Map marker icon  5021 E. Anaheim Street Long Beach CA 90804 • (562) 494-1014

Heart icon Donate   Volunteer   Audition Twitter Facebook Email

Tag Archives: 2025-2026 Mainstage Season

Ticket icon  Tickets

GODSPELL

Synopsis
GODSPELL
Playing in the Long Beach Playhouse’s Mainstage Theater
June 27 – Aug. 2, 2026
Book by John Michael Tebelak, Music & Lyrics by Stephen Schwartz
Directed and Choreographed by Sonya Randall
Musical Direction by Stephen Olear

From famed Wicked! composer and lyricist, Stephen Schwartz, comes his first major musical offering, GODSPELL. Taking the world by storm when it first premiered, the show boasts a score of chart-topping songs including , “Day by Day,” “All for the Best,” and “By My Side,” as it tells the story of Jesus Christ according to the Gospel of Matthew. A small group of storytellers help tell different parables with a hefty dose of humor and pathos using an eclectic blend of songs, ranging in style from pop to vaudeville. This show is a sensation that continues to touch audiences with its messages of kindness, tolerance, and love.

PURCHASE YOUR TICKETS HERE:
CHOOSE YOUR DATE:

AGE LIMIT

As a courtesy to our patrons, it is the policy of the theatre not to admit children under the age of 5. This policy may be altered from time to time based on shows and show content.

June 27, 2026 @ 8:00 pm – August 2, 2026 @ 2:00 pm

Ticket icon   Buy Tickets

Ticket icon  Tickets

THE LION IN WINTER

Synopsis
THE LION IN WINTER
Playing in the Long Beach Playhouse’s Mainstage Theater
May 16 – June 13, 2026
By James Goldman
Directed by James Rice

This medieval drama is a modern day classic that tells the story of the Plantagenet royal family, locked in a free-for-all of competing ambitions to inherit a kingdom. The Queen, Eleanor of Aquitaine, has been kept in prison since raising an army with her sons against her husband, King Henry II. Let out for the holidays, the family descends into sibling rivalry, adultery, and desperate maneuvering for the throne. As Eleanor says, “Every family has its ups and downs,” in this intelligent show that bursts with astringent wit and a humor that bristles and burns.

PURCHASE YOUR TICKETS HERE:
CHOOSE YOUR DATE:

AGE LIMIT

As a courtesy to our patrons, it is the policy of the theatre not to admit children under the age of 5. This policy may be altered from time to time based on shows and show content.

May 16, 2026 @ 8:00 pm – June 13, 2026 @ 8:00 pm

Ticket icon   Buy Tickets

Ticket icon  Tickets

HARVEY

Synopsis
HARVEY
Playing in the Long Beach Playhouse’s Mainstage Theater
April 4 – May 2, 2026
By Mary Chase

In this popular comedy from the golden age of Broadway, the kindly Elwood P. Dowd insists on including his friend Harvey in all of his sister Veta’s social gatherings. Trouble is, Harvey is an imaginary, six-and-a-half-foot-tall rabbit. To avoid further family embarrassment, Veta decides to have Elwood committed to a sanitarium. Yet her frantic explanations of the situation to the doctors get her mistakenly committed instead of her mild-mannered brother. When Elwood arrives at the sanitarium looking for Harvey, hilarity ensues in this gentle comedy about the acceptance of the ones we love and the fact that the truth can’t always be “seen.”

PURCHASE YOUR TICKETS HERE:
CHOOSE YOUR DATE:

AGE LIMIT

As a courtesy to our patrons, it is the policy of the theatre not to admit children under the age of 5. This policy may be altered from time to time based on shows and show content.

April 4, 2026 @ 8:00 pm – May 2, 2026 @ 8:00 pm

Ticket icon   Buy Tickets

Ticket icon  Tickets

August Wilson’s GEM OF THE OCEAN

Synopsis
August Wilson’s GEM OF THE OCEAN
Playing in the Long Beach Playhouse’s Mainstage Theater
Feb. 21 – Mar. 21, 2026
By August Wilson
Directed by Rovin Jay

Master playwright, August Wilson, blends naturalism, mysticism, and magical realism to explore the experience of a Black community at the turn of the 20th century. It’s 1904, and Citizen Barlow comes seeking asylum in the Pittsburgh Hill District home of matriarch and spiritual advisor Aunt Ester. She sets him off on a spiritual journey aboard the legendary slave ship Gem of the Ocean to visit the home of the ancestors, the City of Bones. Confronted with the plight of those who came before him, Citizen must come to terms with his own guilt in this unsettling but compelling story filled with humor and heart that is a touchstone for everything else that Wilson has written.

PURCHASE YOUR TICKETS HERE:
CHOOSE YOUR DATE:

AGE LIMIT

As a courtesy to our patrons, it is the policy of the theatre not to admit children under the age of 5. This policy may be altered from time to time based on shows and show content.

February 21, 2026 @ 8:00 pm – March 21, 2026 @ 8:00 pm

Ticket icon   Buy Tickets

Ticket icon  Tickets

Agatha Christie’s GO BACK FOR MURDER

Synopsis
Agatha Christie’s GO BACK FOR MURDER
Playing in the Long Beach Playhouse’s Mainstage Theater
Jan. 10 – Feb. 7, 2026
By Agatha Christie
Directed by Floyd Harden

The Queen of Mystery does it again in this ingenious detective story about a devastating event in a family’s past. Carla Crale believes her mother was wrongly convicted of her father’s murder. In an attempt to clear her mother’s name, she persuades those present on the day of her father’s death to return to the scene of the crime and ‘go back’ 16 years to recount their version of events. The play thrillingly slips from past to present, as Carla takes on the role of her mother to see how others’ stories of what happened are warped by time, prejudice, and perception.  Can Carla find the real murderer, or will the truth always be clouded by mystery?

PURCHASE YOUR TICKETS HERE:
CHOOSE YOUR DATE:

AGE LIMIT

As a courtesy to our patrons, it is the policy of the theatre not to admit children under the age of 5. This policy may be altered from time to time based on shows and show content.

January 10, 2026 @ 8:00 pm – February 7, 2026 @ 8:00 pm

Ticket icon   Buy Tickets

Ticket icon  Tickets

A CHRISTMAS CAROL (2025)

Synopsis
A CHRISTMAS CAROL
Playing in the Long Beach Playhouse’s Mainstage Theater
Dec. 6 – Dec. 21, 2025
Adapted from the novella by Charles Dickens
Directed by Carole Louise Nicholson

Holiday favorite, A CHRISTMAS CAROL, returns for its annual incarnation in this quick-paced, highly theatrical retelling of Charles Dickens’ classic tale. The ghosts of Christmases Past, Present, and Future show Ebenezer Scrooge the poverty of his miserly ways and the blessings that come with generosity. Can they convince him to change before it’s too late? Come spend time with the characters you’ve come to love – Bob Cratchit, Tiny Tim, and, of course, the irascible miser himself.  This yearly tradition will be the Christmas ghost story needed to set you and your loved ones on the path to holiday cheer.

PURCHASE YOUR TICKETS HERE:
CHOOSE YOUR DATE:

(*There is a $3.00 service fee for online purchases.)

AGE LIMIT

As a courtesy to our patrons, it is the policy of the theatre not to admit children under the age of 5. This policy may be altered from time to time based on shows and show content.

December 6 @ 8:00 pm – December 21 @ 2:00 pm

Ticket icon   Buy Tickets

Ticket icon  Tickets

Neil Simon’s PLAZA SUITE

Synopsis
Neil Simon’s PLAZA SUITE
Playing in the Long Beach Playhouse’s Mainstage Theater
Nov. 1 – Nov. 29, 2025
By Neil Simon
Directed by James Rice

Hilarity abounds in Neil Simon’s portrait of three couples successively occupying a suite at The Plaza Hotel. The first tale is of a marriage in tatters, as the room a suburban couple uses while their house is being painted turns out to be the suite they honeymooned in years ago. In the second, a Hollywood producer reconnects with a childhood sweetheart for a little romantic diversion, but she turns out to be more than he bargained for. In the third, the parents of a bride are fighting about the best way to get their daughter out of the bathroom and down to the ballroom to get married. The town will be set laughing in this wild and richly funny farce that answers the age old question, “What if these walls could talk?”

PURCHASE YOUR TICKETS HERE:
CHOOSE YOUR DATE:

(*There is a $3.00 service fee for online tickets)

AGE LIMIT

As a courtesy to our patrons, it is the policy of the theatre not to admit children under the age of 5. This policy may be altered from time to time based on shows and show content.

November 1 @ 8:00 pm – November 29 @ 8:00 pm

Ticket icon   Buy Tickets

Ticket icon  Tickets

DR. JEKYLL AND MR. HYDE

Synopsis
DR. JEKYLL AND MR. HYDE
Playing in the Long Beach Playhouse’s Mainstage Theater
Sept. 20 – Oct. 18, 2025
Adapted by Jeffrey Hatcher, from the novella by Robert Louis Stevenson
Directed by David Scaglione

See this chilling new version of the classic story of duality, desire, and depravity taken from one of the most famous tales of Gothic horror. Behind the doors of Victorian London, Dr. Henry Jekyll’s experiments have brought forth his other self—Edward Hyde, a sensualist and villain free to commit the sins Jekyll is too civilized to comprehend. As we encounter the multiple faces of Hyde, he meets a woman who stirs his interest. But Jekyll fears for her life and decides to end his experiments. Hyde has other ideas, and so the two sides battle each other in a deadly game of cat-and-mouse to determine who shall be the master of the mind they share. 

PURCHASE YOUR TICKETS HERE:
CHOOSE YOUR DATE:

(*Tickets bought online will have a $3.00 service fee)

AGE LIMIT

As a courtesy to our patrons, it is the policy of the theatre not to admit children under the age of 5. This policy may be altered from time to time based on shows and show content.

September 20 @ 8:00 pm – October 18 @ 8:00 pm

Ticket icon   Buy Tickets