Following multiple sold out Australian seasons, a 2022 UK tour, and a hit New York City season in 2024, Belvoir’s international sensation, Counting and Cracking by S. Shakthidharan with Eamon Flack, will embark on another global tour in 2027 to London from 15th June to 10th July and New York City from 20th July to 15th August.
Soho Theatre Walthamstow will be the home of Counting and Cracking’s London debut, for a strictly limited season presented as part of LIFT (London International Festival of Theatre). Soho Theatre has a history of championing new works of theatre, comedy and cabaret. Its second London venue Soho Theatre Walthamstow opened in 2025, bringing a vibrant programme to its biggest stage yet.
In a New York first, Counting and Cracking will return to The Public Theater, this time taking over the open-air Delacorte Theater in Central Park. The venue is traditionally home to Shakespeare in the Park, with tickets free to the public.
Featuring 19 performers from six different countries, speaking in five different languages, performing more than 50 characters, Counting and Cracking follows the journey of a Sri Lankan-Australian family over four generations, spanning from 1956 to 2004.
First presented in Sydney, the production became a landmark piece of Australian theatre, winning 14 major awards, including Helpmann Awards for Best Production and Best Direction. It has since travelled internationally, reaching audiences at the Birmingham Commonwealth Games and Edinburgh Festivals in 2022, before making its New York debut in 2024.
Eamon Flack, director and associate writer, says, “Counting and Cracking is a ridiculous undertaking, it’s a huge and hugely complex show, and every time it gets up it’s because everyone involved is defying reality and common sense to make it happen. That’s what’s so wonderful about it.
Georgie Black and House of Oz have been doing outsize things for Australian performance in the UK for a while now, and Georgie’s been a tireless UK ambassador for Counting and Cracking.
The new SOHO Walthamstow is the perfect place for it – a big, brassy new venue in the middle of one of London’s great South Asia communities. I love that this Sri Lankan-Australian show is part of something new in London. Bringing new kinds of connection to life has always been the spirit of this show.
Oskar Eustis, the Artistic Director of the Public, is an incredible force of belief and possibility. He’s the guy who made Hamilton and Angels in America possible. When he brought Counting and Cracking to New York back in 2024, I thought he’d pulled off a huge, unrepeatable feat. But before that season even closed, he said he’d like to bring it back and put it into Central Park. So this new Australian play about democracy in Sri Lanka and refuge in Australia will play on the same outdoor stage where actors like Meryl Streep and Philip Seymour Hoffman and James Earl Jones have performed the greatest plays of all time, to 1800 people a night for a month, for free. It’s crazy, and entirely in keeping with the spirit of this show – a great public event about how democracies heed the voice of the public.”
S. Shakthidharan, writer and associate director, says, “At this moment in our world’s history, we need stories like Counting and Cracking more than ever. Stories that remind us of our capacity to love across difference, to listen to each other’s truths and to keep our democracies alive. For the story of my family and my community to be part of that conversation, and to share it with audiences in London and New York, is something truly extraordinary.”
The award-winning show will also play Australian seasons in Wollongong and Brisbane, opening at Merrigong Theatre Company on 13th May, followed by a season at Brisbane Powerhouse Museum from 27th May as part of Queensland Theatre Company’s 2027 Season.
COUNTING AND CRACKING 2027 SEASONS
WOLLONGONG
Merrigong Theatre Company
32 Burelli St, Wollongong NSW 2500
Dates: 13th – 23rd May 2027
Tickets: https://merrigong.com.au/merrigong-season/
BRISBANE
Brisbane Powerhouse
119 Lamington St, New Farm QLD 4005
Dates: 27th May – 6th June 2027
Tickets: https://brisbanepowerhouse.org/events/counting-and-cracking/
LONDON
Soho Theatre Walthamstow
186 Hoe St, London E17 4QH
Dates: 15th June – 10th July 2027
Sign up for priority tickets: https://www.houseofoz.co.uk/cc-sign-up
NEW YORK CITY
Delacorte Theater
81 Central Park W, New York, NY 10024
Dates: 20th July – 15th August 2027
More information: https://publictheater.org/productions/season/2627/sftc/counting-and-cracking/
A Belvoir St Theatre and Kurinji Co-Production Presented in London by House of Oz in association with Soho Theatre
Presented in New York with The Public Theater
