MURDER BALLAD, THE WILD PARTY & More Set for Bailiwick Chicago's 2014-15 Season

Bailiwick Chicago Theater has announced its 2014-15 Season, launching this fall with the Tony Award-nominated Broadway musical THE WILD PARTY, with music and lyrics by Michael John LaChiusa, book by LaChiusa and George C. Wolfe, based on the 1928 poem by Joseph Moncure March, directed by Brenda Didier and musical direction by Aaron Benham*. The season continues this winter with the world premiere of the fierce new play PRINCESS MARY DEMANDS YOUR ATTENTION by Resident Playwright Aaron Holland, directed by Artistic Director Lili-Anne Brown*. Next spring, Bailiwick Chicago presents the Chicago premiere of the intense off-Broadway rock musical MURDER BALLAD, conceived by and with book and lyrics by Julia Jordan, music and lyrics by Juliana Nash and directed by James Beaudry.

Bailiwick Chicago is also pleased to announce casting for its season opener, THE WILD PARTY, featuring Danni Smith* as Queenie, Matthew Keffer as Burrs and Danielle Brothers as Delores with Molly Coleman, Gilbert Domally, Patrick Falcon, Desmond Gray, Jason Grimm, Christina Hall, Sharriese Hamilton*, Ryan Lanning*, Steven Perkins, Khaki Pixley, Jason Richards and Sasha Smith.

THE WILD PARTY and PRINCESS MARY DEMANDS YOUR ATTENTION will be presented at Victory Gardens Richard Christiansen Theater, 2433 N. Lincoln Ave., where Bailiwick Chicago is member of the Resident Theater Program. MURDER BALLAD will play at the Flat Iron Arts Building, 1579 N. Milwaukee Ave. in Chicago. Tickets for the 2014-15 Season will go on sale at a later date. For additional information, visit www.bailiwickchicago.com.

"This season is delightfully dark," comments Bailiwick Chicago Artistic Director Lili-Anne Brown. "In each show, central characters are forced to take self-inventory and are found woefully wanting. These are not necessarily likable, easy characters - but they are absolutely fascinating, and as you watch them you become invested in what happens to them, sometimes despite yourself. Of course, like everyone in life, they are trying to find happiness - some people just don't know where to look."

The Bailiwick Chicago Theater 2014-15 Season includes:

October 2 - November 1, 2014
THE WILD PARTY
Music and Lyrics by Michael John LaChiusa
Book by Michael John LaChiusa & George C. Wolfe
Based on the poem by Joseph Moncure March
Directed by Brenda Didier
Music Direction by Aaron Benham*
at Victory Gardens Richard Christiansen Theater, 2433 N. Lincoln Ave., Chicago

Featuring Danni Smith* (Queenie) and Matthew Keffer (Burrs) and Danielle Brothers (Dolores) with Molly Coleman (Nadine), Gilbert Domally (Phil), Patrick Falcon (Black) Desmond Grey (Oscar), Jason Grimm (Goldberg), Christina Hall (Madeline), Sharriese Hamilton* (Kate), Ryan Lanning* (Jackie), Steven Perkins (Eddie), Khaki Pixley (Mae), Jason Richards (Gold) and Sasha Smith (Sally).

Manhattan decadence in the 1920s provides the backdrop for this tough musical fable. Queenie, a vaudeville chorus girl. hosts a titular blowout with her vicious lover Burrs, a blackface minstrel. The guests are a vivid collection of the unruly and the undone: Queenie's conniving rival, a cocaine-sniffing bisexual playboy, a washed-up boxer, a black "brother act," a diva of indeterminate age and infinite life experience, the fresh-off-the-farm ingénue whose naïveté quickly evaporates, a lesbian actress and her comatose girlfriend, and the bargain-basement heartthrob who catches Queenie's roving eye. The jazz- and gin-soaked party rages to a mounting sense of threat as artifice and illusion are stripped away. When midnight debauchery leads to tragedy at dawn, the high-flying characters land with a sobering thud, reminding us that no party lasts forever.

January 15 - February 21, 2015
PRINCESS MARY DEMANDS YOUR ATTENTION - World Premiere!
By Resident Playwright Aaron Holland
Directed by Artistic Director Lili-Anne Brown
at Victory Gardens Richard Christiansen Theater, 2433 N. Lincoln Ave., Chicago

PRINCESS MARY DEMANDS YOUR ATTENTION is a new play inspired by parts of Tolstoy's War & Peace that tells the soulful story of Amari Bolkonski, a gay, black daydreamer suffering from agoraphobia and seemingly "stuck" in life while living with his overbearing mother. After a chance encounter with a dynamic trio of vivacious, club-loving guys, he is thrown into to a decade-long journey to personal acceptance and freedom. Along the way, he is guided (and haunted) by an inexplicable drag queen, ultimately finding his true self - hidden in the last place he would look. With storytelling that incorporates music and dance in a fresh, interpretive approach, PRINCESS MARY DEMANDS YOUR ATTENTION is a fierce new play that ultimately pulls at the heart and demands an answer to the question: Is there really anything in your way?

April 2 - May 9, 2015
MURDER BALLAD - Chicago Premiere!
Conceived by and with book and lyrics by Julia Jordan
Music and Lyrics by Juliana Nash
Directed James Beaudry
at the Flat Iron Arts Building, 1579 N. Milwaukee Ave., Chicago

This new musical follows Sara, a young New Yorker who is torn between her dangerous ex-boyfriend and her reliable husband. Led by a sexy nightclub singer who serves as the show's narrator, MURDER BALLAD documents the details of the torrid affair with vibrant pop-rock tunes. When Sara breaks up with Tom, a gritty bartender, she runs into the arms of Michael, a quiet poetry student at NYU. But after the couple gets married and has a daughter, Sara longs for her old, dangerous life and begins secretly seeing Tom at his bar downtown. As Sara's passionate relationship with Tom intensifies, she begins to miss her old life with her husband and young child - but by then, it may be too late...

*Denotes Bailiwick Chicago Collective Members/Artistic Associates.