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Operation Mincemeat At Milton Keynes Theatre including Review
Following the seventeenth West End and fifth Broadway extensions, the Tony Award® and double Olivier Award®-winning musical Operation Mincemeat comes to Milton Keynes Theatre. Having launched on 16th February 2026 at Lowry in Salford - the venue that first encouraged the writers’ extraordinary debut musical and hosted its first-ever scratch performance in 2017 - a 40-week run will play at theatres nationwide through 28th November 2026, including Milton Keynes Theatre from Mon 8 - Sat 13 Jun.
Reprising their acclaimed roles, West End alumnae Christian Andrews (Sherlock Holmes and the 12 Days of Christmas), Seán Carey (The Play That Goes Wrong), Charlotte Hanna-Williams (Rogers & Hammerstein’s Cinderella), and Holly Sumpton (Lovers Actually) are joined by new recruit Jamie- Rose Monk (Rome & Juliet) to form the cast, while Katy Ellis (The Curious Case of Benjamin Button), Georgina Hagen (Only Fools & Horses), Jordan Pearson (Back to the Future: The Musical), and Morgan Phillips (The History Boys) complete the company.
Simon Tuck went to see this on 8th June
The dead body floating off the coast of Spain wasn’t a tragedy; it was the opening act of the most absurd, high-stakes deception of World War II. And now, it’s the basis for the funniest, most frantically energetic musical to hit the British stage in a generation.
If you happened to be sitting in the audience at the Milton Keynes Theatre recently, wondering how five actors shifting a handful of office chairs could make you roar with laughter and blink back tears within the span of two hours, you aren’t alone. Welcome to Operation Mincemeat.
The premise sounds like a fever dream: In 1943, the Allies need to invade Sicily. The problem? The Germans know they need to invade Sicily. Enter two eccentric MI5 intelligence officers who hatch a plan to acquire a corpse, dress it up as a fictional Royal Marine, stuff its pockets with fake love letters and top-secret invasion plans pointing toward Sardinia, and drop it in the ocean. The goal? Trick Hitler.
What a four-person writing team (known collectively as SpitLip) has done with this slice of history is pure theatrical alchemy. Five actors take on roughly 80 different characters, swapping hats, coats, and accents at a whiplash-inducing pace. The set design is minimalist—dominated by gray filing cabinets and telephone wires—but the props and scenery play a massive role in building the world. A simple desk phone becomes an emblem of bureaucratic dread; a flipped cap transforms a posh MI5 officer into a working-class submarine captain. It is a masterclass in theatrical economy, holding the audience’s rapt attention by forcing our imaginations to do the heavy lifting.
Musically, the show is a chameleon, shifting effortlessly through genres to track the emotional highs and lows of the mission. For every beautifully bizarre comic number—like "Rather Bee," a song about preferring to be a maggot stung by gammas over being a human—there is a moment of show-stopping satire. The second act kicks off with "Das Übermensch," a techno-pop Nazi anthem vibrating with pure Springtime for Hitler energy that brings the house down.
Yet, the brilliance of Operation Mincemeat lies in its pacing. The first half is a meticulous, hilarious build-up, setting the dominoes in place. This allows the second half to unleash total, unadulterated comedic chaos. We watch character Charles Cholmondeley morph from a deeply awkward, indoor-dwelling strategist into a glamorous, smooth-talking fighter pilot persona named "Bill" just to see if their lie holds water.
But just when you think you are attending a pure farce, the musical pulls the rug out from under you. Poignantly, the manic comedy halts, and we meet the true heroes. In a stunningly clever and reverent tonal shift, the show pays tribute to Glyndwr Michael—the real-world, forgotten homeless man whose body became "Major William Martin"—and the actual clerks who spun this deadly lie to save thousands of lives.
Currently disrupting the UK tour with effortless brilliance, the five-piece cast—featuring Seán Carey, Christian Andrews, Charlotte Hanna-Williams, Jamie-Rose Monk, and Holly Sumpton—delivers a masterclass in endurance and comic timing.
Operation Mincemeat is that rarest of theatrical gems: a show that makes you laugh until your stomach hurts, instructs you on a bizarre historical fact, and leaves you deeply moved by the final curtain. It is, without a doubt, a total triumph.
SpitLip, the musical’s writers and composers, commented: “We're so excited to see Operation Mincemeat heading out on a world tour next year, and the fact that it's all kicking off at The Lowry, Salford - a venue who have fiercely championed us as theatre makers for over a decade, and where
some of us made our professional debuts -is incredibly special. Having launched our show on Broadway this year, we know there's an appetite (and a need) out there for shows which champion joy, and the power of small groups of people to change the world. We're also delighted to be
welcoming back our agents Christian, Charlotte, Holly and Seán, and welcoming our amazing new recruit Jamie-Rose, to kick off the UK leg of the tour - MI5 couldn't be in more capable or more spectacularly stupid hands. Father's never been prouder!”
Operation Mincemeat is running simultaneously in London and New York, with the West End production at the Fortune Theatre extended for a seventeenth time through 27th September 2026, and the Broadway production now extended for a fifth time, running through 26th April 2026. It
began as a tiny (and tiny-budgeted) production at the London Fringe New Diorama Theatre in 2019. The show quickly gained a devoted following, spurring sold-out runs at venues including Southwark Playhouse and Riverside Studios. It finally premiered in the West End on 9th May 2023 at the
Fortune Theatre, where it won the Olivier and WhatsOnstage Awards® for ‘Best New Musical’, alongside garnering 88 five-star reviews and counting, and has become the ‘Best reviewed show in West End history.’
The decision to write the musical was the last roll of the dice from SpitLip, a quartet of young British creatives after years of performing sketch shows at the Edinburgh Festival Fringe, and echoes the journey of Beyond the Fringe from the world-famous quartet Alan Bennett, Peter Cook, Jonathan
Miller, and Dudley Moore, which premiered at the Edinburgh Festival Fringe in 1960, before moving to the Fortune Theatre and later to the Golden in 1962.
In Operation Mincemeat, it’s 1943, and the Allied Forces are on the ropes. Luckily, they’ve got a trick up their sleeve. Well, not up their sleeve, per se, but rather inside the pocket of a stolen corpse. Equal parts farce, thriller, and Ian Fleming-style spy caper (with an assist from Mr. Fleming himself), Operation Mincemeat tells the wildly improbable and hilarious true story of the covert operation that turned the tide of WWII.
The production is directed by Olivier Award-nominated Robert Hastie (Standing at the Sky’s Edge, National Theatre – Best New Musical Olivier Award winner), following providing directorial support for the Riverside Studios run, while Olivier Award-nominated Jenny Arnold (Jerry Springer: The
Opera, National Theatre) continues as Choreographer. Also from Standing at the Sky’s Edge at the National Theatre on the creative team are: Olivier Award nominated Ben Stones (Sylvia, The Old Vic) as Set and Costume Designer, Tony Award, six-time Olivier Award and Bafta Award winning Mark Henderson (Girl From the North Country, Broadway & Noël Coward Theatre) as Lighting Designer and Olivier Award winning Mike Walker (Jerry Springer: The Opera, National Theatre) as Sound Designer.
Grammy Award-winning and Tony, Emmy & 2024 ‘Outstanding Musical Contribution’ Olivier Award-nominated Steve Sidwell (Beautiful: The Musical, Broadway & Aldwych Theatre) is Orchestrator and Vocal Arranger, while 2024 ‘Outstanding Musical Contribution’ Olivier Award-nominated Joe Bunker is Musical Supervisor, and Sam Sommerfeld is Musical Director. Georgie Staight is Tour Director, Anna Marshall is Resident Director and Paul Isaiah Isles is Associate Choreographer. Casting is by Pearson Casting. The debut musical is written and composed by SpitLip – David Cumming, Felix Hagan, Natasha Hodgson and Zoë Roberts.
Since premiering at London’s 77-seat New Diorama Theatre in 2019, the show been nominated for 67 awards and won 25, including Best Musical four times at the Olivier Awards®, WhatsOnStage Awards®, BroadwayWorld Theater Fans’ Choice Awards®, and Off West End Awards®.
On Broadway, original cast member Jak Malone won the 2025 Tony Award® for Best Featured Actor in a Musical, having previously taken home the Olivier Award® for the same role in 2024. His breakout performance earned seven major accolades, including the Tony, Drama Desk®, Outer
Critics Circle®, Drama League®, Theatre World®, BroadwayWorld®, and Dorian Theater Awards®. Meanwhile, SpitLip received nominations for Best Original Score and Best Book of a Musical from the Tony Awards®, Outer Critics Circle Awards®, Drama Desk Awards®, and BroadwayWorld Theater Fans’ Choice Awards®.
Operation Mincemeat’s Broadway, West End, and touring productions are produced by Avalon (in association with SpitLip). The show was commissioned by New Diorama Theatre, co-commissioned by The Lowry, and also supported by the Rhinebeck Writers Retreat.
Performances run at Milton Keynes Theatre from Mon 8 - Sat 13 Jun. Tickets are available now via ATGTICKETS.COM/MiltonKeynes