MENIER CHOCOLATE FACTORY
ANNOUNCES NEW SEASON FOR 2025/2026
With its critically acclaimed production of Mel Brooks’ The Producers having opened at the Garrick Theatre in the West End earlier this week, the Menier Chocolate Factory today announces its forthcoming season for 2025/2026.
The season opens with a major revival of Noël Coward’s Fallen Angels, directed by Christopher Luscombe who returns to the Menier having previously directed Travels with My Aunt.
The season continues with two plays directed by Lindsay Posner – who also returns to the venue after productions of Alan Ayckbourn’s Communicating Doors, Mike Leigh’s Abigail’s Party and Florian Zeller’s The Truth, the latter two of which transferred to the West End – Ryan Craig’s The Holy Rosenbergs and Peter Shaffer’s modern classic Equus. Equus is presented in a co-production with Theatre Royal Bath where the production will run after performance at the Menier.
The Menier also continues its work in the US with the upcoming Off-Broadway production of Stephen Schwartz’s The Baker’s Wife, which Gordon Greenberg directs for Classic Stage Company. The cast includes Ariana DeBose, Scott Bakula and Judy Kuhn.
Artistic Director of the Menier Chocolate Factory David Babani said today, “It’s been quite a week for the Menier with our production of The Producers opening in the West End, and now announcing a season of British classics for our home in Southwark. These three wonderful plays – Fallen Angels, The Holy Rosenbergs and Equus – tackle the very contemporary and compelling themes of the power of female friendship; faith and tradition in the core of the Jewish community, and the exploration of the human psyche.”
Fallen Angels is available via priority booking for Supporters of the Menier from today, with public on sale on 24 September. On sale dates for the rest of the season will be announced shortly.
FALLEN ANGELS
By Noël Coward
Directed by: Christopher Luscombe
21 November 2025 – 21 February 2026
First performed exactly 100 years ago, Noël Coward’s outrageous comedy remains one of his funniest creations. Best friends Jane and Julia, now settled in happy marriages, receive an unexpected visit from a glamorous shared ex-boyfriend, and passions are rekindled with explosive results. This is the first London revival of the play in 25 years.
Noël Coward was one of the premiere entertainers of the 20th century. A prolific actor, lyricist, composer, singer, director, producer and playwright, Fallen Angels was one of four Coward productions performed on the West End at the same time in 1925 alongside On With The Dance, Hay Fever, and The Vortex. Famed for his acerbic wit as much as his fashion sense, the quartet of productions would promote him to one of the defining British voices of the 1920s. His more than fifty published works also include Cavalcade, Private Lives, Design for Living, Tonight at 8:30, Present Laughter, This Happy Breed and Blithe Spirit.
Christopher Luscombe’s directing credits include Twelfth Night, Love’s Labour’s Lost, Much Ado About Nothing and The Shakespeare Revue (Royal Shakespeare Company), Star Quality, The Madness of George III (Apollo Theatre), Home and Beauty (Lyric Theatre), Fascinating Aïda – Olivier Award nomination for Best Entertainment (Harold Pinter Theatre), The Comedy of Errors, The Merry Wives of Windsor and Nell Gwynn – Olivier Award for Best New Comedy (Shakespeare’s Globe), A Midsummer Night’s Dream (Regent’s Park Open Air Theatre), Enjoy (Gielgud Theatre), Alphabetical Order (Hampstead Theatre), When We Are Married – Olivier Award nomination for Best Revival (Garrick Theatre), Travels With My Aunt (Menier Chocolate Factory), The Rocky Horror Show (UK tour) and Spamalot (Playhouse Theatre), Hay Fever (Minneapolis), Henry V (Chicago), Candide, Falstaff (Grange Festival Opera), L’Elisir d’Amore (Garsington Opera), Sweeney Todd (Bergen) and The Winter’s Tale (Cincinnati).
THE HOLY ROSENBERGS
By Ryan Craig
Directed by: Lindsay Posner
27 February – 2 May
The Rosenbergs of Edgware are in family in crisis. Father David is desperately trying to save a failing catering business; mother Lesley is trying to save a failing husband, and their daughter Ruth is facing public vilification for investigating war crimes in Gaza for the UN. When tragedy strikes, the family is thrown into even deeper turmoil. Ryan Craig’s play, premiered at the National Theatre in 2011, is now even more timely and painfully pertinent.
Ryan Craig’s work for theatre includes 1984 (Theatre Royal Bath), Charlotte and Theodore (Theatre Royal Bath and UK tour), Games for Lovers (The Vaults), Filthy Business (Hampstead Theatre), We Lost Elijah (NT New Connections), How To Think the Unthinkable (Unicorn Theatre), Talk Talk Fight Fight (Tricycle Theatre – as part of The Tricycle Goes Nuclear), The Glass Room (Hampstead Theatre), Broken Road (The Hush Car, Edinburgh – Fringe First Award), What We Did to Weinstein (Menier Chocolate Factory – nomination for the Evening Standard Award’s Most Promising Playwright Award), Portugal (National Theatre), Three Servants (Jet Theatre), Vintage Stuff (UK tour) Happy Savages (Lyric Studio, Hammersmith), and The Sins of Dalia Baumgarten (Etcetera Theatre). For television his work includes Betrayal, The Brixton Disorders, Hustle, Waterloo Road, Robin Hood, Saddam’s Tribe, Mile High, Hollyoaks, Dream Team. Night and Day and Family Affairs.
Director Lindsay Posner has directed in every major London theatre as well as the RSC and on Broadway. His recent credits include Endgame (Bath’s Ustinov Studio), the double bill of Pinter’s The Lover and The Collection (Ustinov Studio), The Deep Blue Sea and A View from the Bridge (both at Theatre Royal Bath and Theatre Royal Haymarket), Noises Off (Theatre Royal Bath, Phoenix Theatre and UK tour), and Edward Albee’s classic Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf? (Theatre Royal Bath).
EQUUS
By Peter Shaffer
Menier Chocolate Factory: 8 May – 27 June
Theatre Royal Bath: 13 – 25 July (on sale early October)
Directed by: Lindsay Posner
Presented in a co-production with Theatre Royal Bath
What prompts a 17-year-old boy to blind six horses? This is the challenge presented to psychiatrist Martin Dysart as he delves into the psyche of his young patient Alan Strang to search for the answers and at the same time questioning whether the cure is more dangerous than the crime. Peter Shaffer’s brilliantly intriguing award-winning play is now considered a modern masterpiece.
Peter Shaffer’s (1926 – 2016) plays include Five Finger Exercise (Evening Standard Drama Award), The Private Ear/The Public Eye, The Royal Hunt of the Sun, Black Comedy, The White Liars, Amadeus (Evening Standard Drama Award and Tony Award for Best Play), Yonadab, Lettice and Lovage,and The Gift of the Gorgon.
LISTINGS INFORMATION
MENIER CHOCOLATE FACTORY
FALLEN ANGELS
21 November 2025 – 21 February 2026
THE HOLY ROSENBERGS
27 February – 2 May
EQUUS
8 May – 27 June
Theatre Royal Bath: 13 – 25 July
Box Office: 020 7378 1713 (£2.50 transaction fee per booking)
Website: www.menierchocolatefactory.com (£1.50 transaction fee per booking)
www.menierchocolatefactory.com
Instagram: @menierchocolatefactory