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A new Donmar Warehouse season has been announced and it kicks off pretty sharpish: it seems likely (if unconfirmed) that the playwright Caryl Churchill’s recent decision to withdraw an unnamed play of hers from production at the boutique Covent Garden powerhouse has led to a bit of scrabbling around to shore up the schedule.
The schedule would now seem to be shored up, however, kicking off next month with the debut of a new play by the prolific, mercurial Mike Bartlett. Directed by James Macdonald, Juniper Blood (Aug 16-Oct 4) follows Lip and Ruth, a couple who have quit the city to pursue a more ethical life in the country. But what’s the real price of pursuing your dreams in an imperfect world? As you’d imagine for a play that basically starts in a month, it has a full cast already: Terique Jarrett, Hattie Morahan, Nadia Parkes, Jonathan Slinger and Sam Troughton will star.
The most intriguing show of the season is an adaptation of Jean Genet’s The Maids (Oct 13-Nov 29) by Kip Williams. Genet’s surrealist class satire is a reasonably regularly performed classic (Jamie Lloyd did it not so long ago) but the really interesting dimension here is Williams. The Australian director is essentially solely known over here for his ultra high tech one-woman take on Oscar Wilde’s The Picture of Dorian Gray (which starred Sarah Snook); next year he’s back in the West End with a similar version of Dracula performed by Cynthia Erivo. Will this be along similar lines? We’re promised a ‘wild reimagining’; it’ll be fascinating to see what that involves.
Finally, Donmar boss Tim Sheader directs a revival of JB Priestley’s When We Are Married (Dec 6-Feb 7 2026). The comedy about a trio of Yorkshire couples who discover on the occasion of their triple silver wedding anniversary that they are not in fact married is probably Priestley’s most famous play that isn’t An Inspector Calls, but it’s still not been done in London in an age and should be a fun way to see out 2025. The cast includes Siobhan Finneran, Samantha Spiro, Sophie Thompson and Marc Wootton.
Tickets for the new Donmar Warehouse season will go on general sale July 18.
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