Leading theatre publisher Nick Hern Books has acquired the rights to publish Nice Fish, the sublimely playful, profound and very funny new play by multi-award-winning actor Mark Rylance and acclaimed prose poet Louis Jenkins, alongside its UK premiere in November.

On a frozen Minnesota lake, the ice is beginning to creak and groan. It’s the end of the fishing season, and two old friends are out on the ice, angling for something big; something down there that is pure need. Something that might just swallow them whole.

In Nice Fish, celebrated actor Mark Rylance draws on his own teenage years in the American Midwest, in a unique collaboration with critically acclaimed Minnesotan contemporary prose poet Louis Jenkins and the whole company. It transfers from a sell-out run in New York to the Harold Pinter Theatre, London, in 2016, in a production directed by Claire van Kampen and starring Rylance and Jim Lichtscheidl.

Nice Fish marks the second play by Mark Rylance to be published by Nick Hern Books, following the publication of his comedy I Am Shakespeare, a witty exploration of the Shakespeare authorship debate, in 2012.

NHB has acquired publication rights in the UK, Ireland, Australia and New Zealand from Grove Atlantic, Inc., who will publish elsewhere in 2017.

The producers of Nice Fish have previously announced that audience members who come to the Harold Pinter Theatre dressed as a fish or fisherman will be given complimentary tickets to the show, on a first-come-first-served basis. The publishers would like to point out that unfortunately, turning up to a bookshop similarly attired will not necessarily guarantee you a free copy of the playscript. Readers are, however, very welcome to try.