Sydney Theatre Company has unveiled its 2027 season, with Richard Roxburgh, Heather Mitchell, Tim Minchin and Celeste Barber among the names set to take the stage across 13 productions next year.
The program, Artistic Director Mitchell Butel’s second since taking the top job at STC, features four world premieres of new Australian works, and six Australian premieres across the company’s three venues.
Launching the season at Roslyn Packer Theatre on Monday night, Butel said family and community emerged as recurring threads across the 2027 program, while also making the case for live performance at a time when artificial intelligence is reshaping creative industries.
“AI cannot do what these artists can do live on stage, and it will never be able to match the brilliance, complexity and immediacy that is created in a theatre,” Butel said.
“Throughout the diversity of viewpoints, voices, history and entertainment we will bring you in 2027, many of the stories explore family: how they shape us, how some families are chosen, how they can hurt us, but also how they can heal.”
Butel described the artists appearing throughout the season as a “constellation of stars,” but said the sense of family extended beyond those audiences see on stage.
“Families are also made when we create theatre,” he said. “The community of staff and creators at STC is something to behold, working together to create brilliant theatre for our other family — our community of audiences.”
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Opening the 2027 season in January will be the Australian premiere of Robert Icke’s contemporary adaptation of “Oedipus”, which reunites Mitchell and Roxburgh on stage for the first time in 30 years.
At the opposite end of the calendar, Minchin will star in the Sydney premiere of the Old Vic production of Jack Thorne’s “A Christmas Carol”, bringing the 2027 season to a close.
Among the four world premieres is “The Palace Letters”, Melanie Tait’s adaptation of Jenny Hocking’s book chronicling the historian’s lengthy legal battle to gain access to correspondence between former governor-general Sir John Kerr and Buckingham Palace surrounding the dismissal of the Whitlam government.
Georgie Parker will play Hocking, with Jonathan Biggins taking on the role of former prime minister Gough Whitlam.
Pip Williams’ bestselling novel “The Bookbinder of Jericho” will also make its stage debut in a new adaptation by Verity Laughton, while the “Miss Fisher” universe will expand with “Miss Fisher’s Murder Mysteries: Death by Deckchair”, a new story written by Deb Cox, who co-created the original television series with Fiona Eagger.
Rounding out the world premieres is “Amah and Nanna” from Disapol Savetsila, winner of the 2026 Patrick White Playwrights Award.
Barber, meanwhile, will make her STC debut in the Australian premiere of Amy Sedaris and David Sedaris’ comedy “The Book of Liz”.
Eryn Jean Norvill will lead a new Australian production of Simon Stephens’ “Vanya”, while Andrea Demetriades will star in Gina Gionfriddo’s dark comedy “Becky Shaw”, directed by Butel. The play was a Pulitzer Prize finalist in 2009 and returned to Broadway in 2026.
Melbourne Theatre Company Artistic Director Anne-Louise Sarks will also cross state lines to direct the Australian premiere of “John Proctor Is the Villain”.
For more information on the Sydney Theatre Company’s 2027 season, tickets and subscription information, visit sydneytheatre.com.au.