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Burlesque: The Musical – Don’t Shoot The Messenger

Gather round. It’s time to check in on Burlesque the Musical — not to add to the noise, but to make sense of it.

The show, adapted from the Cher and Christina Aguilera film, has never had an easy ride. Its West End run at the Savoy was dogged by workers’ complaints — over hours, conditions and costumes that weren’t ready in time — several of which were flagged to Equity. TR Heels Ltd, the company behind the West End production, posted a £9.4m loss in reserves for the year to July 2025, with roughly £13m owed to creditors.

In the same period, its sole director also arranged loans of over £800,000 to other production companies in which he holds a controlling interest; a detail that raises more questions than the official line, that funding a show upfront is “standard practice,” really answers.

Creatively, the show has now burned through three directors. Todrick Hall, who joined for the West End transfer and wrote original songs, told me and The Stage that his experience had been “quite the rollercoaster,” alleging he was still owed royalties under a contract he refused to sign until songwriting credits were resolved. Producers denied any dispute existed. Racky Plews has since taken over for a version of the show billed, apparently without irony, as “completely new.”

Then came the tour: the ongoing attempt at one. Woking, the planned opening stop, never happened: three postponements, all blamed on “technical issues,” pushed the premiere back more than a fortnight to Sunderland instead. The promised London run at the Arts at Marble Arch was quietly shelved until 2027.

Producers insisted the tour was “fully financed and on a secure footing,” pointing to 90,000 tickets sold and almost £4m in advance box office. The claims didn’t stop the chaos: cast and crew reportedly learned of a Sunderland preview cancellation via WhatsApp with barely a day’s notice, even as producers maintained ATG was “behind us to ensure financially this is stable.”

Once the tour did open, illness took over where technical faults left off. Four performances were scrapped in Sunderland in under a week, including press night, after producers cited a virus among principal cast. Stoke-on-Trent’s opening was pushed back a day for the same reasons the production always reaches for — “technical requirements.” Wales fared worse: the Wales Millennium Centre matinee was halted forty minutes in, and that evening’s show cancelled an hour before curtain, leaving audiences and fans who’d arranged hotels, childcare and dog-sitters with nothing. Glasgow’s King’s Theatre — the tour’s first raked stage — looms next, with insiders reportedly nervous about how the production will fare.

Still, across four tour stops, not one week has gone by unscathed: Woking cancelled outright, Sunderland losing roughly seven in ten performances, Stoke’s opening axed. Meanwhile a new wrinkle emerged with the release of the West End cast recording; Equity reportedly had to step in again after a required union-brokered royalties agreement between producer, distributor and cast hadn’t been secured before release. Sigh.

Money troubles, sick casts and reshuffled schedules are one thing. The bigger story may be who now owns the buildings this show performs in. ATG Entertainment — which runs the Savoy, the Sunderland Empire and dozens of other venues — has agreed to be bought by Ari Emanuel’s Mari Group in a deal reportedly worth around £4.5bn. ATG’s leadership has been quick to reassure producers that “current commitments continue” and relationships remain unchanged. But The Stage’s editor summed up the industry’s unease in a single word: “scary” — a reaction echoed by an earlier government committee report flagging ATG, alongside Live Nation and AEG, as a risk to competition.

Companies House filings show TodayTix, now under the same ownership umbrella, taking security over entitlements owed by a production company linked to Burlesque’s own producer — a reminder of how tightly interwoven this show’s finances already are with its landlord’s.

Unions, for their part, keep sounding the same warning. Equity and BECTU say they’re supporting freelancers hit by cancelled shows, with BECTU’s Philippa Childs noting that permanent crew have generally been paid, but casual venue staff are far likelier to lose out — “the issue will be with the people working in the different theatres.” Both the show and ATG maintain all payments are up to date.

Reviews, where the show has actually made it to stage, by local blogs have been largely positive. Not one credible outlet among them, though. Certainly, ticket sales, by contrast, are reportedly collapsing as word of the delays spreads. Whatever comes next — Glasgow’s rake, the next illness, the next “technical” excuse — the pattern by now writes itself. If you’re holding tickets, request a refund. And if you’re watching from the industry, the real story isn’t a haunted curse. It’s what happens when investment, welfare and basic contingency planning are treated as optional until the whole thing falls over in public.

God help us all.

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RTST Sir Peter Hall Director Award Winner Lily Dyble: “The landscape’s really hard right now. And who gets to do it?” 

Want to spot tomorrow’s directing talent? Look no further than the resident or associate director listed in your theatre programme. 

Last weekend, Lily Dyble stepped into the Globe’s courtyard with the unhurried calm of someone who has learned to trust herself under pressure. 

She is this year’s winner of the Royal Theatrical Support Trust Sir Peter Hall Director Award — and in the current climate, that distinction carries more weight than ever.

Photo credit Matt Chandler

Dyble has served as associate director to Joe Mantello on Stephen Sondheim’s Here We Are at the National Theatre — a connection that led directly to Broadway and an associate directorship on the starry Death of a Salesman. A remarkable trajectory.

But that pipeline is under threat. Producing theatres are making less, squeezed by years of stagnant funding. Less production means fewer opportunities for directors, actors, and every kind of theatre freelancer — and ultimately, a talent development pipeline running dry.

Patrick Marber, one of the directors she names as a formative influence, recently told The Stage that it’s “a really hard time” to make a living as a director, with even well-established figures struggling to land work. Dyble doesn’t flinch at this. “The landscape’s really hard right now,” she says. “And who gets to do it?” 

The award, she makes clear, isn’t a trophy. It’s a lifeline.“I hit a point in my practice where without meaningful intervention I couldn’t scale up, I couldn’t go any further. And then this happened.” 

Born and raised in Manchester, Dyble is a product of precisely the ecosystem she now champions. Free music lessons. The Hallé Youth Choir. A Northern brass band. “I went to a state school where I was really lucky that so much access to the arts was still free” she says — and she means it without sentiment. She knows how easily that luck could have gone the other way, which is why paid placements and access remain causes she returns to again and again. The first assisting job she took was unpaid. She worked back 139 hours to do it. “Getting in the room is so much of it.”

Much of her career has been built through associate work — a role she defines with precision. “It’s a really intimate relationship. You’re a sounding board. You operate as a real partnership.” 

She credits Marber, alongside Nick Hytner, Joe Mantello, and Nadia Fall, as directors she’s learned from profoundly. But it’s the other female creatives — Marianne Elliott, Bunny Christie, Vicky Mortimer — whose teams she watched obsessively as a student, spending every spare penny on tickets, trying to understand how those collaborations functioned.

“It’s a really short window of your career where you get to have that privilege of sitting in another director’s room,” she says. “It goes really quickly.”

Her chosen piece for the award is Sally Cookson’s Jane Eyre, and the choice is anything but academic. She first saw the production at eighteen in Bristol. “I remember when Jane walked across the gantry and it set on fire, sitting there and being so overwhelmed and thinking – that’s what love should feel like. It’s messy and it’s complicated, it defies a straightforward answer”. The RTST will also make a grant of £60,000 to support the costs of the production. 

Now directing it herself, across regional venues including Chester — close to where she grew up — she’s drawn to what the play demands: courage in uncertainty, clarity under pressure. “It gives a theatrical language to those feelings that you can’t articulate. Jane’s internal world is such a vast, emotional landscape.”

Right now she’s in rehearsals for an all-female Glengarry Glen Ross at the Old Vic. A new musical is finding its next home. Jane Eyre awaits. She is, unmistakably, moving. “Holding on,” she says. “Holding the line. Keeping the faith.” In a hard time for directors, that’s not a platitude.

It was a wonderful starry reception hosted by Sir Ian McKellen. RTST chairman Sir Geoffrey Cass said: “We warmly congratulate Lily Dyble and the runner-up, Sophie Drake, and applaud the six other directors on the all-female shortlist.”

So in more ways than one, UK theatre directors need a sustained ecology of work, not isolated chances. Without sufficient opportunity and invaluable schemes like RTST that come with cash to keep talent rooted in the regions, the next Dyble simply won’t emerge.

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Sold Out. Paid Peanuts.

THERE has never been a better time to love the arts. No?

We can be world citizens without leaving home and yet, in the very institutions built to house entertainment, the people who make the experience possible are still not being paid fairly. Hold that thought.

Firstly, a word to new readers who may wonder why this blog takes such a violently unpredictable course. 

Welcome to the twenty-first century. The themes will emerge from the apparent randomness, I promise, but it will often be a bracing read.

The times from which it is written are hard on the nerves, even for those of us lucky enough to lead charmed lives. If the things I discuss were not difficult, they would not be true. See my recent campaign on institutions slashing and burning through live music in live theatre.

Meanwhile, as I have mentioned before, something worth celebrating: more people are attending theatre in the UK than at any recorded point in history, according to the Society of London Theatre and UK Theatre.

A remarkable fact. Yet here is something worth being pissed off about, as I head to the 50th anniversary Olivier Awards at the Royal Albert Hall shortly. 

Indeed, the majority of West End front-of-house staff are not paid the London Living Wage (£14.80 ph). Casual FOH roles and bar work at Delfont Mackintosh pays as little as £13 an hour. 

The reason this matters is that this is not happening in isolation. Off the top of my head, LW Theatres pay £13.40 an hour and ATG (London) pay a pitiful £12.85 an hour. Working conditions also reportedly suck. 

Heavens. We know that UK theatre staff have been attacked, sexually harassed and abused by drunken audience members during performances.

This is important beyond the immediate consequences because well-trained front-of-house staff are not a luxury. They are the experience. Our theatre-going is still underwritten by short-term contracts, unreasonable shifts, and countless unpaid hours. At a time of cuts, nearly all of these short changed employees are afraid to speak up. 

That these workers — many of them young — remain underpaid is something I cannot accept. I have raised it in person with West End Producers, Heads of Unions, the Editor of The Stage, theatre landlords, funders, philanthropists, journalists. Nothing changes. 

Furthermore, I have, in the past, taken easy shots at greedy producers. Some are. Some are not. In any event, the rich should not be taking advantage of the less well off. 

Full stop.

The harsher truth, however, is that theatre owners, these operators are not sharing their record profits with the workforce. 

Alas, Andrew Lloyd Webber says every penny of LW Theatres’ profit is ploughed back into the buildings. Yet ATG (Sonia Friedman is now a major shareholder) have no excuse: the majority of the London venues are a dump.

Whichever way you slice it, the buildings, cannot function without the dedicated, skilled people who take care of us: the audience. Concrete does not get us out the building in an emergency, help us to our seats or gently welcome little children through the door.

As Union Equity recently stated: “It’s important that West End, Commercial and Subsidised producers share the success detailed in the report with our members – without whom the show does not go on.”

So yes, blissful ignorance, on all of this, is very much off the menu, especially now. 

And that connects to the governments Employment Right Act being implemented on a phased basis across 2026 and 2027: a commitment to improve everyday life for millions navigating the sharp end of the modern jobs market. 

We know that West End FOH workers juggling unpredictable pay and hours’ – with some shits as short as 90 minute – keeps staff from upskilling and finding new jobs. 

To understand this we need to remember that the gap between £12.85 and £14.80 is £2.05. On a 30-hour contract, that’s £3,000 a year — a holiday, childcare, a car, a flat with a garden.

Tell you what, in one of the world’s most expensive cities, that gap matters. 

Time to close it.

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Why Black Boys Theatre Club Fills Me With Hope

I’m running back and forward from the bar fetching cups of water at the Noël Coward Theatre for a group of teenagers waiting to Dracula starring Cynthia Erivo. 

It’s not the typical West End crowd. Producer Adam Kenwright has unlocked tickets for a variety of groups that may never otherwise be able attend. 

For many of the teenage lads here, however, it’s their first time inside a theatre at all.

The trip has been organised as part of an education matinee: youth charity Go Live, Erivo’s former school and in conjunction with Munya Chawawa, the comedian and satirist better known for viral sketches. But for the past year he has quietly been bringing groups of young Black boys to the theatre through his initiative, the Black Boys Theatre Club. 

After the show there is a Q&A with the resident director — and, crucially, a non negotiable trip to Nando’s.

Chawawa first publicly announced the project last October with a promotional video featuring actors including Jordan Stephens, Kedar Williams-Stirling and Mohamed Elsandel. The aim is simple but ambitious: to open up the world of theatre to a generation of young Black boys who rarely see themselves reflected in its audiences, or on its stages.

The project now has backing from major institutions including the National Theatre, Regent’s Park Open Air Theatre and the Bush Theatre. But its origins are personal.

Chawawa, who was born in Zimbabwe and moved to Norfolk at 11, discovered theatre relatively late. When he did, he realised how out of place he felt in those spaces.

“For me, Black Boys Theatre Club focuses on Black boys because they’re quite isolated from theatre,” he tells me. “There are cultural barriers and financial barriers.”

Those financial barriers are real. West End tickets can stretch into the hundreds — top price seats for Dracula are £225. (Prices start at £50 and there is a weekly lottery for a limited number of £30 tickets). 

Still, theatre audiences in Britain remain overwhelmingly white, and attending regularly is still largely a middle-class habit.

Yet Chawawa believes live theatre offers something increasingly rare.

“It’s one of the few places where you have face-to-face human interaction,” he says. “You experience a whole spectrum of human emotion — point blank. Not through a screen, not through digital means or VR headsets, but person to person.”

It got me thinking about a video that Reese Witherspoon recently posted a video encouraging young people to rethink the way they approach ambition. Instead of asking what their dream job is, she suggested, they should start by asking what they’re actually talented at. The advice struck a chord online — and it feels relevant here. Talent rarely reveals itself in a vacuum. Young people can’t pursue what they’re good at if they’ve never been exposed to it in the first place.

After the show, the boys stay behind for a Q&A with the resident director Amber Ruby and members of the technical team. We talk about lighting rigs, rehearsal processes and the many routes into the industry.

It’s the sort of backstage demystification that can quietly shift how a young audience imagines the arts.

“Black Boys Theatre Club aims to let boys know they’re allowed to enjoy theatre,” Chawawa says. “They have permission to.”

And at a time when the pressures on young people are perhaps greater than they have been at any time since the second world war, that sense of permission matters. 

However, a 2025 census by Major Players showed that Black men and women were on average the lowest paid across the creative industries, in both permanent salaries and freelance day rates. Black, Asian and Minority Ethnic representation had increased in the last 12 months, but is still below the UK national average of 18.3%. 

Exposure, he hopes, might plant a seed — not only for future audiences but for future storytellers. Some might end up on stage, others behind it.

“What we’re trying to do,” he says, “is plant the seed of them becoming storytellers themselves one day. That’s how humans have always connected — through stories.”

For me, it cemented the fact that have a storytelling crisis in our society. 

So what next?

“More bums on seats,” he says, laughing. But he’s serious about scale: more school partnerships, more shows, and eventually workshops where the boys can try acting, directing or stage management themselves. 

It isn’t hard to create an environment within a building that would be welcoming to groups that are historically shut off from engagement with the arts. Theatre will be the poorer unless this changes. 

For Munya, the long-term goal is simple: a theatre industry — and audience — that looks a little more like the world outside its doors.

And perhaps, for a few of the boys leaving this afternoon a new talent or passion they didn’t yet know they had. 

Say it with me: The work is never done.

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Olivier Awards 2026 – Who Should Win, Who Will Win🏆

TWO very different musicals — one about a marmalade-loving Peruvian bear, the other a darkly Sondheim fairy tale — have emerged as the dominant forces at this year’s Olivier Awards, earning 11 nominations each.

The annual event is the industry’s annual shop window, and the ceremony and media coverage honour SOLT’s description of the awards as “Britain’s most prestigious stage honours”. Even when they get it right, it’s often for the wrong reason – or show.

Anyway, this party’s like a hundred hours long. It is, though, good news that the Oliviers will once more get a prime-time screening in a new deal with the BBC.

The ceremony, marking 50 years since the first Olivier Awards were handed out, will take place next month and will be hosted by Nick Mohammed. 

Close behind the two musical juggernauts are three plays with six nominations: the stunning classic drama All My Sons, the crime drama Kenrex, and the Broadway transfer Stereophonic.

The acting categories are packed with star quality. In Best Actress, nominees include Cate Blanchett for her performance in The Seagull, alongside Marianne Jean-Baptiste for All My Sons, Julia McDermott for Weather Girl, Rosamund Pike for Inter Alia, and Rosie Sheehy for Guess How Much I Love You?

The Best Actor race is similarly competitive, featuring Bryan Cranston for All My Sons and Tom Hiddleston for Much Ado About Nothing. They are joined by Sean Hayes for Good Night, Oscar, Jack Holden for Kenrex, and David Shields for Punch.

The TikTok-grabbing summer stunt of Rachel Zegler in Evita at the London Palladium — that saw her perform nightly from the theatre’s outdoor balcony — put London theatre on the global map and drew huge crowds to the concourse outside and got everyone talking.

And with nominations for Here We Are, Shucked, American Psycho, The Producers, All My Sons, Stereophonic, Oh, Mary! and Brigadoon, we already have a clear overall winner: America.

Anyway, Among the most intriguing categories is Best New Play. Kenrex is nominated alongside Punch, Inter Alia, and Ava Pickett’s 1536 — 70s band saga Stereophonic bizarrely isn’t. 

Meanwhile, plenty of other surprising snubs. The powers that be have decided not to include Cynthia Erivo’s one-person Dracula, or the revival of Connor McPherson’s The Weir starring Brendan Gleeson. McPherson is currently filming a version of the play in Ireland with the cast from the revival. 

Director Jamie Lloyd also missed out for his directorial work on Evita and Much Ado About Nothing, while Mason Alexander Park failed to land nominations for both Oh, Mary! and the karaoke-fuelled Much Ado About Nothing. Giles Terera was nominated for Oh, Mary! but Mary’s strapping acting tutor played by Dino Fetscher wasn’t. A travesty. 

Anyhow. The prizes still depend heavily on subsidised theatre: look at the four awards nominations this year Punch and Kenrex that originated at the excellent Nottingham Playhouse and Sheffield respectively. 
Elsewhere, Mark Addy was overlooked for his tireless turn in The Unlikely Pilgrimage of Harold Fry, while The Fifth Step — starring Martin Freeman and Jack Lowden — drew a complete blank. The mind boggles. 

Read on for my thoughts on how seriously you should take Olivier…

No nods for the productions that have opened under the National Theatre’s new artistic director Indhu Rubasingham. Yikes.

For crystal clarity, greater transparency wouldn’t go amiss. The Society of London Theatre cannot guarantee every Olivier voter has seen every nominated show — and it’s unclear whether those who haven’t recuse themselves. By contrast, the Tony Awards enforce strict rules: voters must attend all nominated productions and log their attendance, or they lose the right to vote in any category involving that show.

Several industry figures I spoke to, however, suggested that Kenrex — and, to a lesser extent, The Unlikely Pilgrimage of Harold Fry — could prove formidable underdogs. But don’t be surprised, however, if quieter nominees lose out to work backed by the big guns.

Alas, Paddington the Musical feels unstoppable. Its real triumph lies in making theatre feel universally appealing. Yet while producer Sonia Friedman may have what looks like a licence to print money at the Savoy Theatre, she would do well to avoid £300 tickets and keep prices accessible for the next generation—especially now. High culture is for everyone. 

But look, my own feelings on all this, if anyone cares, two works stand apart: Kenrex and Stereophonic. Both were rare theatrical experiences: theatre is often at its best and most exciting when it takes you by surprise. 

Best New Musical

  • Here We Are – National Theatre, Lyttelton
  • Paddington the Musical – Savoy Theatre
  • Shucked – Regent’s Park Open Air Theatre
  • The Unlikely Pilgrimage Of Harold Fry –Theatre Royal Haymarket

Should win: Paddington The Musical

Will win: Paddington The Musical

Best Musical Revival

  • American Psycho – Almeida Theatre
  • Evita – London Palladium
  • Into the Woods – Bridge Theatre
  • The Producers – Garrick Theatre

Should win: Into The Woods

Will win: Into The Woods

Best New Play

  • 1536 – Almeida Theatre
  • Inter Alia – National Theatre, Lyttelton
  • KENREX – The Other Palace
  • Punch – Young Vic and Apollo Theatre Should win: Punch  Will win: Punch 

Best Revival

  • All My Sons – Wyndham’s Theatre
  • Arcadia – The Old Vic
  • Much Ado About Nothing – Theatre Royal Drury Lane
  • The Seagull – Barbican Theatre

Should win: All my sons

Will win: All my sons

Best New Entertainment or Comedy Play

  • The Comedy About Spies – Noël Coward Theatre
  • Every Brilliant Thing – @sohoplace
  • Oh, Mary! – Trafalgar Theatre
  • Paranormal Activity – Ambassadors Theatre

Should win: Every Brilliant Things

Will win: Paranormal Activity 

Best Actress

  • Cate Blanchett for The Seagull – Barbican Theatre
  • Marianne Jean-Baptiste for All My Sons – Wyndham’s Theatre
  • Julia McDermott for Weather Girl – Soho Theatre
  • Rosamund Pike for Inter Alia – National Theatre, Lyttelton
  • Rosie Sheehy for Guess How Much I Love You? – Royal Court Theatre

Should win: Marianne Jean-Baptiste

Will win: Rosamund Pike 

Best Actor

  • Bryan Cranston for All My Sons – Wyndham’s Theatre
  • Sean Hayes for Good Night, Oscar – Barbican Theatre
  • Tom Hiddleston for Much Ado About Nothing – Theatre Royal Drury Lane
  • Jack Holden for KENREX – The Other Palace
  • David Shields for Punch – Young Vic and Apollo Theatre

Should win: Sean Hayes

Will win: Bryan Cranston 

Best Actor in a Musical

  • Marc Antolin for The Producers – Garrick Theatre
  • James Hameed & Arti Shah for Paddington The Musical – Savoy Theatre
  • Andy Nyman for The Producers – Garrick Theatre
  • Jamie Parker for Into The Woods – Bridge Theatre
  • Diego Andres Rodriguez for Evita – London Palladium

Should win: Marc Antolin

Will win: James Hameed and Arti Shah

Best Actress in a Musical

  • Katie Brayben for Into The Woods – Bridge Theatre
  • Danielle Fiamanya & Georgina Onuorah for Brigadoon – Regent’s Park Open Air Theatre
  • Jane Krakowski for Here We Are – National Theatre, Lyttelton
  • Jenna Russell for The Unlikely Pilgrimage Of Harold Fry – Theatre Royal Haymarket
  • Rachel Zegler for Evita – London Palladium

Will win: Rachel Zegler

Should win: Rachel Zegler

Best Actress in a Supporting Role

  • Isis Hainsworth for Arcadia – The Old Vic
  • Julie Hesmondhalgh for Punch – Young Vic and Apollo Theatre
  • Lucy Karczewski for Stereophonic – Duke of York’s Theatre
  • Hayley Squires for All My Sons – Wyndham’s Theatre
  • Sophie Thompson for When We Are Married – Donmar Warehouse

Should win: Sophie Thompson

Will win: Julie Hesmondhalgh 

Best Actor in a Supporting Role

  • Hammed Animashaun for Dealer’s Choice– Donmar Warehouse
  • Paapa Essiedu for All My Sons – Wyndham’s Theatre
  • Zachary Hart for The Seagull – Barbican Theatre
  • Zachary Hart for Stereophonic – Duke of York’s Theatre
  • Giles Terera for Oh, Mary! – Trafalgar Theatre

Should win: Paapa Essiedu

Will win: Paapa Essiedu

Best Actor in a Supporting Role in a Musical

  • Trevor Ashley for The Producers at Garrick Theatre
  • Corbin Bleu for The Great Gatsby – A New Musical at London Coliseum
  • Tom Edden for Paddington The Musical at Savoy Theatre
  • Jo Foster for Into The Woods at Bridge Theatre
  • Oliver Savile for Into The Woods at Bridge Theatre

Should win: Jo Foster

Will win: Tom Edden

Best Actress in a Supporting Role in a Musical

  • Tracie Bennett for Here We Are at National Theatre – Lyttelton
  • Amy Booth-Steel for Paddington The Musical at Savoy Theatre
  • Kate Fleetwood for Into The Woods at Bridge Theatre
  • Victoria Hamilton-Barritt for Paddington The Musical at Savoy Theatre
  • Georgina Onuorah for Shucked at Regent’s Park Open Air Theatre

Should win: Kate Fleetwood

Will win: Victoria Hamilton-Baritt

Best Director

  • Jordan Fein for Into The Woods at Bridge Theatre
  • Luke Sheppard for Paddington The Musical at Savoy Theatre
  • Ed Stambollouian for KENREX at The Other Palace
  • Lyndsey Turner for 1536 at Almeida Theatre
  • Ivo van Hove for All My Sons at Wyndham’s Theatre

Should win: Jordan Fein

Will win: Luke Shepherd

Gillian Lynne Award for Best Theatre Choreographer

  • Fabian Aloise for Evita at The London Palladium
  • Ellen Kane for Paddington The Musical at Savoy Theatre
  • Drew McOnie for Brigadoon at Regent’s Park Open Air Theatre
  • Lynne Page for American Psycho at Almeida Theatre

Should win: Drew McOnie

Will win: Fabian Aloise

Best Costume Design

  • Enver Chakartash for Stereophonic at Duke of York’s Theatre
  • Linda Cho for The Great Gatsby – A New Musical at London Coliseum
  • Tom Scutt for Into The Woods at Bridge Theatre
  • Gabriella Slade (Costume Design) & Tahra Zafar (Paddington Design) for Paddington The Musical at Savoy Theatre

Should win: Tom Scutt

Will win: Linda Cho

Best Set Design supported by Blue-i Theatre Technology

  • Paul Tate dePoo III (Scenic & Projection Design) for The Great Gatsby – A New Musical at London Coliseum
  • Tom Pye (Set Design) & Ash J Woodward (Video Design) for Paddington The Musical at Savoy Theatre
  • Tom Scutt for Into The Woods at Bridge Theatre
  • David Zinn for Stereophonic at Duke of York’s Theatre

Should win: David Zinn

Will win: Tom Scutt

Best Lighting Design

  • Robbie Butler for Punch at Young Vic & Apollo Theatre
  • Jon Clark for Evita at The London Palladium
  • Aideen Malone (Lighting Design) & Roland Horvath (Video Design) for Into The Woods at Bridge Theatre
  • Joshua Pharo for KENREX at The Other Palace

Should win: Robbie Butler

Will win: Aideen Malone

Best Sound Design supported by d&b audiotechnik

  • Adam Fisher for Into The Woods at Bridge Theatre
  • Gareth Owen for Paddington The Musicalat Savoy Theatre
  • Ryan Rumery for Stereophonic at Duke of York’s Theatre
  • Giles Thomas for KENREX at The Other Palace

Should win: Stereophonic

Will win: Kenrex

Outstanding Musical Contribution

  • Matt Brind (Orchestrations & Arrangements) for Paddington The Musical at Savoy Theatre
  • Will Butler (Original Songs & Orchestrations) & Justin Craig (Orchestrations) for Stereophonic at Duke of York’s Theatre
  • John Patrick Elliott (Composition) for KENREX at The Other Palace
  • Chris Fenwick (Musical Supervision & Arrangements) & Sean Hayes (Live Piano Performance of Gershwin’s Rhapsody in Blue) for Good Night, Oscar at Barbican Theatre

Should win: Kenrex

Will win: Stereophonic 

Best New Production in Affiliate Theatre

  • Ben And Imo by Mark Ravenhill at Orange Tree Theatre
  • The Glass Menagerie by Tennessee Williams at The Yard Theatre
  • The Ministry Of Lesbian Affairs by Iman Qureshi at Kiln Theatre
  • Miss Myrtle’s Garden by Danny James King at Bush Theatre
  • The Shitheads by Jack Nicholls at Jerwood Theatre Upstairs at Royal Court Theatre

Should win: Ben and Imo

Will win: The Glass Menagerie

The Olivier Awards with Cunard are due to be held on April 12 at the Royal Albert Hall in London.

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How can we ensure real change in gender equality in new writing?

HOW many female playwrights have won the Olivier Award for Best New Play in the past 25 years?

Just four: Katori Hall, Lucy Kirkwood, Suzie Miller and Lolita Chakrabarti. 

Alas, the figures speak to a persistent gender imbalance in new writing and in the plays that reach major stages — particularly in the West End.

Indeed, a 2023 Sphinx Theatre’s Women in Theatre survey highlighted ongoing structural barriers facing women, including caring responsibilities and unequal access to commissioning opportunities.

And so to Dame Kristin Scott Thomas who has suggested that male theatre critics fail to grasp the female experience, arguing that plays by women receive unfair treatment. 

Picking up a lifetime achievement gong at the Women’s Prize for Playwriting ceremony, Scott Thomas said: “Where would I be without women playwrights?” she said. “To be honest, absolutely nowhere.” 

But Scott Thomas pointed to her recent role in Penelope Skinner’s flimsy drama Lyonesse, that ran at the Harold Pinter Theatre. The shoddy play, an exploration of the raw deal women get, drew strong audiences but sharply divided critics. “The play was mostly hated by the critics,” she said. “So why did people flock to the Pinter to catch it before we all vanished?”

Producer Ellie Keel, the co-founder of the The Women’s prize for playwriting later told The Stage: “Lyonesse was received as a very mediocre play, when actually it wasn’t. It feels like women writers are held to different standards, and written about in different ways.”

She continued “We don’t necessarily need more female critics. I just think the men should do better.” 

Cards on the table, sometimes I see things like this and just think sod it, just bugger off; Lyonesse was an entirely mediocre play. Negative (truthful) reviews come from respecting theatre not hating it.

That said, we are thankfully a long way from the kind of reviews by Telegraph critic Charles Spencer, who coined the phrase “pure theatrical Viagra”, that he used to describe a production of The Blue Room starring Nicole Kidman. Thank goodness. 

Changing your mind about a piece of work is part of the daily lexicon of being a critic. Michael Billington regretted his belligerent review of the late Sarah Kane’s Blasted. He queried how such naive rubbish had passed the Royal Court’s play-selection committee. Years later he suggested that his ‘initial comprehension’ had prevented him from giving an ‘honest assessment of its virtues and faults.’

Anyhow. The critical responses for Lyonesse, were mixed rather than out and out hostile. Times critic Clive Davis awarded it one star [he seemed to enjoy it as much as me]. 

Responding to Scott Thomas this week, Davis says: “Lyonesse may have done good business at the box office but I wonder how many advance tickets were sold before the show opened purely on the basis of Scott Thomas and (Lily) James’s star names? Blaming the patriarchy won’t wash. Bad writing is bad writing.” 

Well, quite. Critic Susannah Clapp observed that while Lyonesse contained “a kernel of interest” in its exploration of whether women feel trapped by systemic patriarchy, “this is not enough to give the play a pulse,” she said.

At the time, I wrote that the cast appeared so contorted by the lame material that they might have preferred the “sweet release of a stun gun rather than endure one more second.”

Furthermore, one cannot rewrite the past. Yet despite the reviews, Lyonesse enjoyed a sold-out run and reportedly broke box office records more than 20 times.

Reappraising the fiasco Lyonesse, though, is not the solution.

Face it, there is an irony here. Some contemporary writers position themselves as champions of inclusivity and enlightenment, yet produce work that feels strikingly one-sided, offering little generosity or nuance toward male characters: they cannot even bring themselves to give a character with a scrotum one decent part or even line. 

Others may call this kind of work bold or an uncompromising feminist truth; in Lyonesse I saw something doomed, heavy-handed and reductive. A shoddy star vehicle.

This strain of half-baked commercial theatre, preoccupied with grievance but short on balance, has become increasingly common in recent decades. Which makes you wonder: if that represents progress, is it at the very least contentious? 

Of course, I mostly agree with Scott Thomas. If critics are predominantly male, then female writers will be disadvantaged. But some of Britain’s best theatre critics are women and they loathed Lyonesse, too. 

Hitherto, the question that now needs asking by everyone is why do female playwrights continue to be offered fewer creative opportunities than men and what can we do about it? 

It does feel like way, way, way past time we found out.

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The Best Theatre To See In 2026 


Hello to you,

I’m fine thanks for asking.

Most of this newsletter has been stuck in drafts for a week or two because I have been busy. It was a different time, last week, and society has moved on. 

Here it is. 

Cheers!

Carl W x

Orphans
Jermyn Street Theatre
5–24 January 2026
Lyle Kessler’s Tony-nominated play about two orphaned brothers living on the edge in Philadelphia. Forbes Masson, Chris Walley and Fred Woodley Evans star in an intense revival in an intimate space.

Eat the Rich (but maybe not me mates x)
Soho Theatre
12–31 January 2026
The sold-out Edinburgh Fringe hit arrives in London, directed by Tatenda Shamiso. Already tipped for a screen adaptation, returns are expected to be snapped up fast.

Arcadia
Old Vic Theatre
24 January – 21 March 2026
Tom Stoppard’s modern classic returns in an in-the-round staging, its themes of time, loss and knowledge newly resonant following the playwright’s death last year.


The Unlikely Pilgrimage of Harold Fry
Theatre Royal Haymarket
29 January – 18 April 2026
Adapted from Rachel Joyce’s novel, with music by Passenger, this West End transfer favours emotional generosity over spectacle.

American Psycho
Almeida Theatre
22 January – 14 March 2026
Oh my God. Rupert Goold revisits his musical adaptation of Bret Easton Ellis’s novel ahead of his move to run the Old Vic. Expect a sharper second take.

The Constant Wife
UK tour – opens Blackpool
From January 2026
Kara Tointon stars in Laura Wade’s adaptation of W Somerset Maugham’s comedy, directed by Tamara Harvey. The tour launches in Blackpool soon before travelling nationwide and concluding aboard the Queen Mary 2 during a transatlantic crossing.

Broken Glass
Young Vic
February 2026
Arthur Miller’s rarely staged late play is directed by Jordan Fein, currently acclaimed for Into the Woods at the Bridge Theatre.

Dracula
Noël Coward Theatre
4 February – 30 May 2026
Kip Williams returns to the one-actor, multi-role format that made The Picture of Dorian Gray a sensation. Cynthia Erivo plays all 23 roles.

Double Indemnity
UK tour – opens Eastbourne
From February 2026
Mischa Barton makes her UK stage debut in an adaptation of James M Cain’s noir classic, directed by Oscar Toeman.

Yentl
Marylebone Theatre
6 March – 12 April 2026
The acclaimed Yiddish-English production from Kadimah Yiddish Theatre arrives in London after award-winning international runs. One to get to pronto. 

Teeth ’n’ Smiles
Duke of York’s Theatre
13 March – 6 June 2026
Rebecca Lucy Taylor (Self Esteem) stars in David Hare’s play about a washed-up rock star, directed by Daniel Raggett.

John Proctor Is the Villain
Royal Court Theatre
20 March – 25 April 2026
Kimberly Belflower’s Broadway hit arrives in the UK as part of the Royal Court’s 70th anniversary season. Exciting innit. 

Inter Alia
West End
19 March – 20 June 2026
Rosamund Pike stars in Suzie Miller’s follow-up to Prima Facie, transferring after a sold-out National Theatre run. Catch it if you can. 

Romeo and Juliet
Harold Pinter Theatre
16 March – 6 June 2026
Sadie Sink and Noah Jupe make their West End stage debuts in Robert Icke’s new production. This will be guaranteed to be interesting.

Grace Pervades
Theatre Royal Haymarket
From April 2026
Ralph Fiennes stars as Victorian acting legend Henry Irving opposite Miranda Raison’s Ellen Terry in this transfer from Theatre Royal Bath. Quality drama. 

Please Please Me
Kiln Theatre
16 April – 23 May 2026
Tom Wright’s new play explores the rise of The Beatles through the story of their manager Brian Epstein, directed by Amit Sharma. Fab. 

Care
Young Vic
From May 2026
Alexander Zeldin’s first new play since The Inequalities, focusing on Britain’s care system. Interesting all round. 

Fourteen Again

The Victoria Wood Theatre 

8- 30 May 2026 

Ten years after her death, the creator of Acorn Antiques will be honoured with a theatre bearing her name when the former Old Laundry Theatre in Bowness-on-Windermere becomes the Victoria Wood Theatre this January. This is a musical by Tom MacRae, based on Wood’s songs. I can’t wait.

End of the Rainbow

Soho Theatre Walthamstow 

15 May – 21 June 2026

Jinkx Monsoon stars as Judy Garland in Peter Quilter’s play about the singer’s final months. Brilliant. 

Pride

National Theatre

11 June – 12 September 2026

Matthew Warchus adapts his 2014 film into a new musical. Let us hope it is good. 

Jesus Christ Superstar

London Palladium 

20 June – 5 September 2026

Eurovision songbird Sam Ryder stars as Jesus in a new staging with choreography by Drew McOnie and design by Tom Scutt.

Kimberly Akimbo

Hampstead Theatre

28 August – 7 November 2026

The Tony-winning Broadway musical about a teenager who ages four times faster than normal makes its London debut.

Golden Boy 

Almeida Theatre 

8 September – 31 October 2026

Josh O’Connor stars alongside a live string quartet, directed by Sam Yates.

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Top 5 Shows of 2025 🏆

You have probably been wondering about the five best British theatre shows of the last twelve months. Well, here you go.

And the best shows of 2025 are…

  1. Kenrex

Jack Holden delivers a brilliant and harrowing monodrama at The Other Palace, based on the true story of a violent US psychopath in small-town Missouri.

Co-written with Ed Stambollouian, Holden’s storytelling is masterful. The music is fantastic, with multiple microphones used to convey Holden’s range of voices. Top dollar theatre.

2. Stereophonic

This struck a chord with me. The story of a fictional 70s British-American rock band trying to make an album for compelling drama resonated with me. The searing songs became the source of much drama, particularly when the group fought over which would make the final album.

To be sure: Stereophonic isn’t a jukebox musical, nor is it by-the-numbers biography. This was a sophisticated and classy production that stood out in a year of movie musicals and deadbeat celebrity reimaginings and revivals.

  1. All My Sons

Bryan Cranston, Marianne Jean-Baptiste, Paapa Essiedu and Hayley Squires shone in Ivo van Hove’s terrific production -Van Hove raised Arthur Miller’s rebuttal of the American Dream to something akin to Greek tragedy.

He also chucked out anything not strictly necessary: he proves it does not have to be radical in terms of staging or the treatment of text itself.

The performance is almost entirely underscored with an atmospheric, solemn score. Electrifying and heartbreaking.

4. Into The Woods Stephen Sondheim’s fiendish score was carried with panache by the immaculate cast in this first London production for almost a decade. James Lapine’s story weaves together several fairy tales, including “Cinderella”, “Rapunzel”, “Jack and the Beanstalk”, and “Little Red Riding Hood”.

    Tom Scutt’s affecting costume and set designs added to the cinematic spell. It was a profoundly moving experience, and I can’t wait to watch it again.

      5. Jesus Christ Superstar

      Tim Rice and Andrew Lloyd Webber’s 1971 Biblical rock musical was strikingly relevant in this powerful summer staging at the Watermill Theatre, Newbury. It featured a large cast of talented actor-musicians and a real garden scene in Gethsemane.

      This memorable revival played to the intimate 220 seat venue, making it a major success and a joy. A treat for all ages. Sod Evita.

      Special mention to: Inter Alia, White Horse, The Habits, One Man Musical, Much Ado About Nothing. Paddington The Musical. Evita.

      Fiascos: Burlesque – the musical, Hunger Games on stage, Elektra, Bacchae, Clarkston, Saving Mozart.

      I will take no further questions.

      Bye for now,

      Carl W x

      P.S I would like to hear about your theatre highlights and lowlights of the year. Share your thoughts now – it’s nice to hear from people.

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      Has Theatre Finally Run Out of Ideas? 🎭

      This week, while reading The Economist, I stumbled across a terrific article titled: “Has culture in the 21st century become samey and dull?” Ooh.

      The 21st century, author W. David Marx argues, has stopped innovating. “Where society once encouraged and provided an abundance of cultural invention,” he writes in his new book, “there is now a blank space.”

      Another way to understand 21st-century Western culture, with its subtle variations and recurring patterns, is as a chronicle of relative complacency.

      Global upheavals have certainly shaken the arts, but none have matched the cataclysms that propelled the creative leaps of the early 20th century, which Marx so admires. In extremis, could today’s meme-addled creators rise to that level of genius? Let’s hope we don’t have to find out.

      Lionsgate bet that its newest franchise gamble will pay off as The Hunger Games: On Stage landed with a thud at London’s Troubadour Canary Wharf Theatre. Indeed, the latest entrant in Hollywood’s increasingly desperate flirtation with theatre.

      Spare a thought, then, for Deadline’s Baz Bamigboye, who delivered the best review of the lot: “It’s adapted by Conor McPherson from The Hunger Games books by Suzanne Collins and the film starring Jennifer Lawrence. There’s nothing more to say about it.” Oof.

      None of this is new, of course. Disney rewrote the rulebook decades ago, turning The Lion King, Beauty and the Beast and Aladdin into Broadway cash machines. But with studios choking on franchise fatigue and battered by unpredictable box office returns, theatrical spin-offs are no longer indulgent experiments, they are a survival strategy.

      Universal tried it last year with hit Broadway musical of Death Becomes Her. Lionsgate has gone further, building a full theatrical pipeline: a Wonder stage adaptation opens in Boston this December, while Now You See Me Live occupies the Sydney Opera House. Next year brings a La La Land musical and a new staging of Dirty Dancing. The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy. Talented Mr Ripley, Freaky Friday, Beetlejuice & Karate Kid – The Musical. And on it goes.

      Meanwhile, the pipeline runs both ways: Wicked is now completing the holy trinity: book to stage to mega-budget film(s).

      Studios say they’re merely responding to shifting audience behaviour. “In an age dominated by digital consumption, that shared live experience is hugely appealing,” says Jenefer Brown, Lionsgate’s president of global products and experiences. It’s hard to disagree. “Experiential” remains the industry’s favourite magic word.

      Yet quietly, a more intriguing shift is underway: London has become Hollywood’s R&D department. Soaring costs in New York mean US producers are fleeing to the West End, where it’s cheaper to test, tweak, and *if necessary* crash a new show without obliterating the budget. Why risk a Broadway belly-flop when you can incubate your next franchise hit in Canary Wharf?

      If you are just joining us, the West End itself is thriving. Last year, attendance reached 17.1 million, an 11% jump above pre-pandemic levels. One American investor told me, only half-seriously: “I don’t want every producer in the States getting the same idea.”

      They already have. London’s 2024 season resembled a parade of American imports: glossy musical machines (Clueless, The Devil Wears Prada), star-led prestige offerings (Brie Larson in Elektra), and quirky experiments (Oscar at The Crown, Shucked). On the surface, this looks like an injection of new blood; beneath it lies a more troubling question: is British theatre becoming a convenient laboratory for America’s unfinished work?

      This might be easier to swallow if the West End weren’t already drowning in shows built from existing IP. Paddington: The Musical isn’t awful; it just lacks crucial musicality.

      Either way, original musicals, meanwhile, are thin on the ground. In their place: historical remixes, jukebox nostalgia, reimaginings, movie remakes.

      Producers argue that spiralling costs leave them no choice; familiar titles are the only dependable way to keep the lights on. Perhaps. But London’s stages cannot become a playground for Hollywood risk-management. Nor can they survive on a diet of recycled brands. The West End is booming, but unless we protect space for bold, original work, what’s the point? Audiences deserve more than factory-farmed storytelling dressed up as innovation.

      And it’s not just about movie musicals. Nadine Rennie, co-chair of the Casting Directors’ Guild, recently claimed that casting household names in shows is “killing” the industry.

      Are producers increasingly lazy, arrogant, or simply incompetent, or are they being unfairly chastised for paying warm homage to the movies and intellectual property they, and we, grew up with? And after 2,500 years of this thing we call theatre, are the chances of writing something brand new simply, mathematically, fewer?

      So let’s put some sensible bans in place: no more staging movie adaptations purely to cash in, no more flying in celebrities to drain the energy from a production, and no more long-running shows monopolising our great West End theatres.

      Anyway. Broadway diva Patti LuPone nailed it this week when she said: “I think that Congress, federal and Supreme Court judges, and Broadway musicals should have term limits.”

      That’s all.

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      British Theatre Is Failing The Working Class


      CLASS has always played a part in my life, from my childhood in a council house to my commitment and militant passion that theatre should be for everyone. 

      When I was a kid, I remember my dad asking, “When are you going to get a real job?” I’d done well in my GCSE’s — the creative subjects and ones I enjoyed — I wanted to pursue these subjects at A level. I was determined to become the first in my family to go to university. But he (a health and safety executive) still believed that people didn’t make money from the arts. 

      In reality, that mindset runs deep. Many working-class people still see the arts as something not meant for them — a world that feels distant, exclusive, and unattainable. We need to change that urgently.

      That said, I can socialise with my well-off theatre friends, but I’ll never think like them. I’ll never see the world through the lense of privilege. Many of them dismiss “working class” as an outdated idea — but it isn’t. Being working class isn’t about what job you do, or whether you work at all. It’s about the circumstances you’re born into — the values, the outlook, and the barriers that shape how you see and move through the world.

      The UK’s creative industries are frequently hailed as an engine of innovation and soft power. But behind the rhetoric lies a persistent class divide in who gets to participate, study and succeed in creative fields. Research from the Sutton Trust (A Class Act, 2024) highlights that people from professional and managerial backgrounds dominate elite roles across film, television, music and the performing arts. Working-class representation in many creative occupations has halved over recent decades. Oh dear.

      Private-school alumni are dramatically overrepresented among leading actors and classical musicians despite only 7% of the population being privately educated. As Sutton Trust CEO Nick Harrison has argued, “Talented young people from poorer homes are being blocked from studying creative arts degrees and breaking into creative professions.”

      That class divide starts early. Cultural Learning Alliance (CLA) data show that children’s access to arts subjects is shrinking. Its Report Card 2024 found a 42% decline in GCSE arts entries since 2010 and steep falls in A-level entries. The number of arts teachers in state secondary schools in England has fallen by over a quarter since 2011, with hours of arts teaching dropping by more than 20%. These cuts hit state schools and disadvantaged areas hardest, reducing the chances of nurturing skills and interests in arts and design.

      Arts Council England’s own Equality, Diversity and Inclusion data show similar structural issues. While there has been some progress in diversifying leadership and workforce on ethnicity, disability and gender, socio-economic diversity remains a blind spot. ACE repeatedly states that it wants “the diversity of audiences, leaders, producers and creators of creativity and culture to reflect the diversity of contemporary England,” but its reports show that this ambition is far from realised.

      The arts are not where they should be in education system: centre stage. Campaign groups continue to be vocal about this. The Campaign for the Arts warns that the decline in school arts provision and cuts to higher education funding risk turning the arts into “an elite activity” once again. Director Jack Gamble said, “The arts have a proven role in contributing to better outcomes for children and young people, but they have been sidelined and underfunded. It’s high time we turned this around.” Their analysis shows arts subjects now make up only around 7% of GCSE entries, down from 13% in 2010, with a widening participation gap between the most and least deprived young people.

      Earlier this year, an impact report, including data from the Creative Mentor Network, indicated that working-class representation across the creative industries declined from 26% in 2020 to 19% in 2023. I am only surprised that figure isn’t lower. 

      Over the weekend, I was thrilled to hear from James Graham that he and producers for the West End run of Punch have decided that any profits made from the production will go towards the show being accessible to young people around the UK and beyond in the future.

      Elsewhere, the evidence points to systemic rather than incidental barriers. Unpaid internships, expensive audition fees, and shrinking public provision all privilege those with private means. Campaigners and researchers recommend targeted investment in arts education in disadvantaged schools, banning unpaid roles and costly audition fees, and making public funding conditional on socio-economic inclusion.

      Indeed, when creative leadership and storytelling are drawn from a narrow social base, the range of stories, voices and experiences on stage, page and screen narrows too. If Britain’s culture is to be truly representative, policy and funding must treat class with the same seriousness as race, gender and disability — and rebuild routes that allow talent to flourish regardless of background.

      The strata of class are varied and vast. Many leading artists warn that this entrenched “class ceiling” is stifling innovation and creativity. As actor Christopher Eccleston, who grew up in Salford, recently told The Guardian:

      “If you grow up in the north-west, you don’t feel culture and the arts belong to you. You don’t believe that if you come from a council estate you can be an actor, a poet, or a painter.”

      I’m encouraged to see former chief prosecutor Nazir Afzal, now Chancellor of the University of Manchester, leading efforts to improve working-class representation in the creative industries across Greater Manchester. Given the Labour government’s limited success in addressing this crisis nationally, focusing on local solutions is a brilliant and much-needed approach.

      “There is a wealth of research showing that working class representation in UK creative industries is at its lowest level in decades and many leading artists have warned that the class ceiling is holding back innovation and creativity,” Afzal said. Yet that can no longer be an excuse for failing to ensure class is treated as an equal marker of diversity and inclusion — in how we monitor employment practices, set targets for commissioning and grants, and confer awards.

      For a time, there was a proactive effort to address the imbalance of working-class representation in the theatre industry: a group called Common. It aimed to unite working-class creatives through mentoring, campaigning, and the creation of a database — a practical resource for producers, employers, and funders seeking working-class directors, writers, or choreographer, for example.

      Alas — as is too often the case — a mix of structural pressures, compounded by the impact of the pandemic led to the group disbanding. 

      Thus it increasingly frustrating to know that every pound invested in the arts generates a £1.27 return for the local economy. Investing in the arts isn’t just good economics—it’s a catalyst for growth, a source of social cohesion, and a powerful vehicle for cultural empowerment.

      What’s worse, financial exploitation in theatre is rife — from the reliance on unpaid interns (great news for those who can afford it) to volunteer community choruses padding out productions, and freelancers paid so little they’re struggling to put food on the table amid a relentless cost of living crisis.

      We know that many talented creative workers have left or are considering leaving the theatre industry; this is not acceptable – freelancers make up almost half of the workforce. Without freelancers, the industry simply wouldn’t exist. The only reason I’m still here — writing about the industry, working in it, and fighting for it — is because I’m stubborn, and, frankly, resilient to a fault.

      How do we ensure that people from the working classes find pathways into the arts? How do we move away from ‘connections, connections, connections’? Who tells the story determines the story that is told. And it is bloody obvious that economic growth would be increased, risk-taking enhanced and consumers better-served if arts organisations had more staff from less privileged upbringings. Duh. 

      Anyway, for all of the efforts made by many of you still reading this, it should shame us all that British theatre is one of the most centralised and exclusive industries in the UK.

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