Review: Hadestown 2026 – Lyric Theatre, London

As the old saying goes, the fact that there’s a highway to hell and only a stairway to heaven says a lot about anticipated traffic numbers. And that certainly proves true for Anaïs Mitchell’s Hadestown, which, since opening at the Lyric in 2024, has had six different casts. So writes Franco Milazzo for theQR.co.uk…

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Some musicals arrive fully formed, strut about for a season, then politely leave. And then there is Hadestown that has spent the better part of two decades tinkering with its own myth, like Orpheus endlessly rewriting that one song in the hope it might finally land.

From its Vermont workshop origins in 2006, through concept-album adolescence and eight Tony wins on Broadway, to its current West End residency, this is less a production history and more an Icelandic saga.

New West End Cast: Dooley, de Niese, and Sykes

The latest cast made its entrance this week, and there’s something for everyone. As Hades, Shaun Dooley is the surprise package here, a character actor who has played a broad range of small-screen roles. He was the local reverend in EastEnders for a few years, the sociopathic probation worker on Misfits and the narrator of SAS: Who Dares Wins. You’ll recognise him in the street and spend all day wondering where you’ve seen him before.

Opposite him, Olivier award-winning opera star Danielle de Niese takes on the role of his wife Persephone with real zeal, while The Wanted’s Nathan Sykes is a sparky Orpheus. Whoever had the idea of lumping together a TV everyman, a world-famous soprano and a member of a boyband is either a certified genius or just plain certifiable. Or maybe both.

Either way, the combination works, at least in part because the two other main parts are held down by experienced musical theatre actors Fayth Ifil (Tina – The Tina Turner Musical, Just For One Day) as Eurydice and Malinda Parris as Hermes (Hercules, & Juliet, Matilda, Mary Poppins).

In the assured hands of Parris, Hermes is as warm, wry, and rhythmically precise as ever. She doesn’t so much guide you through the story as gently usher you along, hand in hand through scene after scene. Her performance is crucial, because the simple narrative always threatens to sag under its sentiment rather than soar with its adventurous spirit. Without her effervescent presence, there’s a sneaking suspicion that the whole shebang might quietly sink into an emotional bog and stay there.

If Parris is the show’s spine, then de Niese’s Persephone is its blazing, boozy heart. Her voice cuts through the hellish gloom like a well-aimed shaft of sunlight, particularly in “Livin’ It Up on Top” and the deliciously sardonic “Our Lady of the Underground”. De Niese finds both the mischief and melancholy in a character trapped between worlds and in a rather disappointing marriage.

That marriage, of course, is with Hades. No-one is going to confuse Dooley with a baritone but he gives the lord and master of the underworld a deep resonance. Hades begins as a demonic taskmaster and ends as someone swayed by a song, a resolution which may be efficient but is emotionally thin. His big number “Why We Build the Wall” is filled with lyrics that have echoes of Trump on the stump circa 2016: “How does the wall keep us free? / The wall keeps out the enemy / And we build the wall to keep us free / That’s why we build the wall / We build the wall to keep us free.” It’s long, it’s loud, and it hammers its point home with all the subtlety of a lead-wrapped brick.

Despite all that, Dooley shines through the dated material and underlines both the softer and more brutal side of Hades. Strutting around in an all-black outfit – smart shades, leather overcoat and gloves paired with a three-piece pinstripe suit – he commands the stage. His chemistry with de Niese is palpable and one of the most enjoyable aspects of the second half.

Sykes has moves and energy to spare on “Wait for Me”, even if he can’t quite make us fall in love with Orpheus or his plight, but Ifil gives us a sterling Eurydice. The pair never really bring to life the deep emotions they speak of and, if this really is a love worth defying death for, we are rarely made to feel it. So when at the end Orpheus tragically looks back to Eurydice, we look over to the exit.

Staging and Score: Restrained Visuals vs Musical Triumph

Visually, it’s all a touch underwhelming. This is a story with immense creative potential that spans the overworld and the underworld, life and death, hope and despair, but Rachel Hauck’s set design feels oddly restrained. Lighting designer Bradley King’s language is too similar for both realms. That leaves the audience too often relying on expository cues and imagination to locate the characters. The central revolve, which dutifully goes up, down, and around and around literally and dramatically does much of the heavy lifting. After all these years of development, you might have hoped for something a little more, well, mythic.

There is still plenty of energy in Rachel Chavkin’s snappy direction and David Neumann’s witty choreography. What truly elevates the evening, however, is the music itself. Anaïs Mitchell’s score remains the show’s undeniable triumph, and the on-stage band is its vital engine. The blend of folk, jazz, and blues rhythms gives Hadestown its distinctive pulse, lifting scenes that might otherwise drift. It’s here, in the interplay between voice and instrument, that the show feels most alive, most urgent, most worth the journey.

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But therein lies the rub. Hadestown is a musical that – like Orpheus – resists looking back. It is about ploughing ever forward: find the girl, write the song, escape from Hades. Yet, after nearly 20 years of evolution, one can’t help but feel that, while the score is superb, the surrounding production hasn’t quite kept pace. The road to the underworld is long, and if this show is to travel it for another two decades, it may need more than a beautiful song to see it through.

Featured Image: Malinda Parris in Hadestown. © Brinkhoff-Moegenburg

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Hadestown at the Lyric Theatre, London, is currently booking until 12 December, 2027. For tickets or more information, click here: https://thelyrictheatre.co.uk/tickets/hadestown/