Theatre Review: Dear England at Theatre Royal

If you look back a decade Gareth Southgate seemed like an unlikely person to become a national treasure and have a major West End play written about him. After a decent top-level career as a footballer, he had a distinctly average three years managing Middlesborough FC, which ended in relegation. He was then sacked and spent four years in the wilderness before taking up a role in charge of the England Under 21 team. 

In 2016 the England men’s team seemed to be at an all-time low. We’d had a decade of players dubbed the ‘Golden Generation’, who won everything at club level but didn’t seem to be able to perform for their country. We’d seen Sven Goran Erikssen, Fabio Capello and Roy Hodgson lead them all to nothing. Then former Notts County manager Sam Allardyce took over and lasted just one game before he was ousted by a press bribery scandal involving. That’s about where this play starts. Southgate takes over the role no-one wants and somehow makes a country of football fans fall in love with their national team again. 

This play is the brainchild of Notts-born writer James Graham, himself an avid England football fan. It opened at the National Theatre in London two years ago and has finally come to Nottingham as the centrepiece of the Theatre Royal’s 160th anniversary celebrations. This seems particularly fitting as the author cut his teeth working stage door at the venue. For more information read our recent interview with James Graham. 

Dear England follows the journey of both Southgate and his team to exorcise their own and the nation’s football demons through a mix of psychology, sportsmanship and generally just being decent human beings to each other. The players learn to listen and understand each other and to channel their own traumas to become a better team. Crucially they get the best football tournament results of any men’s England team in more than half a century.  

The cast has changed a little for this run. The role of Gareth Southgate has taken over by David Sturzaker (Dr Who, Doctors) and the role of psychologist Pippa Grange by Samantha Womack (Game On, Eastenders). Considering the likes of Joseph Fiennes and Dervla Kirwan have previously filled these roles they are big boots to fill, but they both do it very well.

The supporting cast of players is excellent and includes Oscar Gough (Harry Kane), Jack Maddison (Jordan Pickford), Jayden Hanley (Marcus Rashford), Courtney George (Alex Scott) and George Rainsford (Mike Webster). Overall a big cast with 23 actors as part of the tour and there are times when more than a dozen of them are bouncing around the stage in a way that makes you realise why there are three members of the (21-strong) backstage creative team with the words ‘movement director’ in their job title. The set design is also immaculate throughout with a brightly lit audio visual set-up that integrates videos and photos of players and matches with a simple stage set-up that is flexible to move around at pace.  

Dear England is populist theatre at its best. If you want to open up the world of theatre to new audiences, then what better way to do it than pick a subject many are already interested in and put it on the stage? If you look at the career of James Graham, this kind of populism is perhaps what he does best. Well done and welcome home James!

Dear England is showing at Nottingham's Theatre Royal until Saturday 27 September 2025.