Chichester Festival Theatre has announced its Winter season which includes includes a mix of five-star West End hits, star-studded dramas, heartwarming family shows, and a host of music, comedy, and performances. The diverse range of shows promises to captivate audiences of all ages.
Five-Star West End Hits
Direct from the West End, Chichester Festival Theatre is set to host some of the most acclaimed productions in the UK. Audiences can look forward to experiencing the following five-star shows:
Life of Pi
Winner of five Olivier Awards including Best New Play in the West End, and three Tony Awards on Broadway, the five-star theatrical phenomenon Life of Pi comes to Chichester Festival Theatre as part of its first UK tour. The show runs from 16 November – 12 December in the main theatre, Festival Theatre.
2:22 A Ghost Story
Winner of Best New Play at the WhatsOnStage Awards, this edge-of-your-seat, supernatural thriller is written by Danny Robins, creator of the hit BBC podcasts Uncanny and The Battersea Poltergeist, and directed by Matthew Dunster and Isabel Marr. The show comes fresh from record-breaking seasons at five West End theatres with a host of acclaimed star performances. It’s a brilliantly funny and adrenaline-filled night where secrets emerge and ghosts may or may not appear… What do you believe? And do you dare discover the truth? 2:22 A Ghost Story runs from 6-10 February 2024 in Festival Theatre.
Noises Off
Michael Frayn’s celebrated play serves up a riotous double bill, a play within a play, directed by Lindsay Posner and featuring Matthew Kelly , Liza Goddard and Simon Shepherd. Hurtling along at breakneck speed, Noises Off follows the on and off stage antics of a touring theatre company as they stumble their way through the fictional farce, ‘Nothing On’. Running from 9-13 Jan 2024.
Stars on stage
Star-studded dramas range from A Voyage Round My Father (7 – 11 Nov) with Rupert Everett to The Merchant of Venice 1936 (21-25 Nov) with Tracy‐Ann Oberman, and Jane Asher in Somerset Maugham’s The Circle (30 Jan -3 Feb 2024). The original cast of Drop the Dead Donkey – Susannah Doyle, Robert Duncan, Ingrid Lacey, Neil Pearson, Jeff Rawle, Stephen Tompkinson and Victoria Wicks – are reuniting on stage in this brand-new topical commentary on the cut-throat world of 24-hour news. Drop The Dead Donkey: The Reawakening runs from 20-24 Feb.
Shakespeare and Me: Judi Dench in conversation with Brendan O’Hea will run on 3 Nov. Join the inimitable and beloved Judi Dench in conversation with friend, actor and director Brendan O’Hea to celebrate their new book Shakespeare: The Man Who Pays The Rent.
Festive season
Christmas at CFT this year will be a true family affair as, alongside Chichester Festival Youth Theatre’s new dramatisation of The Jungle Book for ages 7+, there’s a perfect first musical for ages 3 – 7 in the Minerva: the Unicorn Theatre production of Stiles & Drewe’s The Three Billy Goats Gruff directed by Chichester’s new Artistic Director Justin Audibert. And for the first time ever, Father Christmas himself is taking up residence in Santa’s Grotto.
Other shows include:
Fantastically Great Women Who Changed The World, for ages 7+ (Festival Theatre, 14 – 18 Feb) This ‘pop-fuelled, upbeat’ hit musical, based on the book by Suffragette relative Kate
Pankhurst and adapted by Chris Bush (Standing at the Sky’s Edge), comes from one of the producers of SIX.
Black is the Color of My Voice (20-24 Feb, Minerva Theatre), the Nina Simone-inspired show featuring many of her most iconic songs performed live, Black is the Color of My Voice is written and performed by Apphia Campbell.
A revival of Lucy Kirkwood’s play Mosquitoes will run at the Mienerva from 28 nov – 2 Dec. Kirkwood’s wildly ambitious play is a brilliantly funny and occasionally brutal exploration of the workings of the universe and our place within it, and what it means to be a sister, a mother and a daughter.
