The Woman in Black UK tour opens in Chester next month

PW Productions is delighted to announce casting and full tour dates for Susan Hill’s The Woman in Black, as it returns for a 22-venue UK Tour. The production will star John Mackay as Arthur Kipps and Daniel Burke as The Actor, opening at Storyhouse, Chester on Wednesday 24 September 2025.

It will then play at Theatre Severn, Shrewsbury ahead of a 3-week run at London’s Alexandra Palace before touring to Barnstaple, Plymouth, Brighton, Richmond, Bath, and in 2026, Darlington, York, m Glasgow, Birmingham, Chelmsford, Oxford, Poole, Liverpool, Nottingham, Bradford, Peterborough, Malvern, Southampton and Guildford.

John Mackay’s West End credits include The Doctor at the Duke of York’s Theatre, which he also appeared in at the Park Avenue Armory in New York. His other theatre credits include Witness for the Prosecution at County Hall, Home at Chichester Festival Theatre, Richard II,  Machinal and Oresteia at the Almeida Theatre, Occupational Hazards, Wild, Drawing the Line, and 55 Days at Hampstead Theatre, The Sewing Group at the Royal Court, Measure for Measure and Going Dark at the Young Vic and many productions for the Royal Shakespeare Company including The Histories, Antony and Cleopatra, King Lear, The Winter’s Tale, Julius Caesar, Twelfth Night, As You Like It, Hamlet and Macbeth. His television credits include Doctor Who, Great Expectations, The Hollow Crown II, The Honourable Woman, Landscapers, Nolly, The Canterville Ghost, Black Earth Rising, The Crown and Bridgerton for Netflix. His film credits include Hamnet, Living, Judy, Cruella, Ammonite and Blitz.

Daniel Burke’s theatre credits include the UK Tour of The Girl on the Train, Troilus and Cressida for the Royal Shakespeare Company, and Imperium Part I and Part II, also for the Royal Shakespeare Company, and at the Gielgud Theatre in the West End. His other theatre credits include Bang Bang at the Exeter Northcutt Theatre and on a UK Tour, Romeo and Juliet and Richard III at the Shakespeare Rose Theatre, Hamlet, Richard II and Romeo and Juliet for the Guildford Shakespeare Company, Comedy of Errors at the Mercury Theatre, Colchester, Love All at Jermyn Street Theatre, A Midsummer Night’s Dream and The Great Gatsby at Storyhouse’s Grosvenor Park Open Air Theatre, and The Circle at Theatre Royal Bath and on a UK Tour. His television credits include The Witcher for Netflix and Lord of the Rings Rings of Power for Amazon Prime.

For 33 years THE WOMAN IN BLACK played a record-breaking run in the West End, with over 13,000 performances at the Fortune Theatre before its final performance on Saturday 4 March 2023. It has also been seen by over 7 million people in the UK.

Stephen Mallatratt’s adaptation of Susan Hill’s best-selling novel tells the story of a lawyer obsessed with a curse that he believes has been cast over his family by the spectre of a ‘Woman in Black’. He engages a young actor to help him tell his story and exorcise the fear that grips his soul. It begins innocently enough, but as they delve further into his darkest memories the borders between make-believe and reality begin to blur and the flesh begins to creep.

Following a Christmas production in the bar of the Stephen Joseph Theatre Scarborough in 1987, THE WOMAN IN BLACK was brought to Hammersmith’s Lyric Theatre in January 1989. Reviews were sufficiently encouraging to warrant a West End run. Its West End tour started at the Strand (now Novello) Theatre in March and moved to the Playhouse in April, finally lodging at the Fortune on June 7, 1989.

Throughout the production’s run in the West End and during its many tours the producer has been determined to keep ticket prices within the range of students and young people, a policy that continues today.

THE WOMAN IN BLACK is directed by Robin Herford, with designs by Michael Holt and lighting by Kevin Sleep.

• THE WOMAN IN BLACK
• WEDNESDAY 24 – SATURDAY 27 SEPTEMBER
• CHESTER STORYHOUSE www.storyhouse.com/