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“We wanted to lean into being ambitious and what it means to generate electricity with the stories we’re offering next season,” said artistic director Mike Payette in an interview. “These are some raw and intense works that are coupled with comedy and intense laughter, building on what it means to find commonality between each other even through our differences.”

“After the Rain,” a co-commission between Tarragon and the Musical Stage Company, will mark its world premiere in May 2025. Written and composed by Rose Napoli and Suzy Wilde, the semi-autobiographical musical is based on Wilde’s experience as a music teacher. It follows a struggling songwriter whose life changes after she agrees to teach a mature piano student intent on learning one piece, Erik Satie’s “Gymnopedie No. 1.” The musical will be helmed by director Marie Farsi, who recently penned and directed the Crow’s Theatre production of “Fifteen Dogs.”

Tarragon’s new season will begin this fall with “GOBLIN:MACBETH,” running from Oct. 3 to 27. Co-created by Rebecca Northan and Bruce Horak, the show is an irreverent take on the Bard’s play. Drawing upon fantasy, tragedy and improvisation, the tale is about three goblins who stumble across a copy of Shakespeare’s “Macbeth” and are eager to mount it in a theatre. This production marks the show’s ɫɫ�� premiere. It previously played to critical acclaim at the Stratford Festival and in Calgary. 

Also opening in October is a new work by playwright Rosa Laborde, the Governor General’s Award finalist whose previous plays “Light” and “Leo” were mounted at Tarragon. Her latest play, “Interior Design,” is a biting comedy about a group of four girlfriends who discover some messy truths after an attempted intervention. The production will run from Oct. 15 to Nov. 10 with direction by Kat Sandler. 

Payette himself will direct two productions next season. The first, “Craze,” is a co-production with Modern Times Stage Company. Written by Rouvan Silogix and Rafeh Mahmud, the show is billed as a “sexy, surrealist, laugh-out-loud comedy” following a pair of couples who shelter from a storm, and whose time is filled with technological mayhem and sexual frivolity. The cast includes Ali Kazmi, Augusto Bitter, Kwaku Okyere, Louisa Zhu and Lisa Ryder.

Later, in April 2025, Payette will helm “Benevolence,” a solo play written and performed by Kevin Matthew Wong, exploring ideas of migration and what it means to be from the Hakka Chinese dialect group. The play was part of Tarragon’s inaugural Greenhouse Festival in 2023, an incubator program for new work. That the production will be making its world premiere just two years later, said Payette, is a testament to the show’s qualities. 

“The Greenhouse Festival aims to foster the development of a show in the early stages of the process and bringing audiences in, with the hope that the production has future life, not just at Tarragon,” he added. “In this particular case, ‘Benevolence’ was one of those pieces where the audience response was really compelling.” 

“The Wolf in the Voice,” a new work created by Martin Julien and Brian Quirt, will also receive its world premiere at Tarragon, running from Feb. 4 to 23, 2025. Starring Neema Bickersteth, Jane Miller and Taurian Teelucksingh, the genre-defying work explores the human voice as an instrument, and the relationship between each of the three performers and their vocal artistry. 

Rounding out the season is the ɫɫ�� premiere of “Feast,” created by Governor General’s Award-winning playwright Guillermo Verdecchia. The dark comedy, which premiered at Winnipeg’s Prairie Theatre Exchange last fall, will be directed by Verdecchia’s longtime collaborator Soheil Parsa and will run from April 1 to 27, 2025. 

In addition to its main season, Tarragon will also welcome dance Immersion as its company in residence. The dance company, which focuses on showcasing the performers and dances of the African diaspora, will present its production of “Black & Rural,” described as “an artistic inquiry into the hearts and minds of Black folks tucked away on Canada’s countryside.”

Update - April 18, 2024

This article was edited from a previous version to update that Tarragon’s new season will begin with GOBLIN:MACBETH on Oct. 3. The previous version said the season started on Oct. 4, based on information provided to the Star.