Niagara-on-the-Lake’s Shaw Festival is coming to Toronto

Niagara-on-the-Lake’s beloved Shaw Festival—one of Canada’s largest theatre festivals—will begin a three-year residency at the Harbourfront Centre starting in 2026.

This past Sunday, the Royal George Theatre, one of the three Niagara venues that hosts the Shaw Festival’s performances, shut its doors to accommodate significant renovations. The historic 305-seat theatre will get a new accessible lobby, chic lounge areas for visitors, more seating, and new rehearsal and work spaces, all thanks to a $35-million investment from the province intended to bolster the region’s tourism industry.

While operations will continue at the two remaining Niagara venues, the Harbourfront Centre will temporarily replace the Royal George as the prestigious festival’s marquee theatre. “The Harbourfront alone has a huge community of people who live right by the theatre,” says the festival’s artistic director, Tim Carroll. “It’s kind of beautiful to think that, on either side of the lake, we’ll have communities of fans and supporters.”

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The partnership comes after the reimagining of the Harbourfront under new CEO Cathy Loblaw, who reinstated the familiar buskers and skating rink outside and introduced a new farmers’ market. (The centre also recently parted ways with the Fleck Dance Theatre, the Power Plant Contemporary Art Gallery and the Toronto International Festival of Authors.)

According to Carroll, plans to bring the Shaw Festival to Toronto have been in the works since the summer. “We couldn’t actually remember whether it was [Loblaw’s] idea or ours, which I think is a really good sign,” he says. “It was one of those things that felt very obvious to us from the moment we met Cathy and felt her enthusiasm.”

This marks the first time Harbourfront was home to a theatre residency of this length since it hosted Soulpepper Theatre Company nearly 30 years ago, and it’s the first time the Shaw Festival has had a Toronto residency. Over the next three years, the company plans to perform three productions a year in Toronto, including annual performances of audience favourite A Christmas Carol.

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For now, the performances Torontonians can look forward to remain under wraps, but they can expect shows previously performed by the troupes from Niagara-on-the-Lake. (Might they be Funny Girl? Amadeus?) All shows will be announced in March of next year, ahead of the October 2026 season debut.