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SALT LAKE CITY — The Gwyneth Paltrow lawsuit drama that unfolded in Utah earlier this year is now a comedy coming to a London stage next month, proving how much of a global spectacle the case became.
The Pleasance Theatre, a theater that has built a reputation for putting on offbeat plays, announced Wednesday that it's taking a crack at the zany trial that unfolded in a Summit County courthouse over a skiing accident in Deer Valley Resort in 2016 in its new play, "Gwyneth Goes Skiing."
Theater representatives say the show promises to provide a "kind of" but "not really" depiction of a "story of love, betrayal, skiing and (somehow) Christmas — where you are the jury!" centered on the incident between the actor and Terry Sanderson, a Utah resident, seven years ago.
Sanderson sued Paltrow in 2019 over a collision at the Park City resort, saying she severely injured him in a "hit-and-run ski crash." A jury ultimately sided with Paltrow in March, deciding that Sanderson was at fault for the collision after listening to testimony for eight days. Paltrow was awarded $1 from Sanderson, which is what she requested in a countersuit for a disruption to her vacation.
"She's the Goop-founding, Door-Sliding, Shakespeare-In-Loving, consciously-uncoupling Hollywood superstar. He's a retired optometrist from Utah. In 2016, they went skiing. On the slopes of Deer Valley, their worlds collided, and so did they — literally. Ouch," the theater wrote in a description of the upcoming show. "Seven years later, in 2023, they went to court. Double ouch."
Producers clarified on social media that it's more of a "play with music."
The play is scheduled to run from Dec. 13 to Dec. 23. Tickets for the 90-minute play start at £15 (a little over $18.50 U.S. dollars) — plus the cost of travel for Utahns trying to get out there to see it.
The Pleasance Theatre was founded in 1985, focusing on fringe theater and comedy. It flaunts reviews from its other recent plays that have been called "repellent trash" and the "most unhinged piece of theatre in existence."
The new play serves as the latest pop culture fodder over the Utah trial, joining many references on "Saturday Night Live" and late-night TV shows.
