The Olivier Award-winning play, which will begin previews March 21, will star Billy Crudup, Jeff Goldblum, Zeljko Ivanek and Michael Stuhlbarg.

John Crowley will direct the play by the author of The Beauty Queen of Leenane. The new work is about a writer in a totalitarian state who is interrogated about the horrific events in his short stories.

Crudup will play Katurian, the writer who is interrogated about the content of his work (such as children giving their fathers razor blade-filled apples to eat), and, more frighteningly, their similarity to child murders that are occurring in the same town.

Bob Boyett, Robert Fox, The Shubert Organization and The National Theatre will produce. Pillowman will be the third National show to be brought over by Boyett, after the recent Jumpers and Michael Frayn's Democracy.

Both Pillowman and Democracy were nominated for the Olivier Awards Best Play prize. In what might be considered a minor upset, Democracy lost to The Pillowman.

The design team for The Pillowman comprises Scott Pask (scenic and costume design), Hugh Vanstone (lighting design) and Paul Arditti (sound design). The play will also feature music by Paddy Cunneen.

The Pillowman is from the Irish writer who gave us the Leenane trilogy — The Beauty Queen of Leenane, A Skull in Connemara and The Lonesome West. He was Tony Award-nominated for Best Play two years running, for the Broadway transfers of The Beauty Queen Of Leenane (1998) and The Lonesome West (1999). Pillowman opened at London's National Theatre on Nov. 13, 2003, in the Cottesloe.