Last night, Sydney’s arts community gathered at the Roslyn Packer Theatre to launch the Sydney Theatre Company’s 2027 season, and it reminded me just how extraordinary an institution the STC really is.
For a company that has entertained, educated and influenced Australians since 1978, the STC continues to punch well above its weight, spanning three venues, the Roslyn Packer Theatre, the Wharf and the Drama Theatre at the Sydney Opera House, and drawing some of this country’s finest creative and business minds into its orbit.
Hosted with real warmth and wit by Mitchell Butel, the STC’s Artistic Director and Co-CEO, the night captured everything that makes this company special. Butel is one of those rare leaders who can straddle the worlds of performance and management, and watching him work the room last night, thanking supporters, teasing cast members and building excitement for 2027, you could see exactly why the company has thrived under his stewardship. I believe he is, without exaggeration, one of the most talented and generous custodians the arts in this country have. And so funny to boot!
The night was studded with STC royalty. Roslyn Packer, whose name adorns the theatre and whose late husband Kerry Packer built one of this country’s great media empires, was there to see the season she has supported for so long. Heather Mitchell, one of Australia’s finest stage actors, was on hand, along with the unmistakable Tim Minchin, who had the room laughing within minutes of taking the stage.
Minchin’s news drew one of the loudest cheers of the night. He will return to the STC stage to play Ebenezer Scrooge in a new production of Charles Dickens’s A Christmas Carol, adapted by Jack Thorne, the writer behind Harry Potter and the Cursed Child, and closing out the 2027 season in November and December. It will be Minchin’s first STC appearance in 11 years, and if his career to date is any guide, composer, comedian, actor and one of this country’s most gifted entertainers, audiences are in for a treat.
Minchin wasn’t the only reunion on offer. Perhaps the most anticipated production of the entire season is Oedipus, a contemporary reimagining of the Greek tragedy by British playwright Robert Icke, which will reunite Richard Roxburgh and Heather Mitchell on an STC stage for the first time in three decades.
Beyond those two productions, the 2027 season is a genuinely ambitious slate. Logan St., Becky Shaw, The Palace Letters, a world premiere drawn from the correspondence around Gough Whitlam’s dismissal, Amah and Nanna, Miss Fisher’s Murder Mysteries: Death by Deckchair, The Book of Liz, The Picture of Dorian Gray, The Fifth Step, John Proctor is the Villain, Vanya and The Bookbinder of Jericho round out a program that ranges from classic adaptation to bold new Australian writing.
What struck me most, though, wasn’t the size of the program. It was the sense of a genuine cultural institution still finding new gears after nearly 50 years. The STC has entertained Sydney since 1978, and evenings like last night show why it still matters. It creates jobs, launches Australian stories onto our biggest stages, and gives audiences a reason to believe our arts sector deserves the same respect we give our best businesses and sporting codes. Bravo!
