Bird Grove

Hampstead Theatre gets 2026 off to a promising looking start with its first main house show of the year. Bird Grove comes from the veteran playwright Alexi Kaye Campbell, his first in almost a decade. Set in 1841, it concerns a young woman named Mary Ann Evans – better known to future generations as the great novelist George Eliot. In Campbell’s play, a pre-Elioty Evans has come into conflict with her father Robert, who has moved her to the titular Bird Grove House in Coventry with the intention of marrying her off. But she chafes against this, aware already that to embrace social convention would be to deny her gifts. In her first major role since Andor made her a star, Elizabeth Dulau will play Mary, with Owen Teale as Thomas. Anna Ledwich directs.