'I took over the running of Leeds Playhouse - I want it to be the beating heart of the city'
It’s coming up to a year now since Tom Wright took up his role as the new artistic director of Leeds Playhouse, taking over from James Brining who had been in post for 13 years.
A few weeks ago, Wright launched his inaugural season alongside chief executive Shawab Iqbal with whom he will be working closely as the theatre opens a new chapter.
When we speak in a quiet part of the Playhouse’s Quarry theatre auditorium immediately after the launch – very well received by all present – Wright is energized and enthusiastic, looking forward to the future and to sharing with audiences the diverse and exciting programme he has put together for 2026-27.
While aware of the challenges facing arts organizations everywhere, Wright is confident that the Playhouse is in a strong position going forward.
“Compared to many, we are in a really good place,” he says. “Leeds Playhouse is not in decline – we have a loyal audience that comes regularly and I hope this season demonstrates the ambition of what we are aiming to do.
"We don’t want the Playhouse to be a museum; we want it to be a thriving place. The theatre was established over 55 years ago by and for the people of Leeds; we want it to be the beating heart of the city, to be alive and connected to the city and its people. Hopefully that is what the shows in the new season are doing, in different ways.”
It is a thoughtfully constructed season that features a mix of acclaimed classics, fresh takes on much-loved stories, a dash of the Bard, and a sprinkling of new work from contemporary writers.
It opens in September with a revival of August Wilson’s landmark play Fences, followed by Peanut Butter & Blueberries, the first full length play by Leeds playwright and poet Suhaiymah Manzoor-Khan; the Christmas offering is the hugely popular hit show Dr Seuss’s How the Grinch Stole Christmas! The Musical; January sees a fresh new take on Shakespeare’s Romeo & Juliet, followed by Sirens, a new play written and directed by Wright; then there will be a brand-new adaptation of Frances Hodgson Burnett’s The Secret Garden relocated to a high-rise urban rooftop green space in modern-day Leeds; a 21st-century version of Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein, and the season closes with the cult classic musical Little Shop of Horrors.
Supporting new writing is going to be a key part of Wright’s tenure and it is something that is very close to his heart. He has over a decade of experience developing new and innovative work with some of the UK’s most exciting theatre makers in previous roles he has held at the Kiln Theatre and at The Old Vic.
New writing is potentially risky for any theatre these days, but Wright and his team are willing to take that risk by embedding new work into a season that is surrounded by other work that is more familiar to audiences – the hope is that people will come to see something that they won’t have seen before alongside revisiting old favourites and classics. And that is a smart approach.
“We know that new writing is under threat,” says Wright. “And that is obviously not good news. I really believe that as an industry we need work from living writers and new writing – that is one of the biggest challenges, so we are having to think about how economically we can do that.
"It is a complicated thing. When we are doing stuff that no-one has done before we don’t really know if it will sell, but I feel it is so important to keep championing it.”
A writer, director, producer and dramaturg, Wright has spent many years helping to develop the work of new and emerging writers.
“At Kiln Theatre, I ran a year-round programme of new work and I found it was not as risky as you might think,” he says. “A good recent example here at the Playhouse was the new play Through It all Together by Leeds playwright Chris O’Connor, about a family dealing with dementia and their bonds to a football team.
"That was very popular with audiences not just because it was set in Leeds; it was a great play. You can find audiences for these new stories.”
As a playwright, Wright has written several acclaimed works including My Dad’s Gap Year, Undetectable and Very Special Guest Star. His latest play Please Please Me about Brian Epstein, the Beatles’ first manager, and his hidden struggles, is currently playing at the Kiln Theatre and he is looking forward to directing the debut of his play Sirens in the Playhouse’s Courtyard Theatre next March.
“There aren’t many playwrights who are artistic directors, it is a new thing for the sector to understand,” he says. “It felt important to have that here and I thought it was also a way of introducing myself for the first season.”
Born and brought up in Coventry, Wright became interested in theatre at a young age, although it was dance that first introduced him to performance. “We had a dance teacher who came to my primary school to teach us and I absolutely loved to dance,” he says.
“She really encouraged me and told my mum that I should pursue it, but I was a gay kid and I was a bit nervous about that being known; I didn’t want to bring attention to it, then my local theatre the Belgrade Theatre started doing an outreach programme – and that kind of changed my life.
"The Youth Theatre there taught me how to be a citizen of the world. I was thinking and talking about ideas that I hadn’t come across before.”
He hadn’t really thought about a career in theatre until a teacher told him about drama school and he went on to train as an actor.
“Then three things happened to me at drama school – I was told to take my earring out and to act straight, I was advised to lose my Coventry accent and I was also made to feel that someone from my social class wasn’t really welcome. It felt as though I had to change myself.
"It was only when I started to write that I realised that it was those very things – the fact I was working class, I was gay and my ‘Coventry-ness’ – that made me and my writing interesting.”
In the modern world when people have so many other things competing for their attention, theatres have to work very hard to entice people to come along.
But, as Wright so clearly recognizes and is passionate about, there really is nothing like live performance and the unique connection between a company of actors telling a story that speaks to our times and resonates with an audience.
“Ultimately our ambition is for Leeds Playhouse to be a theatre where there is something for everyone, where everyone feels welcome,” says Wright. “And for it to be a place where some of the most exciting conversations in British theatre are happening.”
For details of Leeds Playhouse’s current shows and the new season, opening in September and running to summer 2027, visit leedsplayhouse.org.uk.