Thandie Newton makes stage debut in Death and the Maiden

Death and the Maiden: Ariel Dorfman's play is the first at the newly-named Harold Pinter Theatre

After more than 20 years working in film and TV, actress Thandie Newton is making her stage debut in Ariel Dorfman's claustrophobic moral thriller Death and the Maiden.

"I was potentially biting off more than I could chew," admits Newton, backstage at the newly-named Harold Pinter Theatre.

The English actress is starring in a revival of Death and the Maiden, by Chilean playwright Ariel Dorfman.

It is the first play at the renamed West End venue, formerly the Comedy Theatre.

It is a fitting choice of play. Dorfman dedicated Death and the Maiden to Pinter when it premiered in London 20 years ago.

Newton plays Paulina Salas, a former political prisoner with a desire to bring her agonised past to light.

When a stranger arrives at the isolated beach house she shares with her husband, Paulina is convinced he was the man who tormented her many years before.

Retreat: Newton stars with Cillian Murphy in the thriller shot in north Wales

The play, directed by Jeremy Herrin, also features Tom Goodman-Hill and Anthony Calf.

For Newton, it is her first taste of stage work, having spent several years looking for the right project.

She is best known for her roles in films such as The Pursuit of Happyness with Will Smith, action film Mission Impossible 2, and Oliver Stone's W, where Newton played US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice.

In 2006, Newton won a Bafta for her role in the Oscar-winning Crash. But now she's stepping into the West End spotlight.

"In some ways this was above my expectations of where I could start in theatre, but it came along and I wasn't going to say no," Newton says.

She admits: "I had a great feeling of responsibility that I was giving voice to the voiceless. The play is not necessarily set in Chile, it could be in any country after a dictatorship. It now has a much broader perspective.

"I've been focusing a lot of my work privately in Congo, where sexual violence against women is epidemic. Rape and torture is a weapon of war and one of the things that is so chronic and difficult for these people is that they are not given a voice, that justice is never done."

'Killer virus'

There are striking similarities between Newton's play and her latest film Retreat, released in the UK last week.

A psychological thriller, it is also a three-hander - where a stranger arrives at a couple's remote seaside house.

Thandie Newton says she is very keen to do more stage work

In the story, Kate (Newton) and and Martin (Cillian Murphy) are spending time at an isolated cottage on a Scottish island to recover from a personal tragedy.

But their strained relationship is tested further when an injured soldier (Jamie Bell) turns up with news that a killer virus is heading their way.

The debut feature of British director Carl Tibbetts, the low-budget film was shot in Gwynedd, north Wales.

"I'm really proud of Retreat because of the limitations placed on us," says Newton.

"We had such a brief time to do it - it was as close to theatre as you can get in that we were on our feet all day long, with barely a break. But that's what I've been looking for, I don't want it easy. It's been too easy."

Does she mean her film career has been "too easy"?

Newton nods. "I've been incredibly fortunate that I've been able to do these big films too, but for an actor it is frustrating, you don't get to really reach through the arc of a character and that's where my juices really flow - so theatre is the obvious place to take that."

She adds: "I'll find it quite hard to work in film after this."

Newton's recent films include Roland Emmerich's effects-laden disaster epic 2012 and drama For Colored Girls, in an ensemble cast which included Whoopi Goldberg and Janet Jackson.

Newton made her first film aged 16, and made four more while she was studying social anthropology at Cambridge in the 1990s.

The actress reels off the titles without prompting: Interview with the Vampire, Loaded, Jefferson in Paris and Journey of the August King.

How did she fit that in with undergraduate studies?

"I was on the M11 in my little Fiat panda hammering it up and down the motorway. I was at Cannes the week before my finals. It was a crazy, crazy time.

"I didn't explore life as a student at university which I sometimes feel sad about, instead I was working all the time. I couldn't imagine putting my work aside and becoming a student. I felt 30 and not 18."

Now at the age of 38, Newton says theatre has come "at exactly the right time in my life".

Newton makes it clear she's keen for more stage work. "I'm absolutely loving it. I emailed our producer the other day and said 'what's next?'"

She adds: "To be able to move between TV, film and theatre - with a bit of skincare commercial thrown in! - that's the dream."

Death and the Maiden opens at the Harold Pinter Theatre in London SW1 on 25 October. Retreat is now in cinemas and on DVD.