New Musicals CAKE OFF and GIRLSTAR Will Premiere at Signature Theatre; Full 2015-16 Season Announced!

Artistic Director Eric Schaeffer and Managing Director Maggie Boland announce the full lineup for Signature Theatre's 2015/16 season. "Signature's 26th season continues our commitment to presenting new works and reinventing great American musicals. We're proud that this season also highlights daring new plays by female playwrights," stated Signature Theatre Artistic Director Eric Schaeffer. "I'm excited to work with so many talented artists in the coming year."

Managing Director Maggie Boland added "This lineup showcases artists new to the Signature family alongside those who have been essential to the Theatre's success throughout our history, and offers Washington's audiences the opportunity to experience an extraordinary range of experiences and voices. With our trademark mix of new and classic, invention and re-invention - it's a thrill to announce a season with so much variety."

The 2015/16 season kicks off with an all-new production of The Fix (August 11 - September 20); the inside-Washington musical satire by John Dempsey and Dana Rowe will be directed by Eric Schaeffer (Broadway's Gigi, Follies and Million Dollar Quartet). Heralded as a "gleefully wicked musical comedy" by the Associated Press, Signature Theatre welcomes back the show that received its U.S. premiere at the Theatre in 1998, cementing a long-standing relationship with Dempsey and Rowe that has also included the American premiere of The Witches of Eastwick and the world premiere of Brother Russia.

In the fall, Signature will present two world premiere musicals. As part of the Women's Voices Theater Festival, Signature's Resident Director of New Works Joe Calarco (Signature's Gypsy) will direct Cake Off (September 29 - November 22), a new musical by Julia Jordan (Murder Ballad), Sheri Wilner (Kingdom City) and Adam Gwon(Signature's The Boy Detective Fails). Starring Sherri L. Edelen (Signature's Gypsy), this hilarious new musical is a battle-of-the-sexes set at the 48th Annual Twillsbury Bake-Off competition. Signature is proud to be an originating theater sponsoring the two-month festival, which boasts participation from more than 50 theaters throughout the Nation's Capital region. Women's Voices Theater Festival is dedicated to featuring new work by female playwrights and highlighting the scope of plays being written by women.

In October, Eric Schaeffer will direct Girlstar (October 13 - November 15). Donna Migliaccio (Signature's Sunday in the Park with George) stars as a record producer in search of her next big hit in this musical fairytale set to an electrifying pop score by Anton Dudley and Brian Feinstein (Crowned).

In the spring, Signature will continue to present exciting female voices with the DC area premieres of two plays. Annie Baker's Pulitzer Prize-winning play The Flick will get its DC area premiere directed by Joe Calarco (March 1 - April 17). The Flick follows the story of three minimum wage employees at a crumbling Massachusetts movie theatre and was called "the best argument anyone has yet made for the continued necessity, and profound uniqueness, of theater" by New York Magazine. In April, playwright Bathsheba Doran (Signature's Nest, Showtime's Boardwalk Empire) will return to Signature with her latest play The Mystery of Love & Sex (April 5 - May 8). Currently receiving its premiere production at Lincoln Center, The Mystery of Love & Sex was heralded as "perfectly wonderful" and "among the season's finest plays" by The New York Times. Doran's play is an unexpected love story of evolving friendship, finding your own path and the value of family.

The 2015/16 season also affirms Signature's passion to stage inventive new productions of classic musicals. Considered one of the greatest musicals of all time, West Side Story(December 8 - January 24), directed by Associate Artistic Director Matthew Gardiner, will feature a 17-piece orchestra and an inventive new staging in Signature Theatre's intimate 300 seat MAX Theatre. Two star-crossed lovers find themselves wrenched between two rival gangs in New York City's Upper West Side in this musical adaptation of Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet. Featuring an iconic score by Leonard Bernstein and Stephen Sondheim that includes "America," "Maria," "Somewhere" and "Tonight," West Side Story will also mark the 25th production of a Stephen Sondheim musical in Signature Theatre's history. Signature will tackle its' 26th Sondheim production with Road Show(February 9 - March 13) directed by Gary Griffin (Broadway's Honeymoon in Vegas, Signature's A Funny Thing Happened...). Stephen Sondheim and John Weidman's musical, about the real-life Mizner brothers and their quest for the ever elusive American dream, was praised as "fierce, funny, lean and heartbreaking" by the Chicago Sun-Times when Griffin's production premiered at Chicago Shakespeare Theater in 2014.

To end the season, Matthew Gardiner will direct the Tony Award®-winning musical La Cage aux Folles (May 31 - July 10). With a score by Jerry Herman (Hello, Dolly; Mame), featuring "I Am What I Am" and "The Best of Times," and a book by Harvey Fierstein (Newsies, Kinky Boots), this musical comedy about identity will star Signature Theatre favoriteBobby Smith (Signature's Simply Sondheim, Spin) as Albin, the lead drag performer at The Saint-Tropez Night Club on the French Riviera. Albin and Georges face a test when their son announces his engagement to the daughter of ultra-conservative political parents.

Signature will present several cabaret performances in the 2015/16 Season. In the summer, audiences can escape the heat in the air-conditioned ARK for Sizzlin' Summer Nights Series (July 8 - 25, 2015); A four-show Cabaret Series (Tracy Lynn Olivera, October 27-31, 2015; Nova Y. Payton, December 15-19, 2015; The Rat Pack, April 19-23, 2016; and Make 'Em Laugh, May 19-23, 2016).

Signature offers flexible subscription options for the 2015/16 season. Subscription packages are now on sale. Custom packages can be created for 3-, 4-, 5-, 6-, 7- or the full 8-show season.

Package prices begin at $187. Benefits of subscribing include first choice of seats, savings over individual ticket prices, fee-waived ticket exchanges and discounts on extra tickets. Season subscriptions are now on sale by calling Signature's Box Office at 703 820 9771 or by visiting www.signature-theatre.org. Subscribers may add the SHEN Cabaret Seriesand Sizzlin' Summer All-Access Pass to their subscription orders.

Photo Credit: Christopher Mueller. Design by Jessica Aimone.

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