MCN Productions was established in 1986 by playwright, Mike Carter, and Glyndebourne director, Dr. Christopher Newell. The company’s first major theatrical production was a musical adaptation of Roald Dahl’s ‘Fantastic Mr. Fox’, which played at The Gardner Arts Centre (Brighton) in 1986/7 and has seen numerous revivals since, including Radio 3′s ‘Listen!’ series. It was, for many years, the only musical version of the famous children’s novel allowed on stage or radio by the Dahl Estate and indeed by Roald Dahl himself who attended the premiere. The company was also responsible for launching the highly acclaimed opera of Raymond Briggs’s ‘Fungus the Bogeyman’, which played at the Leicester Haymarket and the Coventry Belgrade under the direction of the late Ken Campbell.  The company’s production of ’The Jungle Book’, which enjoyed a short tour (UK) in 2002/2003, was highlighted in the Guardian’s ‘Top Five ~ not to be missed‘ shows.

Between 1986 and 2005, MCN Productions was responsible for producing no fewer than 26 theatrical shows – a total of 1,497 individual performances – in theatres across the country.