A Fairytale For Christmas at a glance

Show
A Fairytale For Christmas
Status
Current London run ended
Venue
Dominion Theatre, 268-269 Tottenham Court Road, London W1T 7AQ
Touring history
Four consecutive sell-out UK tours, plus US and European runs
Format
Live festive concert with singers, musicians and dancers
Producers
The team behind Seven Drunken Nights – The Story of The Dubliners
Age guidance
5+ (children under 5 not admitted)
Christmas standards
Santa Claus Is Comin' To Town, Step into Christmas, O Holy Night, Fairytale of New York, and more
Irish folk standards
The Galway Girl, The Irish Rover, Dirty Old Town, The Black Velvet Band, and more
Audience
Families, sing-along audiences, Dubliners catalogue fans
Nearest tube
Tottenham Court Road
2026 dates
Not yet announced (as of May 2026)

Looking back: A Fairytale For Christmas at the Dominion

4.4
★★★★☆

LTH Retrospective Rating

Retrospective by the London Theatre Hub editorial team. Last updated: 13 May 2026.

The Verdict

A Fairytale For Christmas is a concert, not a play — but it has earned its place on a West End stage through four consecutive sell-out UK tours, with side trips to the US and Europe. The producers' previous credit is Seven Drunken Nights – The Story of The Dubliners, and the same musical instincts run through this show: real live musicianship, a song catalogue audiences already know, and a structure designed for people who want to sing along rather than sit quietly. The Dominion Theatre is a large room — over 2,000 seats — and the show fills it through full-throttle musical direction rather than through theatrical complexity.

The mix is the headline. About half the running time is dedicated to mainstream Christmas standards — Santa Claus Is Comin' To Town, Step into Christmas, O Holy Night, and inevitably Fairytale of New York, which gets the biggest reaction of the night. The other half pivots to Irish folk standards (The Galway Girl, Dirty Old Town, The Irish Rover, The Black Velvet Band), which is where the show's identity sits. As Christmas-night-out entertainment for families and older audiences who recognise the Dubliners catalogue, it works. As a piece of theatre, it doesn't pretend to be one — and the audiences who buy tickets aren't looking for one.

What Makes It Special

  • The Irish-folk-meets-Christmas hybrid. Few festive shows commit to a specific cultural identity this clearly. The Galway Girl sitting next to O Holy Night is the formula, and it works because the producers don't dilute either tradition.
  • Four consecutive sell-out UK tours. A festive concert that has built its audience on the road has a different kind of robustness than a one-off West End commission. The show plays the regions as well as London because it was built for regional rooms first.
  • Live musicianship. No backing tracks, no programmed accompaniment. The whole show is performed live by a band that includes traditional Irish folk instrumentation — and on a song like Fairytale of New York, that matters.
  • The Fairytale of New York moment. The Pogues and Kirsty MacColl's 1987 single is now embedded in British and Irish Christmas culture in a way that few songs are. The Fairytale For Christmas live arrangement is the show's anchor, and it earns its place.
  • Seven Drunken Nights producer pedigree. The same team has run a long-touring Dubliners tribute concert for years. They know how to do this kind of show, and the polish shows in the staging and the band tightness.

Everything You Need to Know

What happens at A Fairytale For Christmas?

A Fairytale For Christmas is a live concert rather than a narrative play. The format is a sequence of festive songs performed by an ensemble of singers, musicians and dancers, with the song selection split roughly between mainstream Christmas standards and classic Irish folk material.

The Christmas standards

The festive set list includes Santa Claus Is Comin' To Town, Step into Christmas (Elton John), O Holy Night, and a centrepiece live arrangement of The Pogues' Fairytale of New York — the song the show takes part of its name from. The Christmas material is pitched broadly enough to suit family audiences and traditional enough to satisfy older viewers.

The Irish folk material

The second half of the song book is drawn from the Irish folk tradition — The Galway Girl, The Irish Rover, Dirty Old Town, The Black Velvet Band, and a rotating selection of other Dubliners-era standards. The show describes this section as "a St Patrick's Day party — on Christmas Day", and the audience participation in the Irish material is louder than for the Christmas songs.

The ensemble

The performers are credited as "talented singers, musicians and dancers" with traditional Irish folk instrumentation in the band. Specific cast members rotate between tour legs. The show is designed to work in venues of varying scales — from regional theatres on the UK tour to the 2,000+ seat Dominion in central London.

Suitability

The show is family-friendly. Dominion Theatre policy means children under 5 cannot be admitted, and children aged 15 or under must be accompanied by an adult (one adult per ten children minimum). All patrons regardless of age need a valid ticket. The mix of Christmas songs and recognisable Irish folk material means the show typically draws a wide age range, including multigenerational family groups.