Simon Stone turned his theatre-directing method on a real life for the first time in Elsinore, which opened the BFI London Film Festival's seventieth edition at the Royal Festival Hall.
Simon Stone’s Elsinore opened the seventieth BFI London Film Festival at the Royal Festival Hall on the South Bank on Wednesday 7 October 2026. Andrew Scott and Olivia Colman lead the cast of the film, which had its European premiere that night.
Stone was born in Basel in 1984 and grew up in Australia. He made his name in the theatre by rewriting canonical plays, and founded the Hayloft Project in his twenties.
His Yerma at the Young Vic in 2016, with Billie Piper in the title role, ran twice in London before transferring to the Park Avenue Armory in New York.
Elsinore follows the actor Ian Charleson as he prepares to play Hamlet at the National Theatre while facing considerable personal odds. It is the first time Stone has turned his method on a real life. Stephen Beresford wrote the film.
Receptions were held either side of the screening, and the film repeated in the same hall on Friday 9 October.
Billie Piper, Johnny Flynn, Juliet Stevenson and Peter Mullan complete the cast. Piper’s casting links the film to the stage work that made Stone’s name.