The roster of actors and talent cast in the short films promoting this year’s International Booker Prize has been unveiled.
Kae Alexander (Fleabag), Toheeb Jimoh (Industry), Toby Jones (Alan Bates vs the Post Office), Xelia Mendes-Jones (The Wheel of Time), Indira Varma (Game of Thrones) and musician and actor Jehnny Beth (Anatomy of a Fall) will all appear in films showcasing the six books shortlisted for the International Booker Prize, the world’s most influential award for translated fiction.
The films will be released on Thursday, 16 April and be shown at a 10th anniversary celebration event for the International Booker Prize at the Southbank Centre on 8 May — featuring Dua Lipa, 2021 winning author David Diop and 2025 winning translator Deepa Bhasthi.
The films are helmed by choreographer and director Holly Blakey with original music from Gwilym Gold. They were shot in architecturally striking locations across the Southbank Centre, an iconic site and cultural hotspot in central London.
“I wanted to place the actors in the often unseen corners of the Southbank Centre, my performance home, where so much unfolds quietly, without an audience, I guess akin to reading… still but somehow also stirring,” Blakey said.
Jimoh will read from Shihad Bazyar’s ‘The Nights Are Quiet in Tehran and Beth will be in the film for Rene Karabash’s ‘She Who Remains’. Varma will read from Marie NDiaye’s ‘The Witch’, Alexander from Yáng Shuāng-zi’s ‘Taiwan Travelogue’, Jones from ‘The Director’ by Daniel Kehlman. Rounding out the line-up, Mendes-Jones will read from ‘On Earth As It Is Beneath’ by Ana Paula Maia.
The winner of the International Booker Prize 2026 will be announced on May 19 at Tate Modern, London.
The Booker Prize Foundation started commissioning short films to accompany the Booker Prize and International Booker Prize in 2022. The 2025 Booker Prize films, directed by Sasha Nathwani, were watched over 100M times.
