The Woman in White

This show has now closed, click here for a listing of current and future London shows

Musical Opened 15 September 2004, Closed 25 February 2006

Palace Theatre Shaftesbury Avenue, London

"I have a secret, but can I trust you?...."

The Woman in White - Andrew Lloyd Webber's eagerly awaited new musical! Freely adapted from Wilkie Collins's sensational Victorian thriller, The Woman in White brings to the stage a plot of terrifying brilliance. A handsome young man is stranded at a remote railway cutting. Out of the darkness looms a woman, a mysterious figure dressed in white, who burns to tell a chilling secret.

Two sisters find themselves snared in a web of betrayal and greed, the victims of a flawless crime. Unprotected in a man's world, they will need all their resourcefulness and courage to outwit a villain of overpowering charisma and ingenuity. But they can also rely on the guiding hand of love.

Wilkie Collins' The Woman in White is the first and most influential of the Victorian sensation novels, and quickly became a phenomenon. Since its publication in 1860, it has never been out of print and generations of readers have been thrilled by its suspense and excitement. Now London theatre audiences can look forward to seing The Woman in White brought to life on stage!

Available to buy online: The Original London Cast Recording on CD.

"A return visit to The Woman In White, the first of last autumn's Big Three musicals to open and now into its second year, confirms that this is one of Andrew Lloyd Webber's most daringly ambitious shows and certainly his finest musical score since The Phantom Of The Opera." The Sunday Express, October 2005

"A dazzling white hit... Andrew Lloyd Webber and Trevor Nunn have delivered exactly what the West End always needs - a soaring, romantic drama" The Daily Express

"This is a big, big triumph, a very palpable hit, no question. Andrew Lloyd Webber makes a majestic return to the musical theatre. In fact, The Woman in White is more than a musical: it is a big, powerful popular opera, both romantic and spectacular; a thriller; a swaggering, flamboyant Victorian melodrama; a visual feast; a tempestuous story of love and intrigue; a great, arching narrative, brilliantly told... Trevor Nunn’s production moves masterfully between intimate drama and crowd scenes, between humanity and spectacle. It would have been easy to go for sheer melodrama, but Nunn knows that the plot has quite enough of that, and that characters in melodramatic situations are much more effective when they are scaled down to reality." The Sunday Times

"William Dudley's spectacular set is a masterstroke" The Financial Times

"The Woman in White is about as spine-chilling as a Teletubbies tea party. This wouldn't matter if the show didn't claim to be on shrieking terms with Wilkie Collins's great ghostly thriller. But Charlotte Jones's free adaptation keeps the lineaments of the original plot, while flattening the suggestive, sinister Victorian novel into a more sensible, conventional triangular love story. Though Andrew Lloyd Webber's score is more varied, less soupy than his last two musicals it settles down too readily into sobbing romance." The Observer

"Lloyd Webber's chiller is good enough to haunt the West End for some time to come" The Independent

"Andrew Lloyd Webber's new musical, The Woman in White, is like entering one of his prized pre-Raphaelite paintings. Luscious, lavish, sensual, romantic and melodramatic, with acres of flowing hair and images of adored or oppressed women. OK, it's occasionally so rich and sickly that it's like wading through chocolate, but if you don't mind gorging yourself, it's an irresistible feast... Lloyd Webber is in splendid form and there's much to enjoy in Trevor Nunn's characteristically sumptuous direction. All that's lacking is the fear factor of the original." The Mail on Sunday

"If you are going to get the most out of Andrew Lloyd Webber's new musical The Woman in White, at the Palace Theatre, it is best not to have read the novel by Wilkie Collins on which it is based, or to try to forget it if you have read it - although that's an almost impossible task. Lloyd Webber's show has a good deal to be said for it, in terms of music, design and performances, but he has been let down by Charlotte Jones, who is responsible for the stage adaptation... For all its disappointing aspects, the show offers an enjoyable evening out. My guess it will run and run - but I don't think it will run and run and run." The Sunday Telegraph