The Royal Welsh College of Music & Drama (RWCMD) will return to the Young Vic this summer with NEW ’25, its annual festival of new writing.
Four world premiere plays by established and emerging British playwrights will be presented in the Maria Theatre from 11 to 21 June, following initial performances in Cardiff.
First staged in 2014, NEW pairs professional playwrights and directors with graduating students from RWCMD’s Richard Burton Company. The initiative commissions new work in association with partner companies including Paines Plough and the Sherman Theatre. Since its launch, over 40 original plays have been created under the scheme, which involves actors, designers, and stage managers from the College’s performance and technical programmes.
This year’s programme engages with themes of personal autonomy, political tension and artistic identity.
Samuel Bailey, whose debut Shook won The Times Breakthrough Award, returns with An Armed Robbery in a Petrol Station off the A38, a darkly comic look at economic precarity and impulse. The play is directed by Ned Bennett, who helped launch the inaugural NEW season in 2014.
Vivienne Franzmann’s Into the Light, directed by former Royal Court associate Lucy Morrison, presents a collage of contemporary stories told through intersecting vignettes.
Dipo Baruwa-Etti’s Children of the West imagines a near-future Britain in demographic crisis, where citizens are obliged to have children. Directed by Zoë Templeman-Young and produced in collaboration with Paines Plough, the play considers questions of free will, state control and moral complicity. Both writer and director are shortlisted for this year’s JMK Award.
The final production, Salem, written by Lisa Parry and directed by Sara Lloyd, reimagines a true Welsh story involving the theft of a painting from a Liverpool gallery. The play, produced with the Sherman Theatre, probes the decolonisation of art and whether its meaning can ever be fixed.
Jonathan Munby, Director of Drama Performance at RWCMD, said: “NEW ’25 continues a proud tradition of launching powerful new work into the world. It’s a unique collaboration that gives emerging artists a chance to work at a professional level while giving experienced creatives space to experiment.”
Nadia Fall, the Young Vic’s artistic director, called the partnership “a dynamite collaboration,” adding: “We’re incredibly excited to host this season of powerful new theatre.”
Following NEW ’25, RWCMD will present Balance, an exhibition of graduating design and stage management work, in the Young Vic’s Maria and Clare Theatres from 1 to 4 July.
Currently playing at the Young Vic, James Graham’s Punch is a gripping true crime drama about a Nottingham teenager whose life is upended after a fatal punch thrown on a night out. Following a powerful encounter with the victim’s parents, he begins a path toward redemption. The production transfers to the West End’s Apollo Theatre from 22 September to 29 November 2025. Next at the venue is Tim Crouch’s An Oak Tree (6–24 May), featuring a different guest actor each night — unrehearsed and unseen until the performance. The line-up includes David Tennant, Jessie Buckley, Adjoa Andoh and Meera Syal.
Listings: NEW ’25 at the Young Vic
Dates: 11–21 June 2025
Venue: Young Vic – Maria Theatre
Age guidance: 14+ | Contains adult themes | May include strobe effects
An Armed Robbery in a Petrol Station off the A38
By Samuel Bailey | Dir. Ned Bennett
11 & 13 June – 2pm | 12 & 14 June – 6pm
Salem
By Lisa Parry | Dir. Sara Lloyd
11 & 13 June – 6pm | 12 & 14 June – 2pm
Children of the West
By Dipo Baruwa-Etti | Dir. Zoë Templeman-Young
18 & 20 June – 2pm | 19 & 21 June – 6pm
Into the Light
By Vivienne Franzmann | Dir. Lucy Morrison
18 & 20 June – 6pm | 19 & 21 June – 2pm
Book Punch tickets at the Apollo Theatre, London
Book An Oak Tree tickets at The Young Vic, London
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