10 theatre artists to watch this fall

The summer Fringe festivals are over. People have returned from vacay. TIFF has rolled up its red carpets. And now the 2025/26 Toronto theatre season can begin. There are seven theatre openings this week alone.

But what to see? Here, among the dozens of world premieres, revivals and reinterpretations that are happening from now until early December, are some gifted artists who are guaranteed to bring down the house.

For details about the rest of the fall season, make sure to bookmark the So Sumi Theatre Listings, which include show openings until the end of January 2026.

And at the end of this article, check out a ticket giveaway for another hotly anticipated show you won’t want to miss.

Kanika Ambrose

Writer, The Christmas Market (November 4 to 30 at Crow’s Studio Theatre), and Moonlight Schooner (November 21 to December 14 at Canadian Stage’s Berkeley Theatre)

In only a few years, Ambrose, a Dora Award-winner for her bold plays our place (2023) and Truth (2024), has emerged as one of the country’s most intriguing — and in-demand — playwrights and librettists. No wonder she has two works debuting this season.

First comes The Christmas Market, about three Caribbean migrants working at a holiday market during their first Canadian winter (could this play become an annual theatre tradition?). Then comes Moonlight Schooner, her look at the threat of imperialism, centering on a group of Black sailors stranded on the island of St. Kitts on May Day 1958. Ticket info here and here.

Alan Doyle

Co-writer/actor, Tell Tale Harbour (September 23 to November 2 at the Royal Alexandra Theatre)

Now that Come From Away has left (don’t worry: it’s popping up in a lot of regional theatre seasons), there’s room for another feel-good East Coast-themed musical. Enter this musical adaptation of Ken Scott’s film The Grand Seduction, about a Newfoundland fishing village looking to woo a young full-time physician to its town to encourage a local business venture.