Learn about the real history behind 'Tru' at the Menier Chocolate Factory

Jesse Tyler Ferguson plays Breakfast at Tiffany's author Truman Capote in a one-man show directed by Rob Ashford.

Summary

• Writer Truman Capote is best known for Breakfast at Tiffany's and In Cold Blood
• He fell out with his powerful friends in 1975 when he published a fictionalised exposé
• Jesse Tyler Ferguson stars in Jay Presson Allen's solo show directed by Rob Ashford

Tru-ly excellent news – Modern Family star and theatre veteran Jesse Tyler Ferguson returns to London in September as author Truman Capote in Jay Presson Allen’s one-man show Tru at the intimate Menier Chocolate Factory from 19 September to 14 November. The production is directed by Rob Ashford (Frozen) and was first performed in New York earlier this year.

Capote is best known for his novella Breakfast at Tiffany’s (which became the iconic film starring Audrey Hepburn) and the true crime classic In Cold Blood. He was also a deeply troubled character and this piece explores an incident in his later life when he was blackballed by a group of his wealthy and powerful female friends after publishing a fictionalised exposé of their hedonistic lives.

Read on learn more about Truman Capote's "tru" story and what to expect from this production.

Book Tru tickets on LondonTheatre.co.uk.

Who was Truman Capote?

Writer and literary celebrity Truman Capote was born in New Orleans, Louisiana in 1924 and, following his parents' divorce, was raised by maternal relatives in Monroeville, Alabama during his early childhood. A precocious learner, he started writing fiction at around the age of eight and he was recognised by The Scholastic Art & Writing Awards in 1936.

In 1932, Capote moved to New York City with his mother and her second husband. He graduated from the private Franklin School in 1942 but did not attend college. He was rejected for service in World War II (he claimed he was deemed “too neurotic”) and established himself as a short story writer, contributing to The Atlantic Monthly, The New Yorker, Harper’s Bazaar, and Mademoiselle, among other publications. Other Voices, Other Rooms, his first novel, was published in 1948.

Capote’s best-known work of fiction is the novella Breakfast at Tiffany’s, published in 1958, about a young writer in New York in the 1940s who is fascinated by his vivacious neighbour, “cafe society girl” Holly Golightly. The 1962 film adaptation provided Audrey Hepburn with her signature role, though Capote wanted Marilyn Monroe to play Holly.

His literary masterpiece is In Cold Blood (1966), an investigation into the murder of the Clutter family in Holcomb, Kansas in 1959. The project took six years and features a triple narrative, exploring the lives of the victims, the murderers, and the impact on the local community. It is considered a landmark in true-crime writing for its detail and the way in which it is written like a novel.

Capote was openly gay and had a two-decade relationship with fellow writer Jack Dunphy, to whom he remained close until his death. Other relationships were more volatile. His glittering social circle included writers, Hollywood actors, businesspeople, and socialites. He famously had a long-standing public rivalry with Gore Vidal. He was also a close friend of To Kill a Mockingbird author Harper Lee (who assisted with In Cold Blood) from childhood.

Capote died of liver disease on 25 August 1984 at the age of 59. In 2005, Philip Seymour Hoffmann won an Oscar for the biographical film Capote. He was also played by Toby Jones in the film Infamous the following year. The period of his life depicted in Tru was also dramatised by Ryan Murphy in his 2024 series Feud: Capote vs. the Swans, in which Tom Hollander portrayed Capote.

What is Tru about?

Tru takes place over Christmas 1975, when Capote was 51. Capote had recently published four chapters from his gossipy real-life-inspired novel Unanswered Prayers (on which he had been working since the late 1950s) in Esquire. He intended the work to be a contemporary American answer to Proust’s In Search of Vanished Time. However, many of his high-profile female friends (known as “the Swans”) were unhappy with their unflattering portraits and cut contact.

The play explores Capote’s ostracisation following this rupture, in which he reflects on his life and career, filled with ongoing battles with loneliness, alcoholism, and drug addiction. Unanswered Prayers remained unfinished at Capote’s death and was published posthumously in the UK in 1986 and in the United States the following year.

Who were “the Swans”

“The Swans” were a group of ultra-wealthy and glamorous New York socialites to whom Capote was a friend and confidant. They numbered Babe Paley, a former Vogue editor and wife of CBS founder William S. Paley; fashion icon and jetsetter Slim Keith, and interior designer and aristocrat Lee Radziwill, sister of Jacqueline Kennedy. They were a pretty powerful flock of enemies to have!

Who is in the cast and creative team of Tru?

Tru was first performed at Broadway’s Booth Theatre in 1989, where it played for 297 performances. Robert Morse (Mad Men) won a Tony for his performance as Capote. The piece is adapted from Capote’s own words by Jay Presson Allen, who was Oscar-nominated for her screenplays for Cabaret and The Prince of Tides.

Rob Ashford's revival was first performed in the library at the House of the Redeemer, an Upper East Side townhouse, in March 2026. Director and choreographer Ashford’s Broadway and West End credits include Evita, A Streetcar Named Desire, Anna Christie, and Frozen.

Jesse Tyler Ferguson reprises his role as the irascible Capote. Best known for his role as Mitchell Pritchett in the sitcom Modern Family, Ferguson’s Broadway credits include On the Town, The 25th Annual Putnam Spelling Bee, and Take Me Out (for which he won the Tony for Best Featured Actor in a Play in 2022).

He made his London debut in Stephen Sondheim’s final musical Here We Are at the National Theatre in 2025 and was recently one of the stars playing a guest stint as King Herod in Jesus Christ Superstar.

Book Tru tickets on LondonTheatre.co.uk.

Photo credit: Jesse Tyler Ferguson in Tru off Broadway. (Photos by Marc J. Franklin)