English theatre shines in Montréal
Theatre goers will enjoy blockbuster dramas, rip-roaring comedies and smash hit musicals produced by some of Canada and Montréal’s most exciting professional and independent English-language theatre companies this Spring 2025.
Musicals, comedy and drama!
Montréal’s two big English-language theatres – the venerable Centaur Theatre Company in Old Montréal, and the Sylvan Adams Theatre at the Segal Centre for the Performing Arts in the west end – offer varied programming.
Centaur Theatre
Directed by Jimmy Blais and featuring an all-Cree cast, the family-oriented Geordie Theatre in collaboration with Centaur presents the play Jordan that depicts Jordan River Anderson as a superhero, guided by his animated teddy bear Maskwa, addressing healthcare challenges faced by Indigenous children, and highlighting the significance of Jordan’s Principle in ensuring equal healthcare for First Nations youth. Runs April 3 to 13.
Closing the Centaur season is the return of Michel Tremblay’s For the Pleasure of Seeing Her Again, starring Canadian national treasure Ellen David and Emmanuel Schwartz. Directed by Alice Ronfard, this heartfelt tribute to Tremblay’s mother is the first production to be staged in Centaur’s newly renovated proscenium theatre, featuring state-of-the-art fly-tower technology. Runs May 13 to June 1.
Segal Centre for Performing Arts
The Segal presents Our Little Secret: The 23andMe® Musical, the hilarious, moving and completely true story of Noam Tomaschoff’s discovery that he wasn’t an only child… he actually had more than 35 siblings around the world. Catch the International Fringe sensation in its Main Stage Premiere. Runs April 27 to May 18.
The Segal then presents the slapstick comedy Clue: On Stage, based on the cult classic 1985 film and inspired by the iconic Hasbro board game. Step into a world of mystery as murder and blackmail unfold over a sinister dinner party at Boddy Manor. This slapstick whodunit keeps you guessing: Was it Miss Scarlet in the library with the rope? Or Colonel Mustard in the kitchen with the knife? Runs June 8 to 29.
The Segal also presents the world premiere of Max and Aaron Write a Musical, a new musical queer rom-com by Montrealer Trevor Barrette in which two childhood friends and creative collaborators race against the clock to finish their latest project: a coming-of-age musical loosely based on their lives. A sexy cautionary tale about writing what you know. Runs June 15 to 22 in the Segal Studio.
Montréal, arts interculturels
Located in the Plateau-Mont-Royal, the innovative Montréal, arts interculturels cultural organization – better known as “The MAI” – presents an eclectic slate of multi-disciplinary productions (visual arts, dance and theatre) each season.
The MAI’s current 26th season includes A HOLE IS A HOLE IS A HOLE IS where guests ask the most existential of questions: “Am I a Twink or a Daddy? What will I leave behind if I don’t have children? And what does it mean to be queer in a world where we understand global destruction as a sobering reality instead of adventure-fueled escapism, a Hollywood blockbuster, best enjoyed with popcorn?” Runs April 24 to 26.
Drip or Drown is a re-imagined Hip-Hop concert where Jai Nitai Lotus presents an unconventional blend of performance art, spoken word, dance, visual projections and music, with contributions by his mentees. Runs May 30-31.
And Face Rider is “a queer indie sleaze swamp dump” that combines dance, fashion, music and performance to celebrate “gender deviance, glittery resurrection, and live-laugh-loving the mess of togetherness.” Runs June 18 to 21.
Festival TransAmériques
A festival of contemporary dance and theatre, the star-studded 19th edition of the Festival TransAmériques will present some 25 shows from May 22 to June 5.
Highlights include Taverna Miresia – Mario Bella Anastasia, an unsettling, dreamlike wordless play directed by the rising star of Greek theatre, Mario Banushi, at Théâtre Jean-Duceppe (May 29 to 31); and Argentina’s Tiziano Cruz returns with Wayqeycuna, the final instalment of his trilogy that weaves together family history and a critique of neoliberal power structures, at the Théâtre Rouge du Conservatoire (May 31 to June 3).
Click here for full festival programming.
Montréal Fringe Festival
After a record-breaking 2024 edition, the bilingual St-Ambroise Montréal Fringe Festival returns May 26 to June 15 when 500 artists from some 90 producing companies present more than 700 indoor performances at this year’s 35th edition. The OFF Fringe runs from May 28 to June 15.
Outdoor programming at the hugely popular Fringe Park – located at Parc des Ameriques, corner Rachel and St-Laurent – will feature live bands, as well as the festival’s marquee event, drag icon Mado Lamotte’s annual Drag Race on June 14, featuring Cabaret Mado drag stars versus a bevy of Fringe fest beauties in a knock-down Battle Royale of skill-testing obstacles!
The Fringe launched Mado’s Drag Race 25 years ago in 2000, but thanks to COVID and inclement weather, this year’s edition is actually No. 22. After Canada’s Drag Race season 5 contestant Uma Gahd hosted in 2023, Québec pop icon Mado may be back for one more show. Says Mado, “I found it exhausting because after Drag Race I’d go to work at Cabaret Mado. I’m not a young girl anymore. But I may come back to host one last show for the 25th anniversary edition.”
Other theatre
From May 5 to 9, La Chapelle Scènes Contemporaines presents the bilingual French-English La sommation des acouphènes_A Quiet Life Under The Ground which explores the potential of musical theatre and investigative storytelling techniques to create a spectral camp space.
German superstar Ute Lemper stars as Marlene Dietrich in the internationally-acclaimed musical Rendez-vous avec Marlene May 20 at Théatre Outremont.
Directed by Montréal theatre legend Vittorio Rossi, Knuckles: The Chris Nilan Story is a dinner and live show with legendary Canadiens de Montréal enforcer Chris Nilan sharing his raw journey through iconic moments on the ice, battles with mental health and addiction, and the resilience that defines a true warrior. At the Maison Principale, May 28 and 30, and June 3 and 5.
Canada’s oldest Black theatre company, Black Theatre Workshop presents the second edition of their Club Zed Playwrights’ Festival which assists the professional development of emerging playwrights. Runs May 14 to 17 at the MAI.
Imago Theatre presents the world premiere of playwright Adjani Poirier’s Scorpio Moon, a love story about friendship that explores the complexities of race, queerness, art and money, starring Bénédicte Bélizaire and Cameron Grant, and directed by Murdoch Schon with Warona Setshwaelo. All performances presented with French surtitles. Runs March 27 to April 6 at Studio Mile-Ex in the Mile-Ex neighbourhood.
Teesri Duniya Theatre presents playwright Dalia Taha’s Keffiyeh/Made in China, a collection of 10 short plays bound together in an unfolding story exploring how even the most intimate relationships and everyday occurrences subvert ordinary life under colonization and occupation. At Teesri’s Rangshala Studio in Cité-des-Hospitalières in the Plateau-Mont-Royal from April 10 to 26.
The home of indie theatre in Montréal, Mainline Theatre presents Hadestown: Teen Edition, an adaptation of the Tony Award-winning musical Hadestown by Anaïs Mitchell, blending the Greek myth of Orpheus with contemporary folk and jazz. Runs April 4-5-6.
As part of their 2025 professional season, the Hudson Village Theatre presents Ken Ludwig’s The Game’s Afoot, an uproarious Sherlock Holmes-themed murder mystery, directed by Heidi Hawkins (April 4 to 13); and Canada’s pre-eminent comic playwright Norm Foster’s Halfway There, about colourful characters in a small-town Nova Scotia diner, directed by Don Anderson (May 14 to 25).
Contact Theatre remount the iconic musical Cabaret at the Monument National from May 16 to 24.
The Theatre Ouest End presents Mickey & Joe (Good. Bad. Ugly. Dirty), a contemporary spaghetti western by playwright Michaela Di Cesare and directed by Daniele Bartolini, at the Teatro Mirella & Lino Saputo in the Leonardo Da Vinci Centre from May 17 to 25.
Dawson College’s Professional Theatre Department presents the 1928 Broadway play Machinal – considered one of the high points of Expressionist theatre – by American playwright Sophie Treadwell, directed by Michael E. Hughes (April 22 to May 3) at Dawson’s gorgeous New Dome Theatre.
Concordia University’s Department of Theatre presents Oresteia, British playwright and director Robert Icke’s daring, freely-adapted version of Aeschylus’s ancient Oresteia trilogy exploring familial violence, trauma and war. Presented in the Concordia Theatre (formerly called the D.B. Clarke Theatre), a gorgeous 387-seat proscenium theatre, from April 9 to 12.
Also, click here for updates on upcoming National Theatre School productions at the Monument-National.
From Broadway to Montréal
Evenko and Broadway Across Canada present the hilarious musical MEAN GIRLS (April 22 to 27), and HAMILTON, the epic saga that follows the rise of U.S. Founding Father Alexander Hamilton (August 19 to September 7). Both productions presented at Salle Wilfrid-Pelletier.
French theatre
There are many French-language plays and theatres in Montréal.
Three gay French-language productions of note: Martin Sherman’s classic play Bent about the persecution of gays in Nazi Germany, at Le Théâtre La Comédie de Montréal (April 10 to 12); acclaimed Montréal playwright Eric Noel’s Ces regards amoureux de garçons altérés, about a young man’s crystal meth-fueled 60 hours in a gay sauna, at Théatre Prospero (April 8 to 26); and Québec icon Michel Tremblay’s French translation of Montréal playwright Steve Galluccio’s signature play Mambo Italiano, at L’Espace La Risée (April 25 to 27).
Click here for French-language theatre in Montréal this spring.
Richard Burnett
Richard “Bugs” Burnett is a Canadian freelance writer, editor, journalist, blogger and columnist for alt-weeklies, mainstream and LGBTQ+ publications. Bugs also knows Montréal like a drag queen knows a cosmetics counter.