Shaw Festival announces 2025 season

For the 2025 season, its 63rd, The Shaw Festival returns to Narnia, welcomes back Major Barbara, offers another spine-tingling mystery, takes on modern works by fresh voices, offers a Canadian premiere and much, much more. 

“Major Barbara was one of the first shows Shaw ever did in the Royal George,” says the festival’s CEO and executive director Tim Jennings. “That was in 1987 (then directed by Christopher Newton). It’s fun to have a new version of it here (directed by Peter Hinton-Davis) and I’m really looking forward to it.”

Fittingly, the George Bernard Shaw play will be one of the final four productions to take place at the venue as the Royal George Theatre will be shuttered after A Christmas Carol closes on December 21.

“It was never designed to last,” Jennings says of the theatre, which was built in 1915 and is not a heritage building, though it is in Niagara-on-the-Lake’s heritage district. “When I arrived here 10 years ago there was already a 10-year-old engineering report that said the building would need to be condemned in the next decade.”

The festival is hopeful it will be able to open a new, modernized version of the Royal George in the same location in time for the 2029 season. 

“Working with governments, we hope to be able to rebuild this jewel box theatre with a future of access and sustainability in mind,” said Jennings in a press release last week. ”Our intention is not to change the feel, rather we hope only to amplify this treasured space with 21st-century amenities and technology.” 

For its final season in its current form, the George will also host the madcap, fast-moving farce Tons of Money, directed by Eda Holmes, and Murder-on-the-Lake, a spontaneous, improvisational murder mystery set in NOTL and written by Bruce Horak and Rebecca Northan, who also directs.

“It’s a combo platter of murder and mystery,” says Jennings of the latter. “It will be different every night because an audience member is brought up to be the detective in the show. With Rebecca’s work on Game of Love and Chance (from Shaw’s 2023 season), she’s become the queen of Canadian improv.”

The season kicks off at the Festival Theatre with preview performances of The Lion, The Witch and the Wardrobe beginning on April 9.

“It’s the final Narnia for us,” Jennings tells The Local. “We’ve done all the other ones that precede and lead up to it. We have a big, built-in audience for the Narnia series. It’s a spectacle book, and to finally get to do this on the main stage is a big thing for us. We expect it to be a real family experience.”

The main stage also plays host to Cole Porter’s classic nautical musical Anything Goes, directed and choreographed by Kimberly Rampersad, and Wait Until Dark, a suspense-filled thriller featuring a heart-stopping, high-stakes game of cat and mouse, directed by Sanjay Talwar.

Rampersad also directs the Canadian premiere of Blues for an Alabama Sky, previewing starting on August 2 at the Jackie Maxwell Studio Theatre. 

“It’s a great play that examines part of the Black experience in the US during the Harlem Renaissance period,” Jennings explains. “It digs into the Cotton Club jazz and blues period. It’s a wonderful play, and Kimberly has a particular interest and fascination with that period, including in her academic work. I suspect it will be one of the big hits of the summer.”

Also at the studio theatre, Shaw artistic director Tim Carroll directs playwright Will Eno’s GNIT, a modern-day update of Henrik Ibsen’s 19th-century Norwegian play Peer Gynt.

“Tim’s been trying to get this done here since 2021,” says Jennings. “Right from the title it grabs your attention. It’s a well-thought-out takedown and homage to Ibsen. Eno is one of the USA’s great current writers. He also wrote Middletown which was a huge hit for us in 2017. GNIT is a perfect show for the studio theatre.”

Though Major Barbara is the only play written by the festival’s namesake on next year’s playbill, Shaw’s personal life will be explored in Dear Liar, previewing inside the stunning Spiegeltent beginning on  May 18.

Written by Jerome Kilty, the two-hander is based on the correspondence between Shaw and Stella Tanner, the actress known by her stage name Mrs. Patrick Campbell, with whom he was both infatuated and infuriated.

“It’s actual letters between him and the actress who originally played Eliza Doolittle in Pygmalion,” Jennings explains. “It includes several sequences of his plays because she was in many of them and potentially inspired the king’s mistress in The Applecart. They wrote about 3,000 letters to each other throughout their lives.”

The upcoming weeks will see the festival release details about other performances inside the unique, mirrored structure, including cabarets, concerts, singing, dancing and comedy.

Finally, the holiday season is once again rounded out with Iving Berlin’s White Christmas, directed by Kate Hennig. 

And if you are ordering tickets, take specific note of the new performance times for 2025. All matinees will now start at 1 p.m. and evening shows will begin at 7 p.m., rather than 2 p.m. and 8 p.m. 

Tickets to the 2025 season go on sale beginning November 2 for Friends of The Shaw and December 7 for the general public. Orders can be placed through the Box Office at 1-800-511- SHAW (7429) or online at shawfest.com.. 

SHAW FESTIVAL 2025 PLAYBILL

FESTIVAL THEATRE

THE LION, THE WITCH AND THE WARDROBE
Previews April 9; closes October 4

ANYTHING GOES
Previews May 2; closes: October 4

WAIT UNTIL DARK
Previews: June 25; closes: October 5

ROYAL GEORGE THEATRE

TONS OF MONEY
Previews April 11; closes: October 5

MAJOR BARBARA
Previews June 1; closes: October 5

MURDER-ON-THE-LAKE
Previews July 26; closes: October 4

JACKIE MAXWELL STUDIO THEATRE

GNIT
Previews: June 19; closes: October 4

BLUES FOR AN ALABAMA SKY
Previews: August 2; closes: October 4

SPIEGELTENT

DEAR LIAR
Previews May 18; closes: September 27

HOLIDAY SEASON

A CHRISTMAS CAROL
Previews November 1; closes: December 21
Royal George Theatre

Irving Berlin’s WHITE CHRISTMAS
Previews November 7; closes: December 21
Festival Theatre