NCTC's 35th Anniversary Season to Feature World Premieres & More

Last night, at New Conservatory Theater Center's annual Season Announcement Party for subscribers, donors, artists and press, NCTC Founder & Artistic Director Ed Decker announced the line-up for the 2016-17 subscription season, which marks the 35th anniversary of the company. Regarded nationally and internationally as San Francisco's Premier LGBQI and Allied Theatre Company, NCTC breaks new ground with a season that features eight powerhouse plays and musicals, including three world premieres developed through NCTC's New Play Development Lab.

"Over the last 35 years, we've built quite a family at NCTC and we are thrilled that our family is an ever-growing one," says Decker. "Social progress continues and more of us are able to emerge from the shadows to join the conversation. There are many stories aching to be told. This season we continue the exploration of our lives by presenting a broad spectrum of plays that highlight history, personal expression, identity, unity, heritage, family and sheer joy. Our line-up includes three world premieres developed through our New Play Development Lab, four regional premieres and an award-winning musical that has become a local holiday tradition."

NCTC opens its 2016-17 Season in October, with the regional premiere of Casa Valentina by four-time Tony Award winner Harvey Fierstein (Torch Song Trilogy, Kinky Boots, Newsies, La Cage aux Folles). Casa Valentina is Fierstein's first play in almost 30 years, and NCTC's production follows its premiere at Manhattan Theatre Club on Broadway. In summer 1962, most men who went to the Catskills went to escape the heat. Others made their way to Casa Valentina, an inconspicuous bungalow colony catering to a discreet clientele: heterosexual men who would escape their families to spend their weekends safely dressing and acting as women. Hailed as "moving, beguiling, and, yes, again historically significant" (NY Newsday), Casa Valentina is based on real events and infused with Fierstein's trademark wit, offering a glimpse into the lives of a group of "self-made women" as they search for acceptance and happiness in their very own Garden of Eden.

Next, NCTC presents the regional premiere of Stephen Karam's Pulitzer Prize finalist Sons of the Prophet. If to live is to suffer, then Joseph Douaihy is more alive than most. With unexplained chronic pain and the fate of his reeling family on his shoulders, Joseph's health, sanity, and insurance premium are on the line. Sons of the Prophet is a refreshingly honest take on how we cope with wounds that just won't heal - and the funniest play about human suffering you'll ever see.

Stephen Karam has been garnering national acclaim since his play Speech & Debate won raves Off-Broadway and became widely produced in regional theaters across the country. Sons of the Prophet followed, premiering at Huntington Theatre Company in 2011, and later that year transfered in an award-winning production at Roundabout Theatre Company, which commissioned the play. In addition to being named a 2012 Pulitzer Prize Finalist for Drama, Sons of the Prophet won the Lucille Lortel Award for Outstanding Play, and New York Drama Critics' Circle and Outer Critics Circle Awards. Currently, Karam is represented on Broadway with the transfer of his rapturously received new play, The Humans.

This December, NCTC brings the holiday cheer with everyone's favorite foul-mouthed, feel-good musical: the return of NCTC's award-winning production of Avenue Q, with music, lyrics and original concept by Robert Lopez and Jeff Marx and book by Jeff Whitty. Proclaimed by San Francisco Travel Magazine as "a local tradition," this "year-in, year-out hilarious, high-energy, and heart-warming production" (Theatre Eddys) won over critics and audiences alike in its previous engagements in NCTC's intimate Decker Theatre. Declares the San Francisco Examiner, "only the Grinch could prevent the laughter-filled show from selling out night after night."

In January, NCTC presents the West Coast premiere of Daniel's Husband, the "devastating ... beautifully crafted" (Miami Herald) new play by Michael McKeever. Hailed as "impressive and important" (The Buffalo News) in productions in Florida and Buffalo, New York, McKeever's play explores the profound relationship choices resulting from marriage equality. Michael does not believe in same-sex marriage. His partner Daniel does. As their love story unfolds in this "work of profoundly moving art" (The Sun-Sentinel), these two men learn the consequences of their points of view.

NCTC continues its 35th Anniversary celebration in March, proudly presenting the world premiere of Jewelle Gomez' Leaving the Blues, an NCTC commissioned play with music telling the life of legendary Blues singer-songwriter Alberta Hunter (1895-1984). As the play, Hunter is backstage preparing for a professional comeback, knowing just how many doors to the past it may open. Spanning 60 years, Leaving the Blues imagines a journey through the public life Hunter led as an African-American musician, the private life she hid as a lesbian, and the ghosts that won't let her forget. Framed by her triumphant return to singing in the late 1970s, the play is a backstage story which lays bare the tension history created for Hunter.

Jewelle Gomez is a writer and activist. She wrote the double Lambda Award-winning novel, The Gilda Stories, among many other published works. Her most recent play, Waiting for Giovanni, written in collaboration with Harry Waters Jr., was a dream play exploring the inner life of author James Baldwin. It premiered at NCTC in the 2011-2012 Season, also part of NCTC's New Play Development Lab. Her stage adaptation of The Gilda Stories, Bones & Ash: a Gilda Story was performed by Urban Bush Women in 13 U.S. cities. Her fiction, essays, criticism and poetry have appeared in numerous periodicals, including the San Francisco Chronicle, The New York Times, the Village Voice; Ms. Magazine, ESSENCE Magazine, The Advocate, Callaloo and Black Scholar.

The world premiere of Leaving the Blues, NCTC will be partnering with the Museum of the African Diaspora on special events leading up to and surrounding the production. Details will be announced at a later date.

Also in March is the world premiere of Everything That's Beautiful by Elyzabeth Gregory Wilder. When Luke and Jess decide to allow their eight-year-old child to live as a girl, they relocate from the Midwest in order to give the family a clean start. Shortly after settling into their new home, an accident compels Luke to finally admit the real reason they moved, a confession that could potentially destroy their family. In this timely and tender new play, change is the only constant.

Called "a name to watch" (The Independent, UK), Elyzabeth Gregory Wilder was the recipient of the Osborn Award given by the American Theatre Critics Association for her play Gee's Bend. She has been produced at The Royal Court Theatre, Alabama Shakespeare Festival, Denver Center, Cleveland Play House, KC Rep, Northlight, the Arden and Hartford Stage, among others. The Furniture of Home, which deals with the Gulf Coast recovery in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina, and The Flag Maker of Market Street also premiered at Alabama Shakespeare Festival, where she was Playwright-in-Residence. Currently, Elyzabeth is the Tennessee Williams Playwright-in-Residence at Sewanee: The University of the South.

In May and June, NCTC will present the play that spawned the huge cult comedy phenomenon when Sordid Lives by Del Shores makes its San Francisco debut. Three generations of a dysfunctional small-town Texas family gather after their elderly matriarch dies during a tryst in a seedy motel room with her much younger, much married neighbor. Fireworks are set off and bizarre truths exposed as the town prepares for what could be an embarrassing funeral. After a hugely successful and award-winning long run in Los Angeles in 1996, Sordid Lives became a cult film classic in 2000, written and directed by Shores, and starring Leslie Jordan and Olivia Newton-John. Later, Shores followed the success of the film with a television series on Logo. Sordid Lives marks the third collaboration between Del Shores and NCTC, after lauded productions of his plays Southern Baptist Sissies and Yellow.

In June, NCTC closes its 35th Anniversary celebration and 2016-17 Season with the world premiere of warplay by JC Lee. Inspired by Homer's The Iliad and the epic tale of Achilles and Patroclus, warplay is a shockingly funny, poetic and radical reimagining of one of the oldest love stories in all of Western literature. Two young men. A battle rages in the distance. Game on.

JC Lee writes for theatre, film and television. His play Luce received its world premiere in 2013 at LCT3 at Lincoln Center Theater. Lee's plays have been developed and staged at Center Theatre Group, Williamstown Theatre Festival, Marin Theatre Company, Magic Theatre, Azuka Theatre Company, and other theatres across the country. A graduate of The Julliard School and Bloomsburg University, he was a writer and co-producer for Looking on HBO, where he previously wrote for the hit series Girls. Lee is currently a writer for ABC's How to Get Away with Murder and screenwriter for the Weinstein Company's movie adaptation of the musical Pippin.

The 2016-2017 Season is supported in part by Bloomberg Philanthropies, Grants for the Arts/San Francisco Hotel Tax Fund, Shubert Foundation, William & Flora Hewlett Foundation, NCTC's Producers Circle and our individual donors.

Subscribers get the best seats at the best prices for every show in the season. 8-show full-season subscriptions are available now, as well as a 7-show package (without Avenue Q) and a 4-show sampler, with a choice of any 4 shows in the season. To celebrate our 35th anniversary, we are offering a 3-show flex pass to guests 35 years and under for just $50 - less than $17 a play! Subscriber benefits include 25% off single ticket prices, access to the best seats, free and easy ticket exchanges, first access to Avenue Q tickets, 50% off guest tickets, savings on non-subscription shows and much more. Subscriptions are now available at nctcsf.org/subscribe or by calling the Box Office at 415.861.8972.

New Conservatory Theatre Center has been San Francisco's premier Queer and Allied performing arts institution and progressive arts education conservatory. Founded in 1981, NCTC is renowned for its diverse range of innovative, high-quality productions, touring productions and shows for young audiences; its foundational anti-bullying work with youth and educators through YouthAware; and its commitment to nurturing emerging artists and playwrights to expand the canon of Queer and Allied dramatic work.

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2015-16 SEASON SCHEDULE

Casa Valentina

By Harvey Fierstein

Regional Premiere

October 7 - November 6, 2016

Opening Night: October 15, 2016

Sons of the Prophet

By Stephen Karam

Regional Premiere

November 11 - December 18, 2016

Opening Night: November 19, 2016

Avenue Q

Music and Lyrics by Robert Lopez and Jeff Marx

Book by Jeff Whitty

Based on an original concept by Robert Lopez and Jeff Marx

December 2, 2016 - January 15, 2017

Opening Night: December 10, 2016

Daniel's Husband

By Michael McKeever

West Coast Premiere

January 20 - February 26, 2017

Opening Night: January 28, 2017

Leaving the Blues

A Play with Music by Jewelle Gomez

World Premiere

March 3 - April 2, 2017

Opening Night: March 11, 2017

Everything That's Beautiful

By Elyzabeth Gregory Wilder

World Premiere

March 17 - April 23, 2017

Opening Night: March 25, 2017

Sordid Lives

By Del Shores

San Francisco Premiere

May 12 - June 11, 2017

Opening Night: May 20, 2017

warplay

By JC Lee

World Premiere

June 2 - July 2, 2017

Opening Night: June 10, 201

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