John Daly-Peoples
Auckland Theatre Company 2027 Season
John Daly-Peoples
Auckland Theatre Company has just announced its 2027 season, with eight plays that run the full gamut of the theatrical experience. There are twists on beloved classics, a world-class psychological thriller, a picture of end-stage capitalism and a portrait of an unlikely but real man.
Alongside productions of audience favourites – Agatha Christie’s Death on the Nile, Twelfth Night and The King’s Speech – are exciting new works by New Zealand playwrights, including two world premieres by Arts Foundation Laureate Victor Rodger ONZM and many of New Zealand’s talented storytellers and theatre-makers back to the Company – Anapela Polata’ivao ONZM, Cameron Rhodes, Jennifer Ward-Lealand CNZM, and Michael Hurst ONZM.
“The nature of theatre is the gathering of people in the dark to enter a world created by artists. Spectators may learn, be challenged, be entertained. It could be all three,” says Auckland Theatre Company Artistic Director and CEO Jonathan Bielski. “Each show is made with aroha and manaaki by the actors, playwrights, creatives, builders and stitchers, crews and staff of Auckland Theatre Company. Each is a gift to you, our audience of theatre-lovers.”
MISERY
26 JAN — 20 FEB
By William Goldman
Based on the novel by Stephen King
In this isolated, snow-gripped cabin of 1987, there’s nowhere to run and nowhere to hide.
From the King of Horror, Misery is the ultimate psychological thriller: a tense game of cat and mouse between writer and reader, patient and nurse, fan and celebrity. From page to screen to stage, Misery brings two of New Zealand’s most recognisable actors, Michael Hurst ONZM and Morgana O’Reilly, together to play the roles made famous by James Caan and Kathy Bates.
She’s his number one fan. He’s living a writer’s nightmare. This ice-cold plunge into Stephen King’s twisted mind, directed by Simon Bennett.
THE BOY FROM VAIALA
2 – 14 MAR
By Victor Rodger
Victor Rodger ONZM has written an affectionate love letter to his highly unlikely but utterly fabulous Uncle Pasi, Pasi Daniells Silva – father of three, maître d’ to the stars and founder of an iconic drag bar.
As Pasi approaches his 90th birthday, his nephew Levi presses him for stories from a life that has sashayed from Vaiala to Vegas, Hawai’i to Wellington. Full of sass and wit, featuring Grindr and God, this biography doesn’t shy away from the darker side of the mirror ball.
Directed by Anapela Polata’ivao ONZM and starring Semu Filipo as Pasi, this celebrates one of the most unlikely Samoan men of his generation.
A collaboration between Auckland Theatre Company, FCC, Te Ahurei Toi o Tāmaki Auckland Arts Festival and Creative New Zealand’s Festival Commissioning & Presentation Fund, managed by PANNZ.
THE KING’S SPEECH
6 APR – 2 MAY
By David Seidler
London, 1936. Albert must step forward and save his family. The Windsors are caught in a constitutional crisis as World War II looms. This is the inspiring story of how a man found a voice, got the words out – and saved a nation. Ryan O’Kane (Agatha Christie’s Murder on the Orient Express) stars as Bertie, the king who stutters, alongside Wesley Dowdell (North by Northwest) as speech therapist Lionel Logue.
Inspired by David Seidler’s experiences as a child with a stutter, the film won four Academy Awards, and the West End production was a four-star hit. Benjamin Kilby-Henson directs the production, which had an extended sell-out season at The Court Theatre in Christchurch.
Auckland Theatre Company presents a production by The Court Theatre. By special arrangement with Music Theatre International (Australasia).
HELEN CLARK IN SIX OUTFITS
14 – 30 MAY
By Fiona Samuel
The sold-out satire of gender and power was a talk of the town in 2026 – and now it’s back for another term. Fiona Samuel MNZM retraces the remarkable journey of a Waikato farm girl who became New Zealand’s first elected female Prime Minister and a global voice through her work at the United Nations and beyond.
Jennifer Ward-Lealand CNZM plays Helen the Elder, with Lauren Gibson as Helen the Younger, as they deconstruct her public image and private self through six outfits. The play examines social expectations, private compromises and public masks – and asks: if Helen Clark broke the glass ceiling, where are we now?
Last year NZ Art Review wrote about the play – “Helen Clark in Six Outfits uses the notion of tracking Helen Clark’s career through reference to the clothing she wore at various stages of her life. It is a concept which even the stage version of Clark rejects going on a rant about how she has always been judged by appearance – her hair, her teeth, her voice and her marriage. All those notions which are rarely used to demean male parliamentarians.
The play traces the life of Helen Clark from school kid through to the present as she climbs both the academic and the parliamentary ladders to her unsuccessful bid at becoming the Secretary General of the UN.
Along the way we/she remembers the fluctuating fortunes of National and Labour governments as well as encountering the major political figures of the time – Phil Goff, Jim Anderton, David Lange, Jonathan Hunt, Jenny Shipley, Judith Tizard and even Winston Peters -is he still alive.”
SENSE AND SENSIBILITY
13 JUL – 1 AUG
By Jane Austen and Penny Ashton
When Elinor and Marianne Dashwood are rudely evicted from their childhood home after their father dies, their brother inherits everything – leaving romance their only route out of ruin. But should heart or head rule who takes their hand?
New Zealand playwright Penny Ashton gives Jane Austen’s iconic novel a uniquely theatrical spin, packed with her trademark mischief. An ensemble of six women, including Bronwyn Ensor (Agatha Christie’s Murder on the Orient Express),Lisa Chappell (Fallen Angels) and Jackie Clarke MNZM (Jackie Goes Prima Diva) play all 24 characters. Directed by Margaret-Mary Hollins, expect frocks, feminism, spice, hilarity and bold physical storytelling.
BECOMING JEFF BEZOS
20 JUL – 15 AUG
By Alex Medland
A young woman idealises the Amazon-founding billionaire so much that she’s changed her name. She’s tracking down someone who has lived in the Southern Alps for 30 years and is very keen to keep her location secret from the government. When they meet in a dystopian New Zealand, the culture clash couldn’t be worse – and the whisky doesn’t help.
Nī Dekkers-Reihana (Tiri: Te Araroa Woman Far Walking) and Nicola Kāwana (North by Northwest) star in this premiere by Alex Medland, the youngest-ever winner of the Adam New Zealand Play Award, directed by Jason Te Kare (Scenes from a Climate Era). When you’ve opted out of the world, what does success look like? How do you survive when you’re neck-deep in the system?
TWELFTH NIGHT
19 AUG – 29 AUG
By William Shakespeare
SPECIAL LIMITED SEASON
When shipwrecked Viola washes ashore with nothing but the clothes she’s standing in and a twin brother, she’s certain has drowned, she reinvents herself as a young man, as you do. As love-letter-driven hijinks ensue, a second survivor of the shipwreck arrives, looking a lot like Viola.
Created by a dynamic duo making their directing debuts with Auckland Theatre Company, Katrina George and Miriama McDowell , the production drops Shakespeare’s classic into a glamorous modern-day Illyria. In this dazzling South Pacific resort, the sun never stops shining, and everyone is a little lonelier than they look.
Alongside the strictly limited season of this work are two weeks of performances just for schools, made possible by Woolf Fisher Trust and the Douglas Goodfellow Charitable Trust.
AGATHA CHRISTIE’S DEATH ON THE NILE
14 SEP – 10 OCT
Adapted for the stage by Ken Ludwig
After Murder on the Orient Express smashed every box-office record in Auckland Theatre Company’s books, the Company follows up with another mystery from Dame Agatha Christie, adapted by Ken Ludwig. In the searing heat of Egypt, a group of curious characters boards the steamer Karnak on the River Nile, little knowing their cruise will be beset by murder and mayhem. Famous Belgian detective Hercule Poirot must investigate every passenger, unravelling romantic tensions, old rivalries and the influence of a spooky sarcophagus.
Cameron Rhodes returns as Poirot, leading a cast of 11 in this lush, sweeping and cinematic New Zealand premiere, directed by Eleanor Bishop and designed by Tracy Grant Lord.
NZ Arts Review wrote about the previous Agatha Christie production Murder on the Orient Express “The result is an actor’s piece to die for. And this cast do more than just deliver. The entire cast is let loose, projecting archetypes rather than convincing portrayals of real people. Each character is distinct, their backgrounds are as varied as their accents and the ensemble functions as a singular unit predominantly by using that essence of great comedy – precision timing and the credibility of relationships between them.”
