It is a blisteringly hot Wednesday in London, and Hayley Atwell has just climbed onto Tom Hiddleston’s shoulders. “Perfect!” shouts Vogue’s photographer. Hiddleston grabs Atwell’s knees as she whips off her vintage Comme des Garçons hat. There’s a feeling of celebration in the air, thanks to the pair’s decades-long friendship and their roles in Jamie Lloyd’s revival of Much Ado About Nothing—a confetti-strewn ode to romance. The crates of scented rose petals littering the studio help too.
It’s been more than four decades since Shakespeare’s comedy of errors graced a major New York stage, and Lloyd’s revival arrives at Winter Garden Theatre this autumn from a sellout run in London. “I’m so proud of this show,” Hiddleston tells me. “Am I allowed to say that? It’s one of my favorite things I’ve ever done.” Atwell nods next to him.
Hiddleston and Atwell first met at an audition for the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art in London in the early 2000s—Atwell still recalls the “very tall man with a fabulous crop of curly hair” whom she first spotted at auditions. Years later, they signed with the same agent and found themselves cheering each other on from the sidelines. “There’s something lovely about the fact that we’ve known each other before…anything, really,” Hiddleston muses. “That history is so very comforting.”
Between them, Atwell and Hiddleston have tackled Chekhov, Arthur Miller, and Jacobean tragedy, including plenty of Shakespeare. Hiddleston has also become one of the most bankable stars of his generation, starring in televisual noirs like The Night Manager and as the mischievous Norse god Loki in the Marvel Cinematic Universe. Atwell, too, has participated in the Marvel ecosystem (as Agent Peggy Carter) and nimbly drop-kicked her way into the Mission: Impossible franchise. But Much Ado was the first time the pair had ever acted next to each other. “It feels quite significant that we come together with these two extraordinary characters,” Atwell says.
The kind of resilience they built over their varied careers will help them in this energetic rave-inspired revival, with choreography from the Olivier Award–winning movement director Fabian Aloise, who worked with Lloyd on his 2023 revival of Sunset Boulevard. Atwell displays a balletic athleticism while Hiddleston is all enthusiastic limbs and snake hips. Was the dancing a challenge? Atwell, who has a wicked sense of humor—later she shows me her immaculate Loewe handbag and whispers conspiratorially that she once threw up in it while she was eight months pregnant—points to her costar. “Have you seen this man? Dancing is his first language.”
The soundtrack is centered around nostalgic club anthems, some belted live by Mason Alexander Park (The Sandman), who took over from Cole Escola in the West End transfer of Oh, Mary!. (If you’ve ever wanted to watch Loki hip-thrust to David Guetta’s “When Love Takes Over,” here’s your chance.) Avalanches of pink confetti litter the stage. The impression is of a raucous house party—one in which secrets are spilled, kisses are stolen, and everyone drinks far too much. A giant heart hangs from the rafters, all but throbbing with the promise of romance fulfilled.
“The act of making the production,” Lloyd says, “was very much inspired by the euphoria I was feeling of falling in love.” The heavily tattooed 45-year-old director is referring to his relationship with the actor and dancer Brandon LaVar, whom he met while staging Sunset Boulevard. “I was on cloud nine and just absolutely wanting to celebrate love, joy, and the feeling of finding an amazing person.”
The production is classic Lloyd: minimal set, music blasting, and modern costumes (hot pants, knee-high socks, and a babydoll wedding dress that channels Simone Rocha). But it is also more extravagantly big-hearted than some of Lloyd’s more austere work. The British playwright Martin Crimp, whom Lloyd worked with on his 2019 adaptation of Cyrano de Bergerac, once told him that “you see what’s going on in the director’s mind onstage.” For Lloyd, that has resulted in a show that captures the heady rush of falling head over heels.
A brief primer for those who skipped Much Ado in school: The play follows the will-they-won’t-they travails of Benedick (Hiddleston) and Beatrice (Atwell), a pair who claim to be better off alone but can’t resist each other’s pull. “You’ve got Beatrice weaponizing wit as a way to protect herself from heartbreak,” Atwell explains. Meanwhile, Hiddleston plays Benedick as the charismatic class clown—waging a “merry war” of words with Beatrice. “Their wit is an intellectual defense,” Hiddleston says. “It’s only when they are brave enough to set down those defenses that they discover their capacity to love.” All’s well that ends well by the time the actors leave the stage. In Lloyd’s production, the action climaxes with Benedick and Beatrice in an encounter that nods to Dirty Dancing. “And he never dropped me once!” Atwell says.
“I think they are two of our greatest actors, full stop,” Lloyd says. “The first time I ever saw Tom was as Cassio at the Donmar in Othello with Chiwetel Ejiofor and Ewan McGregor, and I was just blown away.” Hiddleston had been lobbying the director to take on the play and was walking his dog in the pouring rain when he received the call from Lloyd: “It’s time for Much Ado.” As for Atwell, whom Lloyd worked with twice before: “She’s sort of like the next Judi Dench.”
The London rehearsals began on New Year’s Eve. By the first week, Atwell had turned to her costar and said: “Do you remember when we were just babies and we had no idea if we would get into drama school, if we’d be able to make a living?” Today, she smiles: “Now we’re both parents, and we finally get to work together as adults…. There’s a sweetness to that.”
Ah yes—in addition to memorizing lines and choreography, Hiddleston and Atwell were both reckoning with sleep deprivation and toddler tantrums. Atwell had given birth to her daughter just five months prior to the start of rehearsals and credits Lloyd and her partner, the music producer Ned Wolfgang Kelly, for making it possible for her to return to the stage. “I had a very supportive husband who had taken off time from his own career to be at home,” she explains. And Lloyd had already considered what she might need: a nursing room, a car for her husband and child, and rehearsal hours between 11 and 4. “This should be how every theater company approaches working caregivers,” Atwell says firmly.
Both stars will decamp to New York for the Broadway run. It marks Atwell’s debut on the Great White Way and a return for Hiddleston. His first time on Broadway, back in 2019, was for Lloyd’s production of Harold Pinter’s Betrayal, where he grew close to his current partner, and Betrayal costar, Zawe Ashton. The couple now have two children together. “My life after Betrayal has never been the same,” he declares. Then he softens and adds of parenthood: “It’s the most profound joy. There is nothing in life that comes close.” Even with the lack of sleep? “I’m very good at taking a cat nap,” he says. “I’ve become world-class at sleeping on the floor—no pillow, just down, 20 minutes.” The cast also kept their energy up by playing pranks: Atwell led her costars in a quest to make Hiddleston crack onstage. “We set out an entire three-course meal, pretending to drink Champagne and dig into a steak,” she recalls with a laugh. “We dressed up as Loki and pretended to be hysterical Loki fans…. The one that really got him, though, is when three of us just stood there completely dead serious and ate a banana.”
Earlier on set, the pair were busy tossing rose petals into the air for the camera. “As soon as we were face-to-face in those outfits and there was music playing, it was like, Oh yes, this is what we do,” Hiddleston says with a smile after the shoot. Of course, you don’t have to be romantically entwined to have affection and tenderness in your life—although, as Much Ado suggests, it surely helps. “There’s magic in that play,” Hiddleston promises. “It’s a balm for loneliness and solitude—it’s all about burying grievances and holding on to the good stuff…. Love, if you’re open to it, will transform your life.”
In this story: hair, Neil Moodie; makeup, Zoe Taylor; grooming, Amanda Grossman.
Produced by Artistry Global. Set design: Tilly Power. Visuals Editor: Paige Viti.