The playwright was due to travel to Stockholm to receive the world’s most prestigious literary award, but publisher Stephen Page will make the journey instead. The dramatist, who has been recovering from cancer of the oesophagus, will however still deliver his planned lecture to the Swedish Academy on Dec. 7 which is due to be broadcast live to British television audiences.

Pinter is the first British playwright to win the Nobel Prize, worth $1.3 million. In recognition of both the award and his 75th birthday, a starry cast of leading British actors is to perform a reading Pinter’s Celebration.

The event will be presented by The Gate Theatre Dublin at London’s Albery Theatre for three nights only from Dec. 1 to 3.

Directed by Alan Stanford, the cast includes Sinead Cusack, Janie Dee, Michael Gambon, Jeremy Irons, Stephen Rea, Charles Dance and Penelope Wilton.

For the reading of Celebration Gambon and Graham will take on the roles of the hard men and brothers Lambert and Matt who are married to two sisters, Julie and Prue, played by Wilton and Cusack respectively.

Set in a posh London restaurant, the play’s title refers to Lambert’s and Julie’s anniversary. Though often hilarious, the piece has moments of unease when, typically for Pinter, violence simmers under the surface.

Celebration received its world premier at the Almeida in 2000 when it was directed by the author and presented along with the dramatist’s first play The Room, written 43 years earlier.