Adelaide Festival has revealed its first two shows for 2027. Romeo Castellucci’s staging of Bartók’s opera Bluebeard’s Castle and Barrie Kosky’s theatre work K will be Adelaide Festival exclusives, with both directors returning to the festival.

Castellucci’s previous Adelaide Festival productions include Go Down Moses in 2016 and Requiem in 2020. His production of Bluebeard’s Castle, which premiered at the 2022 Salzburg Festival, replaces naturalistic staging with a spectacular water-filled set illuminated by fire as Bluebeard’s new wife Judith opens the seven forbidden doors of his castle. Each chamber reveals another of his secrets while exposing the increasingly turbulent layers of Judith’s psyche.

Barrie Kosky’s production of K, performed by the Berliner Ensemble, is coming to the 2027 Adelaide Festival. Photo © Jörg Brüggemann

Kosky’s K, meanwhile, reimagines Kafka’s novel The Trial as a collision of theatre, dance, song and vaudeville. Performed by actors from Berlin’s Berliner Ensemble and accompanied by a live band, the production follows Josef K as he becomes trapped in an absurd and terrifying system of bureaucratic power.

The production draws on Kafka’s engagement with Yiddish theatre and his Jewish heritage,...