SIX The Musical at a glance

Show
SIX The Musical
Venue
Vaudeville Theatre, West End
Address
404 Strand, London WC2R 0NH
Nearest station
Charing Cross (5 min walk)
Genre
Pop musical / theatrical concert
Running time
1 hour 20 minutes, no interval
Age guidance
10+ (under-16s must be accompanied)
Dates
Currently booking until 31 January 2027
Schedule
Tue–Sat 8pm; Sun 3pm & 7pm; matinees Thu and Sat 4pm
Price range
From £40 (typically £40–£97.50)
Music & lyrics
Toby Marlow and Lucy Moss
Book
Toby Marlow and Lucy Moss
Director
Lucy Moss and Jamie Armitage
Choreography
Carrie-Anne Ingrouille

Expert Review: SIX The Musical at the Vaudeville Theatre

4.7
★★★★★

LTH Expert Rating

Reviewed by the London Theatre Hub editorial team. Last updated: 1 May 2026.

The Verdict

SIX is the rarest of West End beasts: a wholly homegrown, Cambridge-grown student show that turned itself into a global musical theatre phenomenon. Toby Marlow and Lucy Moss reimagine Henry VIII's six wives as a pop concert girl group, and the conceit somehow holds for the entire 80-minute runtime. Each Queen takes the mic and delivers a solo song modelled on a contemporary pop icon — Beyoncé for Aragon, Avril Lavigne for Boleyn, Adele for Seymour, Rihanna and Nicki Minaj for Cleves, Ariana Grande and Britney for Howard, Alicia Keys for Parr — and the pastiche is so precise it almost overshadows how clever the writing actually is.

What looks at first like a competition between the Queens for who suffered most at Henry's hands becomes, by the closing number, something more pointed: a refusal to be defined by him at all. The show is a near-decade old now, and the unusual thing is how little it has aged. The 2026 company — led by Adrianne Langley, Marisha Morgan, Jessica Aubrey, Freya Karlettis, Leesa Tulley, and Nia Stephen — keeps the energy that has defined the production since the original Vaudeville cast, and the all-female on-stage band, the Ladies in Waiting, are as much part of the evening as the Queens themselves.

What Makes It Special

  • The shortest major show in the West End. 80 minutes, no interval. SIX punches above its runtime in a way few musicals attempt — perfect for a post-work or pre-dinner slot, and a serious gateway for first-time theatregoers.
  • An unprecedented Olivier moment. All six original West End Queens were collectively nominated for Best Supporting Actress in a Musical at the 2019 Oliviers. The show went on to win Best New Musical and Outstanding Achievement in Music at the 2022 ceremony, plus two Tony Awards on Broadway and four WhatsOnStage Awards.
  • The pop pastiche actually works. Marlow and Moss don't just nod at their pop inspirations — they build entire numbers around their structures. Boleyn's "Don't Lose Ur Head" is a perfect Lily Allen / Avril Lavigne pastiche; Cleves's "Get Down" is a Rihanna-style banger; Parr's "I Don't Need Your Love" lands like an Alicia Keys ballad. It's craft disguised as confetti.
  • Carrie-Anne Ingrouille's choreography. Tight, slick, pop-video sharp. Ingrouille's work is one of the show's least-talked-about strengths — it's the structural skeleton holding the concert format together, and it's genuinely brilliant.
  • The Ladies in Waiting. The all-female on-stage band are not backing musicians, they're a sixth presence — Beth Jerem on keys as Musical Director, with drums, guitar, bass, and assistant MD on stage throughout. The decision to make the band visible and named is one of the show's quiet revolutions.
  • The Megasix. The closing audience-led finale, where every Queen gets a final verse and the entire room becomes a sea of phone torches, is one of the most effective curtain calls in any West End show. People come back specifically for it.

You'll love SIX if you...

  • Want a high-energy night out that won't eat your whole evening
  • Love pop, R&B, and arena-style musical theatre
  • Are bringing teenagers — SIX converts new theatregoers like few other shows
  • Enjoy clever lyric writing and pastiche done with serious craft
  • Want a feel-good ending and a finale that has the whole room on its feet

It might not be for you if you...

  • Want a traditional book musical with a continuous narrative arc
  • Prefer plot-driven storytelling over concert-style staging
  • Find loud music, strobes, and theatrical haze uncomfortable
  • Are bringing a child under 10 — pacing and lyric density assume a tween+ audience
  • Are looking for a long, immersive evening — SIX is deliberately a quick 80 minutes

Best for

  • Pop music fans
  • Teenagers (10+)
  • First-time theatregoers
  • Date night
  • Hen parties
  • Tudor history fans

Not the strongest fit for very young children or audiences who want a traditional book musical.

Critical Reception

SIX has received broadly enthusiastic reviews across its West End run, with most major UK publications awarding four or five stars. The show has won more than 35 international awards including Olivier Awards for Best New Musical and Outstanding Achievement in Music, Tony Awards for Best Original Score and Best Costume Design, and four WhatsOnStage Awards. Verified ratings from major UK publications:

  • Evening Standard ★★★★★
  • Theatre & Tonic ★★★★★
  • Everything Theatre ★★★★★
  • Musical Theatre Weekly ★★★★★
  • The Telegraph ★★★★
  • WhatsOnStage ★★★★
  • West End Wilma ★★★★
  • Time Out ★★★

Source: published reviews of the West End production at the Arts, Lyric, and Vaudeville theatres, 2019–2026.

Everything You Need to Know

What happens in SIX?

The premise is simple and the execution isn't. Henry VIII's six wives — divorced, beheaded, died, divorced, beheaded, survived — take the stage as a pop group. They've been reduced to a rhyme for centuries, and they're not having it any more. To pass the time, they hold a competition: whichever Queen suffered most at Henry's hands gets to be lead singer. Each takes the mic in turn.

The competition begins

Catherine of Aragon opens with "No Way" — a Beyoncé-style power ballad about being cast aside after twenty-four years of marriage for refusing to grant Henry an annulment. Anne Boleyn follows with "Don't Lose Ur Head," a giddy Avril Lavigne / Lily Allen pastiche that turns flirtation, miscarriage, and execution into a single brutally fast pop song.

Sister, sister

Jane Seymour — the wife Henry loved, the one who died — sings "Heart of Stone," an Adele-flavoured ballad that is the show's most straight-faced moment. Anna of Cleves arrives with "Get Down," a Rihanna-meets-Nicki Minaj victory lap about being divorced, paid handsomely, and given a castle. It's the show's most uncomplicated piece of fun.

The dark turn

Katherine Howard's "All You Wanna Do" starts as bubbly Ariana Grande-style flirt-pop and reveals itself, verse by verse, as something else entirely — a portrait of a teenage girl who learned early that the only attention she could get from men was sexual, and was killed for it at 19. It's the show's genuine gut-punch, and the moment SIX earns its claim to be more than a concert.

Rewriting her-story

Catherine Parr arrives last with "I Don't Need Your Love," an Alicia Keys-style ballad that begins as her own story — the woman she actually loved before Henry forced her to marry him — and turns into a refusal of the entire competition. The Queens stop trying to outdo each other. They imagine, for the closing number, the lives they might have had if they'd never met Henry at all. Then, freed from him, they sing "Six" — the histo-remix where each writes her own ending. The Megasix finale puts the audience on its feet.