A one-man musical that was a hit at the Toronto Fringe Festival and a legal drama that won the 2023 Olivier Award for best new play are among the five productions announced Tuesday as part of the 2026-27 Off-Mirvish season, a lineup that draws heavily on local talent and features partnerships with many Canadian theatre companies.
“Our Little Secret: A True New Musical,” which debuted at the 2023 Toronto Fringe Festival and won the Best of Fringe award, will open the season in November. Written and starring Noam Tomaschoff, the show tells the story of how Tomaschoff, after taking a DNA test, discovered he was not an only child, as he previously believed, but in fact one of 35 half-siblings around the world, conceived through sperm donation.
“Technology has made it possible for people to find out things about themselves and their families that were not possible before, and this is the first time I’ve seen a piece of entertainment tackle that,” said John Karastamatis, Mirvish’s director of communications and programming, who led the curation of the Off-Mirvish season.
After premiering at the Toronto Fringe, Tomaschoff’s musical went on to play the 2024 Edinburgh Fringe Festival. It later returned to Canada last year for a run at Montreal’s Segal Centre. The production, set to play in Toronto this fall, will be directed by Adam Pascal, the Broadway actor who starred in the original company of “Rent.”
The next production in the lineup, and the Off-Mirvish season’s holiday offering, will be “Goblin:Christmas Carol,” running from December 2026 to January 2027. Created by Spontaneous Theatre’s Rebecca Northan and Bruce Horak, along with Ellis Lalonde, the show is a retelling of the classic Dickens novel, from the perspective of three goblins.
This new production follows Spontaneous Theatre’s previous “Goblin” adaptations, including prior hits “Goblin:Macbeth” and “Goblin:Oedipus.”
“Many of us at Mirvish saw the ‘Goblin:Macbeth.’ And while we’ve all known Rebecca for a while, we never thought about doing it,” said Karastamatis. “And then she came up with this idea for ‘Christmas Carol,’ and we thought it would be a nice counterpoint to the other holiday programming happening here.”
In January, the Off-Mirvish season will then present the Canadian premiere of Suzie Miller’s “Prima Facie,” a one-woman drama about a young lawyer who defends men accused of sexual assault but must reckon with her own practice after she herself is assaulted.
Miller’s play debuted in 2019 in Australia. A West End production starring “Killing Eve” actor Jodie Comer in 2022 later won the Olivier for best new play, before transferring to Broadway the following year. The Off-Mirvish production will star Bethany Jillard and be directed by Stratford Festival veteran Seana McKenna.
It’s one of two Off-Mirvish productions McKenna is involved with next season. After she directs “Prima Facie,” the actor-director will then step on stage in March 2027 to co-star in the world premiere of “Jackpot Twins,” produced by Company Theatre, which last partnered with Mirvish in 2023 for “Things I Know to Be True.”
Written and directed by Philip Riccio, the play is inspired by the true story of two Ontario twins who win the lottery three times, their improbable luck changing their lives both for better and for worse. McKenna and Nora McLellan will play the two sisters, with the five-person cast rounded out by Tony Nappo, Colin A. Doyle and Caroline Toal.
The Off-Mirvish season will then conclude in April 2027 with the Crow’s Theatre production of Zahida Rahemtulla’s “The Wrong Bashir,” which previously ran at Crow’s Theatre in 2024, where it received mostly positive reviews.
The farce, set within the Ismaili community, follows Bashir Ladha, a young podcaster somewhat detached from his family’s faith who’s accidentally selected for a distinguished religious position — much to his horror and his family’s jubilation.
The production is being billed as a revised version of the play and follows a workshop held last summer that led to some changes in the script, noted Karastamatis.
This Off-Mirvish transfer will be directed once again by Paolo Santalucia and will feature much of the same cast from the Crow’s run, including Bren Eastcott, Zaittun Esmail, Salim Rahemtulla, Sharjil Rasool, Zorana Sadiq, Jasmine Sawant, Parm Soor, Sanjay Talwar and Sugith Varughese.
The Off-Mirvish season, which typically features smaller productions that are less commercial compared to Mirvish’s musical-heavy main subscription lineup, will run at the 700-seat CAA Theatre.
Tuesday’s announcement comes after the company previously announced in February its main programming for 2026-27, including productions of Agatha Christie’s “The Mousetrap” and a “Karate Kid” musical adaptation.
