How to (probably) get Ariana Grande tickets for Sunday in the Park with George
In the biggest piece of showbiz casting since Tom Holland starred in Romeo + Juliet in 2024, the musician Ariana Grande has been cast in the musical Sunday in the Park with George, to play in London in the summer of 2027.
Grande is one of the world’s most popular musicians, and is scheduled to play ten sold out nights at London’s 02 later this year, having sold over 200,000 tickets within a couple of minutes. By comparison, the Barbican Theatre seats just 1,154 so demand for tickets will be incredibly high.
The singer will perform in the musical Sunday in the Park with George alongside Bridgerton co-star Jonathan Bailey. Bailey and Ariana Grande recently worked together in the Wicked movies.
The show is inspired by Georges Seurat’s painting A Sunday Afternoon on the Island of La Grande Jattehas, and is set across two time periods. Partly staged in the 19th century, it explores the life of the painter Seurat, and 20th century segments detail the life of his great-grandson. Both men are asking similar questions about meaning and legacy in their work and personal lives.
Music and lyrics are by the legendary composer Stephen Sondheim. The book is by James Lapine and the production will be directed by Marianne Elliott and designed by Tom Scutt.
Ariana Grande tickets for Sunday in the Park with George: how to stand the best chance
Become a Barbican Member to have the highest chance of securing tickets. Members get priority access, meaning they can book before the general public. The ‘Standard’ tier of membership includes priority access, and costs £59 per year. ‘Membership Plus’ includes “extra priority” booking for some events, and costs £114.
City PM has approached representatives for the Barbican to confirm whether priority access for Sunday in the Park with George will be included within the members’ offerings.
One thing to bear in mind is that having Barbican Membership doesn’t guarantee tickets. There is a limited amount of priority tickets available for members, to allow enough tickets for the general public. It is likely that the venue has received a spike in people taking up memberships following Grande’s casting announcement, so there may not be enough tickets to meet demand.
If tickets are available, members typically also receive a 20 per cent discount on tickets for themselves and a friend or partner. Weekly members’ emails are distributed with information about ticket release dates.
The Barbican has said tickets for Sunday in the Park with George will go on sale in May 2026, so expect more specific information to follow in the coming months.
Grande, whose hits include Side to Side, Everyday and Into You, is a big theatre fan. Her stage debut was aged 13 in the Broadway musical 13 by Jason Robert Brown. She has been a lover of the musical Wicked since she was ten and described the day she was cast in the movie in the role of Glinda as “the best day of her life.”
Following her role in Wicked Grande has expressed her keenness to appear in more musicals and musical-adjacent work. Her song 7 Rings is partially an homage to Rodgers and Hammerstein’s My Favourite Things from The Sound of Music, and her 2012 duet with Mika ‘Popular Song’ was inspired in part by Wicked.
Jonathan Bailey has worked with director Marianne Elliott before, most notably in 2022’s Mike Bartlett play Cock, in which City PM described the actor as having a “sexy existential crisis.”
“This is the West End opening of the year so far,” we continued, “with Bridgerton lead Jonathan Bailey appearing alongside Rocketman’s Taron Egerton.”
The Barbican Theatre opened in 1982 and is one of the Square Mile’s most arresting cultural destinations because of its Brutalist architectural style.