WELCOME TO THE NITERY EXPERIMENTAL THEATRE

​We would like to think of theatre as something which is being invented. And it will always keep evolving since the world we inhabit keeps changing faster than the forms we inherit. Our bodies are read differently. Every new technology rearranges our attention. Old structures of power keep returning in new clothes. The future often feels intimate and incomprehensible at once.

 

Theatre can help us sit inside that uncertainty. It can sometimes help us make sense of it. But it can equally make trouble and hold contradiction long enough for us to look at it. Sometimes, it may simply be an experiment in abstraction or speculation or absurdity. But it can also abandon representation altogether. It may even take on the world directly and alter the relation between performer and audience. Or it may move somewhere else entirely to test the borders of comprehension and meaning-making itself. Often, it just makes us laugh… or cry… as we revisit an old classic and spend an evening listening to Shakespeare in our neighbourhood theatre!

 

For the 2026-27 season, we are interested in work that pushes at theatre’s own edges and NExT gives us a place to find out. Alongside all of this, we believe that theatre intrinsically remains a craft learned with other people. We are here to help with that process, to connect people, to work through problems, and to help a project become possible in the room.

 

Marlon Ariyasinghe and Shailee Rajak

Co-Artistic Directors

NExT 2026–27