Theatre Raleigh Sets 2016 Season

Theatre Raleigh announces the 2016 Hot Summer Nights Season including a return of the family favorite The Wolf (March 3-20). Next, Theatre Raleigh will premier an adapted story, The Mystery of Edwin Drood A Musical by Rupert Holmes- (May 11 - 22), followed by Arthur Miller's classic All My Sons (June 7 - 19) and The Light in the Piazza (July 6 - 14), presented in the gallery at the North Carolina Museum of Art. Finally, the Southern classic, Steel Magnolias (July 27 - August 7) and the story of the famed recording session Million Dollar Quartet (August 17 - 28) will round out the season.

New this year, 2016 Cool Summer Evenings Concert Series features homegrown performances throughout the summer. Cool Summer Evenings is the side dish to Theatre Raleigh's main course, Hot Summer Nights. These concerts will give an opportunity for local artists to showcase themselves. The concert series will feature all genres, from a cabaret act, a one man show, bands and singing groups. Lauren Kennedy, Artistic Director and the staff at Theatre Raleigh are accepting submissions at info@theatreraleigh.com.

Season packages are available at http://www.theatreraleigh.com or call the box office (919) 832-9997.

2016 Family Festivities Series

The Wolf- March 3 - 20, Kennedy Theatre

Back by popular demand. Theatre Raleigh welcomes their Theatre for Young Audiences original productionThe Wolf. The Wolf is the antagonist from all your favorite Fairy Tales... Little Red Riding Hood, The Three Little Pigs, and The Boy Who Cried Wolf. Follow Peter, Little Red and the Three Little Pigs as they band together to overcome the threat of a common adversary. First presented last season, this is a true gem for the whole family.

2016 Hot Summer Nights Series:

The Mystery of Edwin Drood A Musical by Rupert Holmes- May 11 - 22, Kennedy Theatre (musical)

Theatre Raleigh will be premiering a smaller cast version of this hit created by Tony award-winning composer/writer Rupert Holmes, best known for Curtains, the feature film A Star Is Born starring Barbra Streisand and most famously his pop hit Escape (The Piña Colada Song). Come be one of the first to see this new adaptation of the exploration of Charles Dicken's unfinished work, in which the mystery of the murder of Edwin Drood is examined.

This wildly warm-hearted theatrical experience kicks off when the Music Hall Royale "puts on" its flamboyant rendition of an unfinished Dickens mystery in The Mystery of Edwin Drood. The story itself deals with John Jasper, a Jekyll-and-Hyde choirmaster who is quite madly in love with his music student, the fair Miss Rosa Bud. Now, Miss Bud is, in turn, engaged to Jasper's nephew, young Edwin Drood. Our title character disappears mysteriously one stormy Christmas Eve-but has Edwin Drood been murdered? And if so, then whodunnit? The giddy playfulness of this play-within-a-play draws the audience toward one of the play's most talked-about features, which allows the audience to vote on the solution as prelude to the most unusual and hilarious finale!

All My Sons- June 7 - 19, Kennedy Theatre (play)

All My Sons by Arthur Miller is the sad Post-World War II story about the Kellers, a seemingly "All American" family. But the father, Joe Keller, has concealed a great sin. During the war, he allowed his factory to ship faulty airplane cylinders to the U.S. Armed Forces. Because of this, over twenty American pilots died.

Joe Keller and Herbert Deever, partners in a machine shop during the war, turned out defective airplane parts, causing the deaths of many men. Deever was sent to prison while Keller escaped punishment and went on to make a lot of money. In a work of tremendous power, a love affair between Keller's son, Chris, and Ann Deever, Herbert's daughter, the bitterness of George Keller, who returns from the war to find his father in prison and his father's partner free, and the reaction of a son to his father's guilt escalate toward a climax of electrifying intensity.

Winner of the Drama Critics' Award for Best New Play in 1947, All My Sons established Arthur Miller as a leading voice in the American theater. All My Sons introduced themes that thread through Miller's work as a whole: the relationships between fathers and sons and the conflict between business and personal ethics.

The Light in the Piazza- July 6 - 14, North Carolina Museum of Art (musical)

Come see this production in the breath-taking setting of the North Carolina Museum of Art gallery!

The Light in the Piazza takes place in Italy in the summer of 1953. Margaret Johnson, the wife of an American businessman, is touring the Tuscan countryside with her daughter, Clara. While sightseeing, Clara, a beautiful, surprisingly childish young woman, loses her hat in a sudden gust. As if guided by an unseen hand, the hat lands at the feet of Fabrizio Naccarelli, a handsome Florentine, who returns it to Clara. This brief episode, charged with coincidence and fate, sparks an immediate and intense romance between Clara and Fabrizio. Margaret, extremely protective of her daughter, attempts to keep Clara and Fabrizio apart. As The Light in the Piazza unfolds, a secret is revealed: in addition to the cultural differences between the young lovers, Clara is not quite all that she appears. Unable to suppress the truth about her daughter, Margaret is forced to reconsider not only Clara's future, but her own hopes as well.

Steel Magnolias- July 27 - August 7, Kennedy Theatre (play)

A southern classic. Concerned with a group of gossipy southern ladies in a small-town beauty parlor, the play is alternately hilarious and touching-and, in the end, deeply revealing of the strength and purposefulness which underlies the antic banter of its characters.

Truvy Jones runs a successful beauty salon in Chinquapin, Louisiana, where all the ladies in the neighborhood have a standing Saturday appointment. Along with her anxious and eager assistant, Annelle, Truvy styles the hair of many of the women about town: wealthy widow and former first lady of Chinquapin, Clairee Belcher, local curmudgeon Ouiser Boudreaux, intelligent and compassionate career woman M'Lynn, and her daughter Shelby, the prettiest girl in town. Shelby's engagement is the talk of the town, but the joy and excitement of her wedding quickly turn to concern as she faces a risky pregnancy and a myriad of health complications. Eventually, when Shelby dies from complications related to her diabetes, M'Lynn has to deal with the most difficult of life's challenges: the loss of one's only child. As the women of Chinquapin makes their ways over life's many hurdles together, they find comfort in one another.

Million Dollar Quartet- August 17 - 28, Kennedy Theatre (musical)

They came together to make music. They ended up making history. Million Dollar Quartet is the Tony Award-winning Broadway musical inspired by the true story of the famed recording session where Sam Phillips, the "Father of Rock 'n' Roll" brought together music icons Johnny Cash, Carl Perkins, Jerry Lee Lewis and Elvis Presley For one unforgettable night.

Featuring over 20 rock 'n' roll hits including: "Blue Suede Shoes," "Matchbox," "Who Do You Love," "Folsom Prison Blues." "That's All Right," "Sixteen Tons," "Hound Dog," "Down by the Riverside," "Peace in the Valley," "I Walk the Line," "Great Balls of Fire," and "See you Later, Alligator."

2016 Cool Summer Evenings Concert Series

This brand new series will feature local artists performing their work in the Kennedy Theatre. Line up will be announced soon!

April 30 & May 1

May 29

July 9

July 16 & 17

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