Alan Cumming Named Artistic Director of Pitlochry Festival Theatre in Scotland

Alan Cumming has been named the new artistic director of Scotland’s Pitlochry Festival Theatre.

The Tony winner will join Pitlochry Festival Theatre in January, with his programmed season beginning in 2026.

Founded in 1951, Pitlochry Festival Theatre is located in Highland Perthshire, set against a backdrop of Scottish hills. The theater is renowned for its diverse and high-quality productions, drawing over 100,000 visitors annually. 

“For me, all roads lead to the theater and all roads lead to Scotland. I am a theater animal at heart and, like Robert Burns, my heart is in the Highlands. To become Pitlochry Festival Theatre’s artistic director is a homecoming I embrace with all my experience, all my passion and, yes, all my heart,” Cumming said in a statement Friday.

“This theater is a hidden gem with the most amazing facilities and boundless possibilities, and I will invite the world’s best theater artists here and showcase the best of Scotland’s thrilling theatrical legacy,” he continued. “I want Pitlochry Festival Theatre to be a home for everyone and to remain at the heart of the community. And, to quote Burns again, ‘I will dare to be honest and fear no labour.’ Above all, I cannot wait to share Pitlochry with the world, and the world with Pitlochry.”

Cumming made his professional theater debut 40 years ago at the Tron Theatre in Glasgow. A decade later, he became a stat of the West End for his work in “Hamlet.” He earned a Tony in 1998 for his groundbreaking portrayal of the Master of Ceremonies in “Cabaret.”

Pitlochry’s 2025 season will include productions of “The Great Gatsby,” “Grease,” “The 39 Steps” and four new plays staged in the Theatre’s Studio. Elizabeth Newman’s last production as artistic director at Pitlochry will be “The Sound of Music,” which runs from Nov. 15-Dec. 22.