Globe announces new winter season

Shakespeare's Globe have announced their winter season with highlights including a return of Jonathan Munby's acclaimed production All the Angels – Handel and the First Messiah and a new production of Othello.

Opening the 2016-17 Wonder Noir Season in October will be John Milton's Comus – A Masque in Honour of Chastity. Lucy Bailey directs the production which was first presented in 1634 and tells of an unnamed heroine lost in the woods who encounters Comus, God of Revelry.

Hans Christian Andersen's The Little Matchgirl (and Other Happier Tales) will run next (4 November to 22 January). Adapted for the stage by Joel Horwood and Emma Rice and directed by Rice, the show offers a magical world for adults and children, brought to life with music, puppetry and candlelight.

The festive period will also see the return of Munby's play with music All the Angels – Handel and the First Messiah, from 6 December. Written by Nick Drake and directed by Jonathan Munby, All the Angels returns to the Globe after a sell-out run in 2015 and traces the story of the world's most popular choral work, Handel's Messiah, from its first rehearsal in a Chester pub to the world stage.

From January, John Webster's The White Devil will run at the theatre. Annie Ryan, founder of Dublin theatre company The Corn Exchange and adapter of Eimear McBride's A Girl is a Half-Formed Thing (Young Vic and UK tour), directs. The production centres around the Duke of Brachiano as he murders his wife in order to possess another woman, triggering a cycle of violence, deceit and madness.

Drawing the season to a close from 23 February will be Ellen McDougall's Othello. Shakespeare's tragedy tracks Othello’s descent into jealousy and madness after the scheming Iago convinces him of his wife Desdemona's infidelity.

The Globe's artistic director Rice, said: "As the nights draw in, my Wonder Season moves indoors and slips sensuously into 'noir'. I’ve been itching to get into the magical den that is the Sam Wanamaker Playhouse and can't wait to explore its intoxicating beauty. Moral complexity, tragedy and folklore will all come together with John Milton’s Comus, John Webster’s The White Devil, Hans Christian Andersen’s The Little Matchgirl and Shakespeare’s masterpiece Othello.

"I look forward to welcoming you to Wonder Noir, and bringing these haunting, surprising and enrapturing tales into the flickering candlelight."