“These plays, explosive and lyrical, raw and sophisticated, by young artists and masters, are a rich expression of the huge range of theater that finds a home at The Public.”
- Oskar Eustis, Artistic Director
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Check out our 2012-2013 Season Brochure filled with video interviews, show info, and more! Click here.
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SPRING 2013 AT THE PUBLIC
UNDER THE RADAR A Festival Tracking New Theater
January 9-20, 2013
Now in its ninth year, UNDER THE RADAR is an explosively diverse festival of new theater from around the world and the U.S. The festival spotlights artists ranging from emerging talents to masters in the field.
World Premiere DETROIT '67
By Dominique Morisseau
Directed by Kwame Kwei-Armah
February 26-March 17, 2013
Public Lab
It's 1967 in Detroit. Motown music is getting the party started, and Chelle and her brother Lank are making ends meet by turning their basement into an after-hours joint. But when a mysterious woman finds her way into their lives, the siblings clash over more much more than the family business. As their pent-up feelings erupt, so does their city, and they find themselves caught in the middle of the '67 riots. DETROIT '67 is presented in association with Classical Theatre of Harlem and the National Black Theatre.
English Language Premiere NEVA
Written and Directed by Guillermo Calderón
Translation by Andrea Thome
March 1-March 31, 2013
In a politically charged, haunting meditation on theater and the revolutionary impulse, writer-director Guillermo Calderón’s NEVA tells the story of Anton Chekhov’s widow, the actress Olga Knipper, who arrives in a dimly lit rehearsal room in St. Petersburg in the winter of 1905. As Olga and two other actors await the rest of the cast, they huddle together, act out scenes from their lives and muse on their art form and love - while, unseen, striking workers are being gunned down in the streets by Tsarist regime. Calderón savagely examines the relationship between theater and historical context in this ominous and tightly crafted ensemble work that allows a palpable terror to creep through the theater walls.
World Premiere HERE LIES LOVE
Concept and Lyrics: David Byrne
Music: David Byrne and Fatboy Slim Additional music: Tom Gandey, J Pardo
Directed by Alex Timbers Choreographed by Annie-B Parson
April 2-May 5, 2013
Within a
throbbing dance club atmosphere, David Byrne and Fatboy Slim deconstruct
the astonishing journey of Filipina First Lady Imelda Marcos and her
meteoric rise and subsequent descent into infamy. This wholly immersive
spectacle combines disco beats, adrenaline-fueled choreography, and a
remarkable 360-degree scenic and video environment to go beyond Imelda’s
near-mythic obsession with shoes and explore true questions of power
and responsibility.
Directed by two-time Obie Award-winner Alex Timbers (Bloody Bloody Andrew Jackson, Peter and the Starcatcher), HERE LIES LOVE is
neither a period piece nor a mere biography, neither a play or a
musical, but rather a unique theatrical experience that raises the
pulses and quickens the blood - all filtered through the remarkable
vision of David Byrne, one of the great American artists of the last
half-century.
Snapshots from an enigmatic fairy-tale in which Suzie, the elusive coquette, brings Samuel to his knees – from where he worships a life he only half understands. OLD-FASHIONED PROSTITUTES (A TRUE ROMANCE) is an expressionistic chamber-play that twists emotional heartache into a landscape of continual mental invention, marking the return to theater of a celebrated artist whom TheNew York Times has dubbed “the Godfather of the American avant-garde.”
Presented in association with Ontological-Hysteric Theater.
New York Premiere VENICE
Book by Eric Rosen
Music by Matt Sax
Lyrics by Matt Sax and Eric Rosen
Additional Music by Curtis Moore
Directed by Eric Rosen
May 28-June 23, 2013
Public Lab
An electrifying new musical, VENICE will ignite the stage with a fusion of musical styles from hip-hop and rock to soaring anthems of love and hope, tracing a young man's rise as he fights for what's right against a backdrop of deceit and sibling betrayal. Part epic romance, part political tale, VENICE will transport you to a fallen city in the not-so-distant future where revolution is in the air, political structures are crumbling, and only the children of the city's fallen heroes can change the course of history. If you dream of peace, follow us. If you dream of freedom, follow us. If you know these are not the same thing, well…are you ready?
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PAST PRODUCTIONS
World Premiere WILD WITH HAPPY
By Colman Domingo
Directed by Robert O’Hara Featuring Colman Domingo, Korey Jackson, Maurice McRae, and Sharon Washington
October 9-November 18, 2012
From Colman Domingo (a Tony Award® nominee for The Scottsboro Boys and an Obie Award winner for Passing Strange)
comes a deeply imaginative and utterly outrageous new work that
explores the bizarre comedy that lies within death and healing. Gil, an
actor who’s struggling to carve out his own new life, finds his worlds
colliding when his mother dies and he decides to have her cremated. But
where should he scatter the ashes? And can he make a fairytale ending
for her in the one place that made her WILD WITH HAPPY? Domingo leads a cast of four. And directing is Obie winner Robert O’Hara.
World Premiere FUN HOME Music by Jeanine Tesori Book and Lyrics by Lisa Kron Based on the Alison Bechdel book Directed by Sam Gold
October 17-November 4, 2012
Public Lab
From Jeanine Tesori, four-time Tony Award®-nominated composer of Caroline, or Change; Shrek the Musical; and Thoroughly Modern Millie, and Lisa Kron, Tony-nominated author of Well and 2.5 Minute Ride, comes an original new musical about fathers, daughters, cartoons, caskets, and love. Based on Alison Bechdel’s acclaimed graphic novel and set in the family business, Bechdel Funeral Home, FUN HOME
charts Alison's quest to come to terms with her father's life and death
by painstakingly reconstructing their shared but unspoken bond.
Surprising, funny, ultimately deeply moving, FUN HOME is an exciting world-premiere musical from some of New York’s brightest theatrical talents.
New York Premiere GIANT
Book by Sybille Pearson
Music and Lyrics by Michael John LaChiusa Based on the novel by Edna Ferber Directed by Michael Greif
October 26-December 16, 2012
Based on the classic novel by Pulitzer Prize-winning author Edna Ferber, GIANT
is a new American musical that spans generations in an epic chronicle
of the state that’s like no place else on earth: Texas. Amid a turbulent
culture of greed, bigotry and money, a powerful cattleman, his new East
Coast bride, their family and friends – not to mention their enemies –
embrace and confront the joys and sorrows that loom as large as the
state they call home. With a book by Sybille Pearson (the Tony-nominated
author of Baby), music and lyrics by Michael John LaChiusa (the five-time Tony-nominated composer of The Wild Party and Hello Again) and direction by Michael Greif (the three-time Tony-nominated director of Rent and The Intelligent Homosexual's Guide...), GIANT will come to life in an appropriately huge production with a company of 22 actors and a 17-piece orchestra.
GIANT is a co-production with Dallas Theater Center and a project of The Public's Musical Theater Initiative. GIANT is made possible with the generous support of THE TED AND MARY JO SHEN CHARITABLE GIFT FUND.
World Premiere SORRY Play Three of The Apple Family Plays
Written and Directed by Richard Nelson
November 3-December 2, 2012
Public Lab
A year after Sweet and Sad,
the Apple family again share a meal in Rhinebeck, as they sort through
personal and political feelings of loss and confusion on the morning of
the day the country will choose the next president. Like the first two
plays in this trilogy, Sweet and Sad and That Hopey Changey Thing, SORRY will open on the day that it is set, November 6, 2012 – Election Day.
Best-selling author Nathan Englander (What We Talk About When We Talk About Anne Frank) adapts this new play from his acclaimed short story of the same name.
A Soviet
prison,1952. Stalin's secret police have rounded up twenty-six writers,
the giants of Yiddish literature in Russia. As judgment looms, a
twenty-seventh suddenly appears: Pinchas Pelovits, unpublished and
unknown. Baffled by his arrest, he and his cellmates wrestle with the
mysteries of party loyalty and politics, culture and identity, and with
what it means to write in troubled times. When they discover why the
twenty-seventh man is among them, the writers come to realize that even
in the face of tyranny stories still have the power to transcend.
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*All productions, announced cast and directors are subject to change and tickets are subject to availability. Memberships are subject to a $5 handling fee and are non-refundable. The exclusive Member ticket discount is valid for all regular Public Theater Membership shows and excludes rentals and other special events, such as benefits. Memberships are valid for one year from the date of purchase.
Pictured (from top): Natalie Cortez and Matt Doyle by Karen Almond; David Byrne by Simon Luethi; Colman Domingo by Joseph Moran; Laila Robins, J. Smith-Cameron, and Maryann Plunkett by Joan Marcus; Nathan Englander by Juliana Sohn; Dominique Morisseau by Joseph Moran; Trinidad González and Paula Zúñiga, courtesy of Guillermo Calderón; Richard Foreman by Joseph Moran.
