Set an alert for when Kyoto tickets go on sale to see this timely, four-star (The Guardian) drama, hot off its West End debut where it was nominated for an Olivier Award for Best New Play. A critical look at how Big Oil keeps its power, Kyoto plays off Broadway at the Mitzi E. Newhouse Theater at Lincoln Center Theater, this fall, for a limited run only.
Experience Kyoto in New York and see this powerful American premiere by Good Chance Theatre Artistic Directors Joe Murphy and Joe Robertson, the acclaimed creators behind The Jungle. The play dramatizes how Big Oil, having learned about the risk of climate change, use legal tricks and misinformation through their representative Don Pearlman in an attempt to protect their profits. Tony Award winner and Oscar nominee Stephen Daldry (The Inheritance, Billy Elliot, The Hours) and Justin Martin direct the darkly comic Kyoto off Broadway.
October 8th, 2025
By: Joe Murphy and Joe Robertson
Director: Stephen Daldry and Justin Martin
Producer: Lincoln Center Theater, by arrangement with Royal Shakespeare Company, Good Chance Theatre, Rachel Styne, and Jessica Foung
Cast list: Stephen Kunken (as Don Pearlman), Jorge Bosch (as Raul Estrada-Oyuela), Peter Bradbury (as Fred Singer), Kate Burton (as USA), Feodor Chin (as China), Erin Darke (as Germany), Natalie Gold (as Shirley), Daniel Jenkins (as Gore/Bolin/Santer/Observer), Dariush Kashani (as Saudi Arabia), Rob Narita (as Japan), Imani Jade Powers (as Secretariat), Ferdy Roberts (as U.K./Prescott/Houghton), Roslyn Ruff (as Tanzania), Taiana Tully (as Kiribati)
Sets: Miriam Buether
Costumes: Natalie Pryce
Lighting: Aideen Malone
Sound: Christopher Reid
Other info: Video design by Akhila Krishnan, original music by Paul Englishby, dramaturgy by Gemma Stockwood
Wheelchair access, induction hearing loops, headsets
Kyoto is a searing story that imagines a crucial moment in Big Oil history: the meeting when all nations tried to set aside their differences for the sake of the earth. How successful were they, and what power does Big Oil still hold as climate activism continues to rise and cope with political oppression?
Tony nominee Stephen Kunken (Enron) stars as oil industry lobbyist Donald Perlman in this sharp drama that is so prescient and dark it is often ridiculously hilarious.
The play sees nation leaders arguing over word choice in bills that would alter how customers access, and have a positive or negative relationship to, oil. It gets very granular, and that's where the comedy — and arguments — lie. In a four-star review, The Guardian wrote "Kyoto could have a sequel, which I would happily see. But this play about the diplomatic consequences of commas deserves a string of exclamation marks."
-Star Stephen Kunken is known for the roles of Ari Spyros on Billions and Commander Putnam on The Handmaid's Tale. -WhatsOnStage in London said the play is "sheer theatrical magic." -Stephen Daldry and Justin Martin reunite after directing another theatre smash, Stranger Things: The First Shadow. -The play is based on true events: the first international treaty on tackling climate change.
Kyoto is a topical new play about how Big Oil protected itself from profit loss as climate activism was on the rise.
Kyoto is at New York's Lincoln Center Theater - Mitzi E. Newhouse Theater, which is located at 150 West 65th Street, New York, 10023.
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