Featuring everything from global smash-hits, gripping thrillers, cosmic journeys and poignant historical explorations, Manchester’s upcoming theatre programme delivers another diverse slate of acclaimed productions to suit thespian connoisseurs and first-time audiences alike.
Here’s our pick of the best theatre shows you can book now in Manchester.
Even These Things, a new play that explores three moments in Mancunian and Irish history, including the day that an IRA bomb exploded in the city centre, comes to the Royal Exchange.
Award-winning Film and Television star Elaine Cassidy makes her Royal Exchange debut, alongside Katherine Pearce, who returns to the Royal Exchange after starring in NO PAY? NO WAY! (2023).
Billed as the original ‘Girl Power’ story, the hit musical Malory Towers returns to Manchester later in the year. Based on Enid Blyton’s books, the nostalgic show follows short-tempered Darrell Rivers and the new-found relationships she must develop at her new boarding school.
Jason Manford returns to the stage alongside Richard Fleeshman and two-time Olivier nominee, Marisha Wallace. Something Rotten!, which makes its UK premiere at the Opera House, follows brothers Nick and Nigel, both of whom are desperate to write a hit play but remain stuck in the shadow of Shakespeare.
When a quirky soothsayer foretells an outlandish future for theatre – full of acting, singing, and dancing all at the same time – Nick and Nigel set out to write this strange new creation…a musical.
Full of humour, romance, and sparkling dialogue, this vibrant adaptation from Hope Mill Theatre’s own Amateur Dramatic Company reimagines Austen’s Pride and Prejudice this June.
Set in Georgian England, where only male heirs could inherit an estate, Mr and Mrs Bennet live in relative comfort—but with five daughters and no son, their future security depends on advantageous marriages.
Matthew Bourne’s award-winning The Car Man is back and heading to Lowry for a short summer run.
Loosely based on Bizet’s ever-popular opera, Bourne’s vivid storytelling combines with one of the most passionately dramatic scores ever written, with music by Terry Davies featuring Rodion Shchedrin’s Carmen Suite (after Bizet’s Carmen), making for a fiery dance thriller.
Now in its 17th year, Off Cut Festival returns to 53Two, bringing 20 plays to the theatre over a two-week period. Throughout the festival, audience members vote for their favourite, with the top eight playing again in an exciting final show, after which the winning play is revealed. Off Cut has become one of the UK’s most renowned platforms for discovering new writing, acting and directing, with the winning play receiving £10,000 worth of support, and being produced, in full, at 53Two.
The world premiere of a dance work inspired by Sinéad O’Connor, created by Tony Award-winning choreographer and director Sonya Tayeh, heads to Aviva Studios in the summer. Fierce, unflinching and tender, The Surge: An Ode to Sinéad O’Connor is a meditation on voice, protest and the courage to live a life that defies the norm.
The internationally award-winning Wright&Grainger (HELIOS, ORPHEUS, THE GODS THE GODS THE GODS) brings its latest show, SELENE, to Jodrell Bank this summer.
Delivered by a solo storyteller against an epic, electronic score, SELENE is an immersive story about the light sides of us, the dark sides of us, and the things we grow up in the orbit of.
A unique 24-hour performance piece by artist and activist Ai Weiwei comes to Aviva Studios this July, coinciding with the largest site-specific exhibition by the artist, which will be on display this summer.
Running across Fri 3 Jul – Sat 4 Jul, Sewing a Button will give audiences an unflinching look at Ai Weiwei’s secret detention by Public Security in China in 2011 and is the first time the artist has reenacted his experience.
Bruntwood Prize-winning playwright Tim Foley brings his funny, quietly haunting sci-fi drama Life Out There to Jodrell Bank this July.
For one night only, the award-winning, Manchester-based Ransack Theatre will reimagine the show — which explores the ethics of space exploration, human selfishness, and the fragile hope that we can still change — as a live radio play.
For the first time ever, a novel by John le Carré, the undisputed master of the modern spy genre, is brought to life in a thrilling stage adaptation.
Starring Ralf Little, The Spy Who Came In From The Cold is a riveting journey through the fog-shrouded terrain of Cold War espionage, deception, and moral compromise.
To save their home, the unconventional sisters of St. Magdaline’s are planning the ultimate “holy” heist. Facing a future of shopping centres and student flats, this misfit family of “last chance” nuns must band together to “borrow” their way to salvation by targeting the Church’s own coffers.
The best-selling novel turned Netflix hit, The Haunting of Hill House, emerges in its latest iteration, this time reimagined for the stage.
Based on the book by Shirley Jackson, adapted for the stage by Olivier and BAFTA winner Stef Smith and directed by Sky Arts Award winner Martin Constantine, the new stage adaptation is ‘tense, unsettling and darkly playful’, promising heart-thumping supernatural suspense.
30 years on from the original film’s release, Irvine Welsh has reimagined his iconic creation for the stage in Trainspotting The Musical.
Speaking about the adaptation, Welsh says: “I believe the musical has a bigger, loudly beating human heart than either the book or the film. People need to think about the world we’re living in, and we offer that inspection, but they also really need to sing their hearts out and laugh their heads off – it’s what being human is all about.”
Renowned contemporary dance company Rambert has announced a major new dance work inspired by the award-winning Channel 4 series, It’s A Sin, in partnership with Factory International, set to make its premiere at Aviva Studios in the new year. The show sees original series creator Russell T Davies (Queer As Folk, Doctor Who) serving as Executive Producer, alongside legendary pop duo Pet Shop Boys and Glyn Fussell (Sink the Pink, Mighty Hoopla festival).
Lowry has announced that as part of a landmark partnership with the National Theatre, a brand-new production of The Rise and Fall of Little Voice, will come to Saford in February 2027, following a run at the National Theatre in London.
The Rise and Fall of Little Voice will be the first National Theatre production to tour as part of NT Nationwide, supported by funding from Arts Council England. Jim Cartwright’s modern classic, which will be directed by Deputy Artistic Director, Robert Hastie (Standing at the Sky’s Edge), is a joyful, tender and bittersweet celebration of music, ambition and the courage it takes to be heard featuring iconic music from the likes of Judy Garland, Shirley Bassey and more.
The Chichester Festival Theatre, Stage Entertainment and Sheffield Theatres smash-hit production of Singin’ in the Rain will come to Lowry as part of a major new tour and following a summer season at Sadler’s Wells in London.
Journey back to the glamour of Hollywood in the roaring 20’s with high-energy choreography and sumptuous set designs (including over 14,000 litres of water on stage), combined with all the romance and wit of one of the world’s best- loved films.
- Words:
- Wire Editor
- Published on:
- Sun 7 Jun 2026
Narrated by Richard Armitage, audiences are invited to experience the thrill of launch, the challenges of life in space and cutting-edge NASA tech in this spectacular dome show at the iconic UNESCO heritage site, Jodrell Bank, throughout January.