John Lithgow Brings Giant to Cinemas on November 19
john lithgow’s Giant will begin screening in movie theatres on November 19, 2026, turning a West End live capture into a wider theatrical release. Tickets go on sale July 9, and the screenings will reach the U.S., Canada, the U.K., Australia and other international territories.
For audiences who followed the play onstage, the move extends access beyond the Broadway run now playing at the Music Box Theatre. Lithgow said he is thrilled the production will now reach movie theatres around the world, and Mark Rosenblatt described the cinema version as a way to give the cast’s performances “a new kind of immediacy and intimacy—close-up, at a cinema.”
West End capture, Broadway run
The filmed version comes from Giant’s live performance in London’s West End, not from a separate studio shoot. Lithgow stars as children’s book author Roald Dahl, with Aya Cash as U.S. publisher Jessie Stone, Elliot Levey as Dahl’s Jewish publisher Tom Maschler, Rachael Stirling as Felicity Crosland, Tessa Bonham Jones as Hallie and Richard Hope as Wally.
Lithgow, Cash, Levey and Stirling are reprising their roles in the Broadway production, giving the cinema release a direct link to the current New York staging. That continuity is the draw here: the film is not a detached adaptation, but a record of the same production model now playing on Broadway.
Olivier and Tony momentum
The London run won three 2025 Olivier Awards, including Lead Actor for Lithgow, Best New Play and Supporting Actor for Elliot Levey. Giant is also a 2026 Tony nominee for Best Play, while Lithgow is nominated for Leading Actor, Cash for Featured Actress and Nicholas Hytner for Direction.
That award spread gives the cinema release a built-in sales pitch: the production arrives with major London recognition and fresh Broadway visibility. Brian and Dayna Lee, Stephanie Kramer and Nicole Kramer, Josh Fiedler and Robyn Goodman, plus the Royal Court Theatre are producing the screenings with Trafalgar Releasing, a structure that points to an intentionally broad theatrical rollout rather than a limited specialty run.
July 9 ticket sale
Tickets go on sale July 9, 2026, giving audiences more than four months to decide whether to see the production in theatres or on Broadway. The release also lands after the 2023 changes to Roald Dahl’s books, when hundreds of words were altered or omitted from future printings to remove negative references to race, skin color, ethnicity, gender, disabilities and more.
That backdrop makes Giant more than a prestige stage transfer. The play is arriving to cinema audiences as a live record of a production built around Dahl, and the timing puts the release in front of viewers already aware of the cultural argument surrounding his work.
