Benchmark, by Bud Shrake and Michael Rudman, and starring long-legged actress and model Jerry Hall, is set in a park in Los Angeles. Two men who knew each other well meet by chance. One of them has just returned from a monastery in Tibet. Or has he? One of them is a successful business man. But why is he operating his office with a laptop and two phones from a park bench. Enter a beautiful young woman who says nothing. Enter 'Sugar' who has been married to both of them. Enter a hit man who looks very like a sandwich salesman. . .

The cast consist of Harry Ditson (Courtney Henderson), Stephen Greif (Scott Ginsburg), Jerry Hall (Sugar Moran), Simon Meacock, Jacqueline Nairn, Tanya McKenzie. It is directed by Michael Rudman and designed by Paul Farnsworth.

Harry Ditson was last seen in the West End in Sunset Boulevard and The Prisoner of Second Avenue. Stephen Greif was last in the West End in Fallen Angels, directed by Michael Rudman.

Jerry Hall has just been seen in the tour of Picasso's Women, The Vagina Monologues at the Arts Theatre, and as Mrs. Robinson in The Graduate at the Gielgud. Bud Shrake has written five feature films, including "Tom Horn" starring Steve McQueen, two TV films, seventeen books and two plays.

Michael Rudman has been Artistic Director at the Traverse, Edinburgh, Hampstead Theatre, Lyttleton Theatre at the National, Chichester Festival Theatre and Sheffield Theatres. His last play, Short List, was directed by Mike Ockrent at Hampstead Theatre, and his musical version of Moll Flanders was at Nottingham Playhouse. His Broadway productions include Death of a Salesman with Dustin Hoffman. His last West End production was the sell-out revival of Fallen Angels with Felicity Kendal and Frances de la Tour.

Paul Farnsworth, who has designed Benchmark, designed Fallen Angels for Michael Rudman last year and has just designed Follies at the Royal Festival Hall.

—By Paul Webb Theatrenow