Macbeth and The Merry Wives of Windsor on deck as Bard on the Beach announces summer of 2026 programming

Goblin:Oedipus and Antigone set to hit the Douglas Campbell Theatre

The Bard on the Beach site at Sen̓áḵw/Vanier Park.

ONE OF SHAKESPEARE’S lightest farcical works joins one of his darkest in Bard on the Beach’s just-unveiled summer 2026 season.

The Merry Wives of Windsor is set to open the festival next June, featuring one of the Bard’s most famous comedic characters, Falstaff, as he woos two married women in a plot to steal their husbands’ fortunes. The production will be livened up even further with a fresh musical treatment.

It alternates with Macbeth on the BMO Mainstage in Sen̓áḵw/Vanier Park. Bard says to expect “stark design and stylized visuals” in the famous play about a murderous, power-thirsty general and his wife.

At the smaller Douglas Campbell Theatre, the fest stages Goblin:Oedipus, complete with grotesquely masked Wug, Kragva, and Moog, returning from their darkly comedic spin on Macbeth at Bard in 2023. This time out, the terrible trio takes on Sophocles’ Oedipus Rex, adapted by John Murrell.

It alternates with Antigone in a new adaptation by local playwright Kate Besworth. Adapting Sophocles’ classic Greek tragedy for a contemporary audience, it portrays Oedipus’s Antigone, who sets off a chain of events that pits family loyalty against political power.

The announcements were made as Bard wrapped up its 2025 season.

Premium and Regular Season Packs are now on sale at the Bard on the Beach website, with launch pricing available until October 4.

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Janet Smith

Janet Smith is founding partner and editorial director of Stir. She is an award-winning arts journalist who has spent more than two decades immersed in Vancouver’s dance, screen, design, theatre, music, opera, and gallery scenes. She sits on the Vancouver Film Critics’ Circle.

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