Preview: The Departure at Newcastle Alphabetti Theatre

BBC stars head to Newcastle for one-night-only premiere of new play The Departure

The Departure,

Newcastle Alphabetti Theatre, 

Friday 11 September 2026

Two strangers, one flat, and a grief they can't quite outrun: that's the setup for The Departure, a new play landing at Newcastle's Alphabetti Theatre for a single night this September.

The production stars BBC screen actor Tom Wells, known to audiences from EastEnders, Waterloo Road, Bancroft and Doctors, alongside Harriet Chomley, who co-wrote and starred in Posh Girls. Wells also wrote the piece, which he has spent five years developing, and directing duties fall to Jay Ford.

Lily (Chomley) is an anxious, sharp-witted chemist who arrives back at her London flat the day after burying her mother, still needing to finish a speech that forces her to confront old wounds. Waiting there, uninvited, is Ross (Wells) — a rugged agricultural fencer from rural Northern England who's been secretly staying in her flat while he waits for the passport that will let him disappear to a new life fencing land in the Australian outback.

What starts as panic and confusion between two total strangers slowly gives way to something else. Lily deflects with intellect; Ross clings to superstition. Both are carrying grief they haven't dealt with — hers bound up in guilt and shame, his in the absence of his own mother. As the night wears on, tension turns to unexpected humour and tenderness, and the pair are gradually forced to drop their guards.

The play unfolds in real time, in a single room, running a tight 80 minutes with no interval — a format built for the kind of close, intimate studio space Alphabetti is known for.

Wells has described the play as a response to a world that can leave people feeling numb, saying it looks unflinchingly at the messy ways people hide from pain and avoid connection. Director Jay Ford brings a stripped-back, performance-led approach to the staging, leaning into quiet behavioural detail and the weight of what goes unsaid.

Production: The Departure

Venue: Alphabetti Theatre, St James' Blvd, Newcastle upon Tyne

Date: Friday 11th September (one night only)

Time: 7.30pm

Running time: 80 minutes, no interval

Tickets: Book via TicketSource

 

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