Dr Strangelove

Stanley Kubrick’s classic film Dr Strangelove (or How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb) has been adapted for the stage for the first time.

The 1964 apocalyptic comedy, about a rogue US general who triggers a nuclear crisis and puts the world on the verge of catastrophe when he orders an attack on the Soviet Union, has been adapted by Armando Iannucci, the writer and broadcaster known for political satires including the TV series The Thick of It and the film In the Loop.

“In these sad times what better to cheer the nation up than a stage show about the end of the world,” Iannucci quipped on BBC Radio 4’s Today programme on recently.

He added: “We started talking about this adaptation several years ago, but now with the war in Ukraine and the whole nuclear question, it just hasn’t gone away.”

This is the first time Kubrick’s family have allowed his work to be adapted.

His widow, Christiane Kubrick, said: “We have always been reluctant to let anyone adapt any of Stanley’s work, and we never have. It was so important to him that it wasn’t changed from how he finished it. But we could not resist authorising this project: the time is right; the people doing it are fantastic; and Strangelove should be brought to a new and younger audience. I am sure Stanley would have approved it too.”

In case you don’t remember the iconic movie, the plot concerns an unhinged United States Air Force general who orders a pre-emptive nuclear attack on the Soviet Union. It separately follows the President of the United States, his advisors, the Joint Chiefs of Staff, and a Royal Air Force exchange officer as they attempt to prevent the crew of a B-52 (following orders from the general) from bombing the Soviet Union and starting a nuclear war.

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