast of London and It’s A Sin. Tracy-Ann’s most recent theatre includes playing Shylock in the critically acclaimed The Merchant of Venice 1936 (RSC / West End).

Also joining the cast are Daniel Abelson (In Praise of Love, Orange Tree Theatre; Machinal, Old Vic), Julia Kass (Harry Potter and the Cursed Child, West End), David Kennedy (Days of Significance, RSC), Alexander Marks (who is making his professional stage debut) and Sam Marks (The Fever Syndrome, Hampstead Theatre). Young actors Rex Bamber and Maxwell Rich share the role of young Timmy.

Director, Blanche McIntyre said:

“I am thrilled to be able to direct this exquisite, sparkling, profound masterpiece by one of America’s most brilliant and insightful playwrights. At a time when the world feels increasingly unstable, it is a pleasure to work on a piece that speaks so tenderly about the bonds of family and the passing of time, and beyond exciting to have our dazzling, internationally renowned cast bringing it to life. I look forward enormously to presenting its European premiere.”

Richard Greenberg’s virtuosic comedy-drama was such a sensation when it played on Broadway in 2013 that it had to be extended three times. The award-winning playwright died earlier this year leaving a canon of work that includes Take Me Out, Three Days of Rain and The Dazzle.

The Assembled Parties is a sharply observed portrait about an extended New York Jewish family. Former movie star Julie Bascov insists on taking Christmas seriously - despite her family’s reminders that that they are in fact Jewish. Every year, she and her impossibly well-heeled husband Ben host a feast in their palatial apartment on Central Park West. In December 1980, their son and his best friend Jeff come down from Harvard to join the party, and Jeff is dazzled by the Bascov clan. But when he returns for the same occasion twenty years later he finds that much that was sown in 1980 has been reaped in the intervening years…

Blanche McIntyre is an award-winning director. She has directed at major venues including the RSC, Shakespeare’s Globe and National Theatre with recent credits including The Invention of Love (Hampstead Theatre) and The Merry Wives of Windsor (RSC).

The creative team also includes designer James Cotteril, lighting designer Malcolm Rippeth, sound designer John Leonard and casting director Anna Cooper.

 

The Assembled Parties plays on the Main Stage from 17 October to 22 November.

BOOK THE ASSEMBLED PARTIES HERE