The best theatre to see in 2026
Sexual politics dominate the year’s most anticipated plays
ByTheatre review
Christmas Day captures the generational divide among British Jews
Questions about identity propel Sam Grabiner’s new play at the Almeida Theatre
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Bryan Cranston and Paapa Essiedu are flawless in All My Sons
Ivo van Hove’s adaptation of Arthur Miller’s play embraces the story’s raw tragedy
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Ambika Mod is luminous and feral in Porn Play
Sophia Chetin-Leuner’s new production is sure to make her a star
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Othello is missing the tragedy
Tom Morris’s production starring David Harewood makes the audience side with the wrong character
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How not to adapt a great novel
The new theatre adaptation of Alan Hollinghurst’s The Line of Beauty loses the beauty
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The Importance of Being Hyper-Earnest
Max Webster’s queer reimagining of the Oscar Wilde classic is an explosion of conflicting performances
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The Lady from the Sea drowns out the Ibsen
Simon Stone’s contemporary take on the Victorian-era family drama is witty but struggles against its rain-soaked staging
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Doomers records our AI angst
We have reached a strange moment in human imagination
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Black Power Desk reminds us that protest suppression is nothing new
Urielle Klein-Mekongo’s 1970s-set musical explores the consequences of state overreach
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The Estate is a Westminster fever-dream
Shaan Sahota’s debut play dances confusingly between the roles played by race, class and gender in our politics.
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Run Sister Run is a winding descent into tragedy
Chloë Moss’s play explores addiction, codependence and time’s cruel loops in a stark, intimate staging.
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Evita for the West End masses
While Rachel Zegler sings “Don’t Cry for Me Argentina” to a crowd outside the Palladium, the audience inside may ponder…
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Quadrophenia the ballet is a storm of movement
The dance version of the Who’s rock opera is full of stunning choreography, but the classic mod story is lost…
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4.48 Psychosis is a disturbing dissection of the mind
At the Royal Court, Sarah Kane’s high-intensity play reveals the desperation of severe mental illness.
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Stereophonic: all the sex, drugs, tears and boredom of true rock ’n’ roll
Can a musical about flights of creativity survive a setting of earthbound realism?
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Thom Yorke’s Hamlet is brilliantly rendered sacrilege
In an inventive theatrical mash-up, Radiohead’s album Hail to the Thief perfectly articulates the prince’s torment.
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It’s the Economy, Stupid is a polemic about the perils of capitalism
This show is both a whistlestop tour of modern economics and Joe Sellman-Leava’s attempt to understand why he’s always broke.
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London’s season of sexed-up Shakespeare
New productions of Richard II and Much Ado About Nothing both burnish their texts with hot celebrity appeal – but…
Kyoto gives voice to the urgency of the climate crisis
Soho Place’s perceptive and absorbing production shrewdly reminds its audience that there is nothing more exciting than saving the world.
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