The best London theatre shows to see in 2023

Where: Menier Chocolate Factory, 53 Southwark Street, London SE1 1RU
When: 11 January – 26 February 2023
Website: menierchocolatefactory.com 

Patriots 

A new play from writer Peter Morgan (Netflix’s The Crown, Frost/Nixon), Patriots transfers from the hit-making Almeida in Islington to St Martin’s Lane in summer 2023. Tom Hollander reprises his role as billionaire businessman Boris Berezovsky – the oligarch and “kingmaker behind Vladimir Putin” (played by Will Keen) – in the wake of the Soviet Union’s collapse. Exploring patriots and traitors, Russia’s 1 per cent, Londongrad, Abramovich’s rise, Berezovsky’s misreadings, and Litvinenko’s assassination (amongst other matters), Almeida Artistic Director Rupert Goold brings this “brilliant and startlingly timely story of ambition, loyalty, and betrayal” centre stage in theatreland.

Where: Noël Coward Theatre, 85-88 St Martin’s Lane, London WC2N 4AP
When: 26 May – 19 August 2023
Website: patriotstheplay.com 

Aidan Turner and Jenna Coleman in Lemons Lemons Lemons Lemons LemonsJason Bell

Lemons Lemons Lemons Lemons Lemons

A love story to render you speechless, Lemons Lemons Lemons Lemons Lemons, penned by Manchester native Sam Steiner and directed by Josie Rourke, explores the principle of free speech. Starring Aidan Turner and Jenna Coleman as Oliver and Bernadette, the one-act rom-com examines, as the synopsis reads, “what we say, how we say it, and what happens when we can’t say anything anymore”. Written in 2015, this was Steiner’s first play – a two-hander of rationed language, with characters limited to 140 words per person per day. Landing at the Harold Pinter Theatre in early January, this 75-minute reworking for the West End stage is likely to humour theatregoers (and give them something to talk about too). 

Where: Harold Pinter Theatre, Panton Street, London SW1Y 4DN
When: 18 January – 18 March 2023
Website: lemonstheplay.co.uk 

Drive Your Plow Over the Bones of the Dead Camilla Adams

Drive Your Plow Over the Bones of the Dead

One of the UK’s most interesting and imaginative theatre companies, Complicité’s shows are wholly unique. Conceived and directed by artistic director and co-founder Simon McBurney, the troupe’s latest turn, Drive Your Plow Over the Bones of the Dead, tours across the UK this spring with a pitstop at The Barbican. The first English language stage adaptation of Nobel Prize-Winner, Olga Tokarczuk’s darkly comic novel, this murder mystery – with an estimated running time of two hours – begins in the depths of winter as men from the local hunting club begin to die in unusual circumstances. Comedic and macabre, catch the inimitable Kathryn Hunter in the role of central character Janina Duszejko – an environmentalist, devoted astrologer, and enthusiastic translator of William Blake.