Welcome to the 2026 Season at Sydney Theatre Company and the first season I have curated as Artistic Director and Co-CEO. It has been a great privilege, honour and delight to build (with the incredible support of the Company’s Board, Foundation, Executive Director and Co-CEO, Anne Dunn and a brilliant group of Company staff colleagues and partners) a season that I hope will feed, entertain, challenge, soothe, awaken, dazzle and dare you in more ways than you’d expect!
And it’s been a similar delight to have built it with the input of so many great artists who have brought their dreams to us and which will now spring to life on stage in 2026.
What our artists imagine is only made real when it is shared with and received by you – our audience. I’m so glad you’ve opened these pages to begin that journey with us and so thankful to those who have travelled here before and are coming back for more!
Like the wonderful Sydney Theatre Company Artistic Directors who have preceded me, I want to share with you a diversity of works and genres and voices. In this season, you’ll find three exciting world premiere Australian works, other recent Australian gems, the best of contemporary international theatrical writing and beloved and classic tales told anew. And some really good tunes. All created by a cavalcade of acting, directing and designing talents. Some at the beginning of their careers, some returning to the Company after soaring to thrilling professional heights.
At the heart of all the shows in our season is a desire to hold space for difference. It is something that I think theatre does better than any other cultural medium.
Theatre is often created when we collectively witness two opposing views come into close contact. Sometimes they collide. And drama is born. But sometimes, thesis and antithesis become synthesised and we’re offered a new way of seeing things. Or we see deeper into what troubles our heroes and by extension, us.
There is a work by American conceptual/visual artist Barbara Kruger that is made up of three words “BELIEF+DOUBT=SANITY”. I like that notion a lot.
In many of the shows we have in store for you this year, you’ll witness many beliefs and values challenged and doubted, sometimes dramatically, sometimes comically, even musically. Either way, I’m hopeful that you’ll leave the theatre readier to realise that holding a different view to your neighbour is not only not as frightening as you think but could be what ultimately makes the world spin forward. That what is “normal” for one may not be for another. And that appreciating that, investigating it, even celebrating it, is something pretty special and something very human. And something that helps us more fully understand and value the planet we find ourselves on and the time we find ourselves in.
We think all the shows we have planned in 2026 are pretty special. We hope you do too. I’m so looking forward to the journey we’re all about to go on together.
Mitchell Butel
Artistic Director & Co-CEO