Michelle Terry to Step Down as Shakespeare's Globe Artistic Director
Michelle Terry will step down as artistic director of Shakespeare's Globe at the end of 2027, ending a ten-year tenure. WhatsOnStage reported the news on 27 October 2026.
The artistic director decides what the Globe stages and who it works with. The theatre is a reconstruction of Shakespeare's playhouse on the South Bank in London. Terry is an Olivier Award-winning actor who trained at RADA, the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art. She was announced as Emma Rice's successor in 2017 and took over fully in April 2018.
Over those ten years, more than 2,000 actors have worked with the Globe across 77 productions. The theatre expects its productions during her tenure to have been seen by more than 2.3 million people from over 190 countries by the time she leaves. She commissioned 25 new plays. Of those, 63% were written by women and 26% by global majority writers, a term for people of Black, Asian and minority ethnic heritage.
Some of that work has moved on. Emilia, written by Morgan Lloyd Malcolm, transferred to the West End's Vaudeville Theatre in 2019. A transfer means a production moves from its original venue into a commercial London theatre. The show won three Olivier Awards in 2020.
Her time at the Globe has also been contested. In 2024 the theatre faced criticism for casting Terry, who is not disabled, as Richard III. The Guardian later reported her view that much of the anger about the casting was misogynistic.
She is not leaving the stage yet. Terry will return to the Globe in summer 2027 to reprise her role as Mother Courage in Bertolt Brecht's Mother Courage and Her Children. The production runs from 10 June to 17 July 2027. Anna Jordan has translated the play, and Globe associate artist Elle While is directing. The run also marks 20 years since Terry first performed on the Globe's stages.
No successor has been named so far. The Globe's current chief executive, Neil Constable, announced in 2023 that he would step down by the end of that year, so the theatre has already changed its leadership once in recent years.
