Carol Badaracco Padgett
Senior Staff Writer
It’s just past 6 p.m. GMT on a late September evening in London, and Charing Cross Road outside the Phoenix Theatre in the West End district is buzzing beneath the glowing red marquee. You’re here to catch a 7 p.m. production of the stage play “Stranger Things: The First Shadow,” based on the globally acclaimed Netflix series “Stranger Things.”
As a major theater district that’s hosted world-class plays and musicals since the 17th century, the West End is literally alive with story. Its energy moves through the throng and even seeps into your pulse.
Once inside the Phoenix, you wander upstairs along merch-filled landings—darker and then brighter, like the mysterious flicker of the wall lights in the Byers home in season 1 when Will was trapped in the Upside Down.
You round the corner to appear inside a dress circle lounge with velvet and hardwood décor, where you’ll wait for the doors to open. The bar is pumping out ’80s tunes—the series’ staple sounds—as the fandom settles in.
Then, you notice. This flock doesn’t necessarily feel like theatergoers, but they definitely look like fans of “Stranger Things.” You blend right in because, like Eleven says, “Friends don’t lie.”
Prequel to a modern-day classic science fiction tale
Based on the iconic Netflix series “Stranger Things,” whose five television seasons spanned 2016-25, “Stranger Things: The First Shadow” is a dramatic stage origin story set in 1959. The play opens with multimedia that all fans recognize, like drone footage of Jackson, Georgia, as the fictional Hawkins, Indiana, from the television series. But once the audience gets its bearings and knows where it is, a fresh prequel story unfolds live before them.
“Stranger Things: The First Shadow” follows the parents of the streaming series’ characters as high school kids—where a young Joyce Maldonado, Jim Hopper, Bob Newby and others meet a new student named Henry Creel, aka Vecna, controller of a cosmic entity called the Mind Flayer, which comes to terrorize the 1980s town of Hawkins in “Stranger Things” on TV. In season 4 of the series, the audience learns about the Creel family, victims of a massacre in their Hawkins mansion back in 1959.
Written by Kate Trefry and based on the original story created by the Duffer brothers, Matt and Ross, the prequel has been called “breathtaking theatre” by outlets including London Theatreland, The Guardian and The Daily Telegraph.
The story onstage delivers the same mix of sci-fi intensity, mind blowing special effects, humor and wild surprise that fans love about the television series. It ends with a final-scene glimpse of a child in a hospital gown with a shaved head, reminiscent of Eleven at the Hawkins National Laboratory system where experiments are held. On social media, the play has teased “001”—the lab’s first patient?
As a fast forward refresher, the “Stranger Things” television series follows a group of school kids beginning in 1983 in the fictional town of Hawkins, Indiana. When their friend Will Byers goes missing, they search for him and find a mysterious government lab and a portal to an alternate dimension called the Upside Down. They also meet a strange little girl who has escaped the lab, known only as Eleven, and take her under their wing.
When the friend group, now including Eleven, teams up with Will’s frantic mother and the local police chief to search for their friend, they uncover bizarre government secrets, strange experiments and frightening supernatural forces in their little town.
The global hit series has amassed legions of die-hard fans around the world, yet its creators, the Duffer brothers, say they hit multiple brick walls before finding the right creative partner. “When we were starting out, there were so many doors slammed in our faces. Twelve studios passed on ‘Stranger Things’ before Netflix finally bought it,” they said.
Taking “Stranger Things” to the stage was an idea brought to the Duffer brothers by Tony Award-winning director Stephen Daldry, executive producer for the TV series “The Crown.” As the brothers told Spyscape.com (“Stranger Things: Crucial Intel About ‘The First Shadow’ Stage Play & 001”), “He wanted to tell a new and original story.”
The prequel play had its official world premiere in London’s West End at the Phoenix Theatre on Dec. 14, 2023.
By April 2025, “Stranger Things: The First Shadow” had opened on Broadway at the Marquis Theatre, as well. In June 2025, four Tony Awards followed, including best scenic design, best lighting design, best sound design and a special Tony Award for illusions and technical effects.
Melding of media
The “Stranger Things” franchise isn’t stopping with television and stage. A virtual reality game, “Stranger Things: Catalyst,” is reportedly coming from developers Netflix and Sandbox VR.
As the proliferation of the Duffer brothers’ franchise illustrates, when art forms are willing to merge and use technology to help tell the story, audiences arrive and fans converge, giving everything from fine art to pop culture a seat at the show. And there’s evidence that the efforts are appreciated all around.
London Theatre gave “Stranger Things: The First Shadow” a five-star review, calling it a “must-see” and “awe-inspiring sci-fi spectacular.” Variety described it as a “visceral thrill ride,” and People hailed it “an eleven out of 10.”
The powerful media convergence propelling the franchise isn’t lost on the Duffer brothers, who are teasing the links between “Stranger Things: The First Shadow” onstage and the new season 5 of “Stranger Things” on TV. As they told Spyscape.com about their show’s final season, “This gripping new adventure will take you right back to the beginning of the ‘Stranger Things’ story and may hold the key to the end.”
Entertainment amplified and fandom-approved.
This article appeared in the 2026 edition of the Creative Economy Journal. See more from the Journal here.
