Tiler Peck to make her West End debut in Susan Stroman’s Little Dancer
Julian Ovenden plays Edgar Degas and Laura Pitt-Pulford the adult Marie in the new musical about the girl behind Degas’s famous sculpture, opening at the Theatre Royal Haymarket in February.
The New York City Ballet principal Tiler Peck is to make her West End debut next year in Little Dancer, the musical directed and choreographed by Susan Stroman about the girl who posed for Edgar Degas’s celebrated sculpture. With book and lyrics by Lynn Ahrens and music by Stephen Flaherty, it plays the Theatre Royal Haymarket from Monday 15 February to Saturday 27 March 2027.
Peck is joined by three Olivier Award nominees: Julian Ovenden as Degas, Laura Pitt-Pulford as the adult Marie and Josefina Gabrielle as Martine.
The girl behind the sculpture
Marie van Goethem was 14 and poor when she posed for Degas, and she has stood in the same fourth position for more than a century, arms behind her back and chin lifted. Set in Belle Époque Paris, the musical follows two people bound together by art and ambition – a girl with impossible dreams and the artist who immortalised her.
Peck said she was thrilled to bring the show to London with “this incredible team” and to make her West End debut in a story that resonates deeply with her. “Many people know of the Little Dancer sculpture, but few know much about the girl, the muse, who inspired it,” she said. “This show is about two determined artists willing to do anything for their craft, and it reveals a whole new side to Degas’ masterpiece.”
For Stroman, the inspiration ran both ways. “Just as Degas was inspired by Marie, Marie inspired me,” she said, describing the piece as a visually stunning, life-affirming work about the lives of women and the power of art. “She wanted to be a great dancer, and inadvertently, through art, became the most famous dancer in the world.”
Ovenden, who returns to the Haymarket next spring, said Ahrens and Flaherty had written a deeply moving show about art, ambition and the lives of artists, and that he felt lucky to be working with “such extraordinary women at the very top of their game”.
From Washington to the West End
The musical has already had sold-out runs in Washington DC and Seattle, and a sold-out concert performance at London’s Theatre Royal Drury Lane in 2025. Ahrens called it a rare thing “to discover an untold story of art, and then get to tell it with a world-class team of collaborators”, while Flaherty said writing the score had been “the joy of a lifetime”. The lead producer, Anita Waxman, who has believed in the show from its earliest beginnings and followed it from the Kennedy Center to the West End, said London was “just the beginning”.
Stroman, a two-time Olivier and five-time Tony Award winner, is best known for The Producers, Crazy for You, Contact and Oklahoma!; Ahrens and Flaherty wrote Ragtime, Anastasia and Once on This Island. The creative team includes Beowulf Boritt (sets), Ken Billington (lighting), William Ivey Long (costumes) and Kai Harada (sound), with orchestrations by Doug Besterman and Larry Hochman, and music supervision and dance arrangements by Sam Davis.
Tiler Peck
Peck is a principal with New York City Ballet and was recently named its first Choreographic Associate, the first woman in the company’s history to hold a choreographic title. Her recent works for NYCB are Concerto for Two Pianos and Symphonie Espagnole. The programme she curated for New York City Center became Turn It Out with Tiler Peck and Friends, which earned her an Olivier nomination and two National Dance Awards in the UK.
On screen, she won an Emmy for the PBS Great Performances documentary Tiler Peck: Suspending Time, choreographed for John Wick: Chapter 3 – Parabellum and Olivia Rodrigo’s “Stupid Song” video, and has appeared in Tiny Pretty Things, Ballet NOW and Étoile. She is scheduled to appear in all performances up to Saturday 20 March 2027.
Little Dancer is at the Theatre Royal Haymarket, London, from Monday 15 February to Saturday 27 March 2027, with a press night on 18 February. Tickets are on sale at littledancer.co.uk.
Graham Spicer, aka ‘Gramilano’, is a writer, director and photographer based in Milan. He was a regular columnist for Opera Now magazine and wrote for the BBC until transferring to Italy. His articles have appeared in various publications from Woman’s Weekly to Gay Times, and he wrote the Danza in Italia column for Dancing Times magazine. Graham was the historical advisor on Codice Carla, the 2023 documentary on Italian ballerina Carla Fracci.
Graham also works as a dance photographer, and his photos have appeared in many books, theatre programmes, and magazines, including Dancing Times, Dance Spirit and Ballet2000, as well as all the major Italian newspapers.
He is a member of the Dance Section of The Critics’ Circle.
