Brilliant shows heading for Liverpool in 2026
- Catherine Jones
- 4 hours ago
- 12 min read
Liverpool venues have lined up a brilliant 12 months of entertainment to see the city’s theatre lovers through 2026 from start to finish.
Despite the ongoing financial challenges being faced in the arts – as in the country at large, Liverpool theatre world has if anything upped its game even further with a whole host of must-see productions heading our way between January and December.
Whether it’s old friends, first time visitors, acclaimed touring productions, re-visited classics, brilliant musicals, hard-hitting dramas or new homegrown productions being created especially for the 2026 season – I’m looking at you Royal Court and Liverpool Everyman, the curtain will be going up on great shows here, there and everywhere.
Here are just some of the treats that have already been announced for the next 12 months. For the much fuller programme, and to keep an eye on new productions, visit individual theatre websites.
Inspector Morse: House of Ghosts – Liverpool Playhouse
January 13-17
Liverpool has given the world one Morse (Endeavour’s Shaun Evans) and now the world is giving Liverpool a Morse in return.
Tom Chambers stars as the opera-loving, classic car-driving Oxford detective in this first ever stage adaptation of Colin Dexter’s hit TV series.
What begins as a suspicious death inquiry takes a darker turn when the legendary inspector, accompanied by his sidekick Det Sergeant Lewis, uncovers a connection to the sinister events in his past some 25 years earlier.
Book HERE
Mary Poppins – Liverpool Empire
January 14-31
Spit spot, this way for the arrival of Mary Poppins at the Liverpool of Empire for a supercalifragilisticexpialidocious fortnight of fun. Umbrellas are optional.
The spectacular production, from Cameron Macintosh and Disney, flies in to the city as part of a tour of the UK and Ireland and promises a magical experience for the whole family.
Book HERE
The Marian Hotel – Unity Theatre
February 6-7
The Marian Hotel enjoyed a sold-out tour across the North of Ireland in 2024 and now it’s coming to Liverpool for early 2026.
Its 1979, Kitty is pregnant. She is on her own, not by choice.
She arrives in a mother and baby home. Nothing could have prepared her for this. The young women hold each other up with sharp, dark humour against the backdrop of the war in the North of Ireland.
The play, based on Caitriona Cunningham’s lived experience of being in Marianvale mother and baby home in Newry, is described as a searing – and moving - portrayal of a dark time in Irish history and is accompanied by a 70s/80s soundtrack.
Book HERE
Our Little Hour – Hope Street Theatre
February 19-21
Hailed as ‘an intensely moving new musical drama’, Our Little Hour it tells the inspirational story of Walter Tull - grandson of a Barbadian slave and orphaned at just eight years old, and how he rose to prominence as the first black footballer to play at the highest level of the domestic game in the UK.
Not only that, but Tull then went on to become the first man of his heritage to be commissioned as an officer in the British Army.
The show is written by award winning playwright Dougie Blaxland and including 16 ‘hauntingly beautiful’ original songs.
Book HERE
The Memory of Water – Liverpool Everyman
February 25 to March 14
The Liverpool Everyman and Playhouse and Bolton Octagon are staging a major 30th anniversary revival of Shelagh Stephenson’s Olivier Award-winning play about families, grief, and the unreliable narratives we inherit.
Winter, 1996. The Spice Girls are riding high in the charts, football has failed to come home, and Dolly the Sheep has been cloned.
Meanwhile, on the eve of their mum’s funeral, Mary, Teresa and Catherine return to their Northern childhood home for the first time in years. As they sort through clothes, keepsakes and ghosts of the past, the whisky flows, resentments surface, and long-held silences crack open with unexpected laughter.
Book HERE
Blithe Spirit - Hope Street Theatre
February 25-28
The Off West End Award-winning Northern Comedy Theatre returns to Hope Street for 2026, this time with Noel Coward’s classic comedy.
Former Corrie star Steven Arnold leads the cast in the story of celebrated author Charles Condomine who decides to host a séance to gather inspiration for his next book but never imagines he will invite more than just creative ideas into his life. Enter Elvira, the mischievous spirit of his late first wife, who returns from the afterlife with one mission in mind – to disrupt Charles' new marriage.
Expect witty dialogue, supernatural shenanigans, and the kind of chaos only a ghost can bring.
Book HERE
Dear England – Liverpool Empire
March 3-7
James Graham’s award-winning drama, centred around Gareth Southgate’s time as the England football manager (when he enacted what has been described as a ‘gentle revolution’), arrives at the Empire as part of a UK tour.
On the surface, the play is about the cultural significance of football in Britain and the challenges faced by the national team.
But it also uses the England squad as a way of examining themes like national identity and patriotism, what we understand as masculinity and the role of men in a changing society.
Book HERE
The Constant Wife – Liverpool Playhouse
March 10-14
Former EastEnder Kara Tointon takes the leading role in this Royal Shakespeare Company production coming to Liverpool ahead of a West End run.
1927. Constance is a very unhappy woman. “Nonsense” says her mother “she eats well, sleeps well, dresses well and she’s losing weight. No woman can be unhappy in those circumstances.” Constance is the perfect wife and mother, and her husband is as devoted to her as he is to his mistress, who just happens to be her best friend.
Adapted by Olivier Award-winner Laura Wade from Somerset Maugham’s glittering comedy, The Constant Wife is directed by RSC co-artistic director Tamara Harvey and features original music by Jamie Cullum.
Book HERE
Waiting for Godot – Liverpool Everyman
March 17 to April 4
Everyman Rep Company alumni Matthew Kelly and George Costigan reunite on the Hope Street theatre stage in a ‘made in Liverpool’ production of Beckett’s classic.
Set in a shifting, timeless landscape, Waiting for Godot follows two men, Vladimir and Estragon, as they wait for someone who may never come. As they pass the time with scraps of conversation, moments of tenderness and flashes of dark humour, their story becomes a moving reflection on what it means to keep going in a world that rarely offers answers.
Darkly comic and deeply moving, it is a profound exploration of what it means to be human – even when the waiting never ends.
Waiting for Godot is a three-way co-production with Citizen Theatre and the Bolton Octagon.
Book HERE
Prima Facie – Liverpool Playhouse
March 17-21
If you are lucky enough to have secured a ticket for Jodie Comer’s stage debut in her home city, you’re in for quite an experience.
Comer reprises her award-winning performance (she scooped both an Olivier and a Tony) in this hard-hitting one-woman drama.
Tessa is a thoroughbred. A young, brilliant barrister who loves to win. She has worked her way up from working class origins to be at the top of her game; prosecuting; cross examining and lighting up the shadows of doubt in any case.
An unexpected event forces her to confront the lines where the patriarchal power of the law, burden of proof and morals diverge.
Sold out.
Glorious! – Epstein Theatre
March 23-28
When filmmakers were looking for a location to shoot some of Meryl Streep and Hugh Grant-helmed Florence Foster Jenkins, they headed for Liverpool to stand in as New York City.
Now Florence is back, but this time on stage and in the person of Wendi Peters who stars as the warbling arts philanthropist in this Hope Mill Theatre production which takes over the Epstein stage for a week ahead of Easter.
Book HERE
The Shawshank Redemption – Liverpool Playhouse
March 31 to April 4
If you missed The Shawshank Redemption when it came to the Floral Pavilion last autumn, never fear because there is another chance to catch it during the spring leg of it UK tour.
The stage production, based on Stephen King’s original 1992 novella Rita Hayworth and Shawshank Redemption, stars Joe McFadden as Andy Dufresne who, despite protests of his innocence, is handed a double life sentence for the brutal murders of his wife and her lover.
Incarcerated in the notorious Shawshank facility, he quickly learns that no one can survive alone.
The production also stars Ben Onwukwe as Ellis ‘Red’ Redding – the fellow prisoner who befriends him, and Bill Ward as corrupt prison warder Stammas.
Book HERE
Conteh – Liverpool’s Royal Court
April 17 to May 9
Ten-years-old and fighting out of a club in Kirkby. Nineteen and winning gold at the Commonwealth Games. Twenty-four and becoming the light heavyweight champion of the World.
But that’s only half the story.In the 1970s and 80s, Liverpool boxer John Conteh was one of the best-known people in the city. He lived the highest of high lives and wrung every ounce of pleasure from his sporting success. A friend to many, perhaps too many, and some were quick to take advantage.
This new drama at the Royal Court is written by and stars Aron Julius.
Book HERE
Miss Saigon – Liverpool Empire
April 21 to May 2
Alain Boubill and Claude-Michel Schönberg’s other big sung-through stage musical (the one that’s NOT Les Mis) has embarked on an epic UK and Ireland tour which finally makes it to Liverpool in April.
In the last days of the Vietnam War, 17-year-old Kim is forced to work in a Saigon bar run by a notorious character known as The Engineer. There she meets and falls in love with an American GI named Chris, but they are torn apart by the fall of Saigon.
For three years Kim goes on an epic journey of survival to find her way back to Chris, who has no idea he's fathered a son.
Book HERE
The Assassination of Margaret Thatcher – Liverpool Everyman
May 2-23
Based on the incendiary short story by Hilary Mantel, The Assassination of Margaret Thatcher – written by Alexandra Wood and receiving its world premiere at the Everyman in May - is described as “darkly funny and dangerously tense – a gripping psychological thriller created for Liverpool, the Everyman and our politically violent times”.
It’s late summer, 1983. Out in the street, the world is waiting to greet Margaret Thatcher as she emerges from hospital. Just routine surgery – what on earth could go wrong? But here in this room her life is up for deadly debate… and history is holding its breath.
Two people. One window. One gun.
Book HERE
To Kill a Mockingbird – Liverpool Empire
May 12-16
The stage production of Harper Lee’s seminal American tale, adapted for the stage by Oscar-winning Aaron Sorkin as a tense courtroom drama, comes to Liverpool as part of a UK and Ireland tour.
The powerful and enduring coming-of-age story of racial injustice and childhood innocence is set in 1930s Alabama where lawyer Atticus Finch tries to prove the innocence of Tom Robinson, a Black man wrongly accused of raping a white woman.
While Finch encourages kindness and empathy in his children Scout and Jem, he is pushed to the limits of these qualities himself when he resolves to uncover the truth in a town that seems determined to hide it.
Book HERE
The Spy Who Came in From the Cold – Liverpool Playhouse
May 12-16
The work of the late John le Carré is brought to life in a thrilling stage adaptation – and it’s believed to be the first time one of his bestselling novels has been adapted for the theatre.
The Spy Who Came In From The Cold, adapted by David Eldridge and directed by Jeremy Herrin, is a riveting journey through the fog-shrouded terrain of Cold War espionage, deception, and moral compromise.
British intelligence officer Alec Leamas is weary, hardened, and ready to come in from the cold. But when Control, the Chief of the Circus, presents one final mission — dangerous, deceptive, and deeply personal — Leamas agrees to stay in the game.
Dispatched into enemy territory, he finds his convictions tested and his defences breached by Liz Gold, a quietly defiant librarian whose compassion threatens to thaw his frostbitten heart. And what of veteran spymaster George Smiley? What is his role in the operation?
Book HERE
Cured – Liverpool’s Royal Court
May 22 to June 6
For some people, a pilgrimage to Lourdes is an opportunity for prayer, contemplation and quiet self-reflection. But for Connor Fisher, a young, wheelchair-using scally, it’s just a chance to get his leg over.
After lying his way onto the trip in order to pursue Rose, a woman he meets in the queue for a disability benefit reassessment, he proceeds to lead his fellow pilgrims astray. There’s Helen who is searching for that ever-elusive miracle, and then there’s Callum who speaks with a voice synthesiser and always has a witty put-down up his sleeve.
But thanks to Connor’s influence, before long they end up doing pretty much everything Catholics hate.
Liverpool writer and comedian Laurence Clark is the playwright and the show is being produced by Liverpool’s Royal Court in partnership with Birds Of Paradise.
Book HERE
Moulin Rouge the Musical – Liverpool Empire
July 2 to August 8
Multi-award-winning musical Moulin Rouge! is set to can-can into Liverpool in summer 2026 as part of its first ever world tour.
Set in 1899 Paris, Moulin Rouge! The Musical (based on Baz Luhrmann’s 2001 film) is the story of a lovesick American writer, Christian, and Satine, the dazzling star of the titular nightclub.
When their lives collide at the Moulin Rouge, they fall hopelessly in love, only to be thwarted by the nightclub’s host and impresario, Harold Zidler, and the Duke of Monroth, the wealthy and entitled patron of the club who thinks he can buy anything he wants, including Satine.
Together with his Bohemian friends – the brilliant and starving artist Toulouse-Lautrec, and the greatest tango dancer in all of Paris, Santiago – Christian stages a musical spectacular in an attempt to save the Moulin Rouge and win the heart of Satine.
Book HERE
Take Me Home County Road – Liverpool’s Royal Court
July 31 to August 29
Shelly’s a County Road girl, born and bred, through and through. Once upon a time, she had it all – the looks, the talent, the fire in her belly. But now she’s forty-something, and life’s all gone a bit… naff. Work is fine, her mates are sound, and her hubby Mick is always there when she needs him, but something’s missing.
She knows deep down, she was born to be singer. Back in the day – before she was Mick’s missus – she had a song and a dream.
Anthony next doorstep thinks Shelly's got what it takes to make it… so he’s entered her into 'The Next Big Thing'.
Could Shelly really swap the streetlamps of County Road for the spotlights of stardom? Or is she destined to save her singing talents for a once-in-a-blue moon karaoke night down at The Black Horse?
Book HERE
Waitress – Liverpool Empire
September 7-12
West End smash hit musical Waitress makes a return booking at the Empire in September to dish up a delicious slice of entertainment after it previously played at the Lime Street theatre in 2022.
Meet Jenna, a waitress and expert pie-maker who dreams of a little happiness in her life. When a hot new doctor arrives in town, life gets complicated.
The score is from Grammy Award-winning Sarah Bareilles, and Matt Willis plays Doctor Pomatter.
Read a review of a previous production of Waitress.
Book HERE
Letter to Brezhnev – Liverpool’s Royal Court
September 11 to October 10
This new stage version of much-loved Liverpool-based film Letter to Brezhnev, written by original screenwriter Frank Clarke, receives its world premiere at the city’s Royal Court.
Theresa and Elaine are young, beautiful and full of life. But they don’t think that will last long, because it’s 1985 and this is Kirby.
Sergei and Peter are fresh off the boat and revelling in being away from the Soviet Union. Liverpool has opened their eyes.
Teresa is looking for sex and a smile, Elaine wants love, romance and the dream of a life far away from the grime of Liverpool. All of them have the chance to forget their lives and live their dreams for one glorious night.
Book HERE
Death of a Salesman – Liverpool Everyman
September 19 to October 10
Arthur Miller’s classic tale comes to the Everyman stage in a new production for autumn 2026.
Tomorrow always promised so much for Willy Loman. He’s worked hard, nurtured his dreams, put in the hours and done his best to be well liked. But as the future catches him up, why is he losing himself in yesterday’s memories? And why does tomorrow still seem so far out of reach?
Seamlessly weaving past and present into one of theatre’s most enduring stories, Death of a Salesman reveals a family at breaking point and a man in conflict with his own sense of worth.
Can Willy and those around him survive? Or will their gleaming tomorrow become a tarnished and tragic today?
Book HERE
Mean Girls – Liverpool Empire
October 19-31
Meet The Plastics – Regina, Gretchen and Karen. They rule North Shore High and will burn anyone who gets in their way. Home-schooled Cady Heron may think she knows a thing or two about survival of the fittest thanks to her zoologist parents, but high school is a whole new level of savage.
When Cady devises a plan to end Regina’s reign, she learns the hard way that you can’t cross a queen bee without getting stung.
Direct from the West End, award-winning Mean Girls is the smash-hit musical comedy from writer Tina Fey (30 Rock), composer Jeff Richmond (Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt), lyricist Nell Benjamin (Legally Blonde) and director and choreographer Casey Nicholaw (The Book of Mormon).
Book HERE
The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-time – Liverpool Empire
November 3-7
Simon Stephens’ acclaimed, multi-award-winning adaptation of Mark Haddon’s bestselling novel returns to the Liverpool Empire for autumn 2026.
Fifteen-year-old Christopher Boone stands beside Mrs Shears’ dead dog. It has been speared with a garden fork, it is seven minutes after midnight, and Christopher is under suspicion. He records each fact in the book he is writing to solve the mystery of who murdered Wellington.
The teenager has an extraordinary brain and is exceptional at maths while ill-equipped to interpret everyday life. He has never ventured alone beyond the end of his road, he detests being touched and he distrusts strangers. But his detective work, forbidden by his father, takes him on a frightening journey that upturns his world.
Read a review of a previous production of Curious Incident.
Book HERE
Mamma Mia! – Liverpool Empire
December 8 to January 3 2027
Here they go again, my my, how can you resist it? The Empire rounds off the year by welcoming the smash-hit stage musical Mamma Mia! for Christmas 2026.
When Sophie, about to get married on the Greek island where she was brought up, embarks on a quest to discover the father she’s never known it brings her mother Donna face to face with three men from her distant romantic past on the eve of a wedding they’ll never forget.
But which one of the three (if any) is Sophie’s father? And will there be more than one happily ever after?
Book HERE