State Theatre Company South Australia has put together an electric line-up of bold new theatrical drama, comedy, musical theatre and reimagined classics led by both Australian entertainment icons and brilliant new talent.
This year’s season includes a festival of new South Australian plays in Great Australian Bites. From Emily Steel’s behind-the-scenes dive into Australian politics in Housework to the Tony Award-winning Best Musical Kimberley Akimbo, to an Australian 90s classic Looking For Alibrandi, to the beloved and legendary The Glass Menagerie, Season 2025 will be a rollercoaster ride of high-wire and high-quality work.
Housework
7–22 February, Dunstan Playhouse
A whip smart, gaspingly funny and incisive deep dive into the corridors of power with shades of Veep, The Thick of It and The Hollowmen, celebrated South Australian playwright Emily Steel (Euphoria) blows open the doors of Parliament House to unlock some devilish and dangerous truths in this bold new black comedy.
Two of Australia’s greatest comic actresses take to the stage in this thrilling world premiere – acclaimed actress and comedian Susie Youssef, star of The Project, Deadloch and The Appleton Ladies Potato Race assumes the ministerial mantle while Emily Taheny, she of a thousand characters from Shaun Micallef’s Mad As Hell, is set to juggle a plethora of political hot potatoes as Anna, with direction from State Theatre Company South Australia Artistic Associate Shannon Rush (Cathedral, The Puzzle).
Sex scandals, betrayals, culture wars, the price of power, motherhood and Machiavellian manipulation – it’s all in a day’s work inside the House.
Dictionary of Lost Words
3–17 April, Dunstan Playhouse
After delighting audiences and critics alike in sold out seasons in Adelaide, Sydney and Melbourne, our highest and fastest selling show in the history of the Dunstan Playhouse returns to Adelaide as part of a wider national tour throughout 2025.
Lovingly adapted by South Australian playwright Verity Laughton from Pip Williams’ acclaimed bestseller, The Dictionary of Lost Words is back.
In 1901, the word bondmaid was discovered missing from the Oxford English Dictionary. The Dictionary of Lost Words is the story of the girl who found it.
A multi-award winner, the book has been praised by critics as an “absorbing, quietly revolutionary novel” (The Age) and
“a captivating and slyly subversive fictional paean to the real women whose work on the Oxford English Dictionary went largely unheralded” (The New York Times).
Looking for Alibrandi
22–31 May, Dunstan Playhouse
An iconic Australian coming-of-age novel takes centre stage.
It’s the last year of school and 17-year-old Josephine Alibrandi can’t wait for her future to begin – if only she can get past the world of her Nonna, holding onto the values of the old country and the world of her Mum, full of care and secrets. It’s time to take her place in the real world, beyond her family, beyond being an Alibrandi.
But this is the year Josie gets to know her father. This is the year she falls in love. And this is the year she uncovers the truth – and finds the Alibrandi she has been searching for.
Three generations of women. The Italian-Australian experience. A trip back into the 1990s. A theatrical adaptation of the beloved iconic Australian novel and groundbreaking film, fresh from sold out seasons in Sydney and Melbourne will have its Adelaide premiere in 2025. Directed by the new Artistic Director of Brink Productions, Stephen Nicolazzo, there’s a new Josie coming this way!
Kimberley Akimbo
8–19 July, Her Majesty’s Theatre
The Australian premiere of a Tony Award-winning new musical and a great adventure.
The new girl in town is making heads spin. You’ve got to move fast when you’re 16 going on 70.
Kimberly Akimbo is the musical that took Broadway by storm. It won countless hearts and raked in five Tony awards including Best Musical, with music by Jeanine Tesori (Shrek) and book by David Lindsay-Abaire (Ripcord).
This Australian premiere directed by four-time Helpmann Award-winner and outgoing Artistic Director, Mitchell Butel and starring Australian stage icons Marina Prior, Casey Donovan, Nathan O’Keefe and Christie Whelan Browne, brims with infectious energy and tunes that soar. This new musical transcends generations with laughter, love and a poignant reminder of life’s fleeting moments.
Dear Son
26 July–16 August, Odeon Theatre
A message of love, hope and healing.
Along with his own vivid and poignant prose and poetry, author and editor Thomas Mayo, co-author of The Voice to Parliament Handbook and Kaurareg, Kalkalgal and Erubamle Torres Strait Islander man, invited 12 contributors to write a letter to their son, father or nephew, bringing together a range of perspectives that offered a celebration of First Nations manhood.
Featuring letters from Stan Grant, Troy Cassar-Daley, John Liddle, Charlie King, Joe Williams, Yessie Mosby, Joel Bayliss, Daniel James, Jack Latimore, Daniel Morrison, Tim Sculthorpe and Blak Douglas, what resulted was a gentle, honest and loving book for families from anywhere in the world.
In 2025, renowned First Nations theatre makers, Isaac Drandic (At What Cost?) and John Harvey (Heart is a Wasteland) will adapt these letters into a world premiere theatre work, and starring leading First Nations actors including Jimi Bani and Trevor Jamieson, that will open your eyes and your heart.
Great Australian Bites
23 November–7 December, Odeon Theatre
A festival of new South Australian plays.
Across November and December, come and take a bite of some tasty new offerings from the cream of South Australian playwrights. Great Australian Bites is a festival of never-performed-before works from some of our most dynamic, innovative and talented theatre makers.
These new plays will be rehearsed over several days by similarly talented South Australian actors and directors and read script-in-hand on the Odeon Theatre stage, so expect some fast and fresh fabulosity!
For next-to-nothing ticket prices, get a slice of one, or all, of these treats!
The Glass Menagerie
15 November–7 December, Odeon Theatre
Glass breaks so easily. No matter how careful you are.
In a small apartment in 1930s St Louis, Amanda Wingfield and her two children, Tom and Laura, spin singular and separate dreams.
The Glass Menagerie, Tennessee Williams’ semi-autobiographical evocation of loneliness and lost love, is one of his most powerful and moving plays; an unforgettable American classic.
Under the direction of Artistic Associate Shannon Rush, this production will feature some of Adelaide’s finest performers including the incomparable Ksenja Logos (fresh from her acclaimed turns in The Dictionary of Lost Words and Gaslight) as Amanda and Kathryn Adams (the scene-stealing star of Antigone, Single Asian Female and Welcome to Your New Life) as Laura.
Don’t miss this compelling journey into the heart of memory, illusion and a family fighting for their lives in the intimacy of the Odeon Theatre, to round out State Theatre’s 2025 season.
For more information on the State Theatre Company South Australia’s 2025 Season, go to statetheatrecompany.com.au
