West End beats Broadway – Stranger Things stage productions in London and New York compared

Klara Hammudeh in New York, US

Rating:

Stranger Things: The First Shadow premiered at London’s Phoenix Theatre in December 2023. The play, written by Kate Trefry and directed by Stephen Daldry, is set decades before the events of the Netflix original series and explores the origins of the show’s protagonists and its greatest villain. It explains how Henry Kreel (or 001 or Vecna) got his powers, and why he has become a murderer.

Allegedly, the theatre play contains a number of ‘easter eggs’ for the show’s highly anticipated season 5.

The West End show was a massive success and won two Olivers, so it was not entirely surprising that in April 2025, The First Shadow premiered in New York City, at the Marquis Theatre in the heart of Broadway. However, the New York version differs from the one that is on stage in London.

I had the opportunity to see both versions of the play over the past year, and I was much more impressed by the West End production; the Broadway version left me feeling quite critical.

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When I saw the play on the West End for the first time, I was mesmerised. Two aspects of the play struck out: the acting, and the special effects. I saw the show with its second cast, and these actors’ abilities were the best I had the opportunity to see over the last year. The honourable mention here goes to Louis Healy, portraying Henry Creel, who has perfectly captured the change of a young, innocent boy into a brutal serial killer. I will be looking forward to seeing Healy in another production.

Broadway’s first cast, surprisingly, delivered poorer acting than West End’s second. While Broadway has actors worth the praise (Alex Breaux as Doctor Brenner and Louis McCartney as Henry Creel; McCartney played the role earlier in London as well) – I found casting Gabrielle Nevaeh Green as Patty Newby (Henry’s high-school crush around whom the play revolts) entirely unconvincing.

Nevaeh is a Nickelodeon star turned Broadway actress, and I could not help it but to think that the Broadway producers cast her because of the fact that she is already well-known among younger audiences for her role in the kids show That Girl Lay Lay, and not because she was a good fit for the role. I found her acting in The First Shadow exaggerated and not believable. Navaeh was no comparison to Miranda Mufema, who fantastically portrayed Patty in London.

The special effects are the second thing that should make theatregoers seek an opportunity to see the play in London, and not in New York. West End took great care of translating the special effects from the screen onto a stage, and their work was second to none – visual effects are stunning, look incredibly natural and all set changes happen seamlessly.

Broadway, yet again, disappointed. In most cases, the special effects were, dare I say, ruined by poor light work. For example, at one moment, a ship is to appear on stage. In London it materialises in the flash, straight from nothing, starting the audience. In New York, the theatre was not dark enough, so the audience could see how the ship was rolled out onto the stage.

Effectively, if you would like to seeing the play to have the entire Stranger Things covered, I highly recommend visiting a theatre in London rather than in New York – while the West End show is a five-star experience, the one on Broadway would only get three stars.

Written by:

Klara Hammudeh

Politics Section Editor 2025

Warsaw, Poland

Born in 2008 in Warsaw, Poland, Klara joined Harbingers’ Magazine to cover international affairs, crime, and music.

She joined the magazine in March 2024, writing numerous articles on politics and music. In 2024, she reported on the US presidential elections on the ground and, in February 2025, covered the Middle East crisis from Amman, Jordan. Her strong writing skills led to her appointment as Politics Section Editor in March 2025. Simultaneously, she will serve as the Poland 2025 Presidential Election Newsroom Editor.

In the future, Klara plans to study psychology, international politics, or criminology, preferably in the United States.

In her free time, she enjoys reading, dancing, listening to music, and exploring pop culture—particularly how Broadway and West End adapt classic Disney stories into musicals.

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