Kline, Harris, Hoffman and More Coming to Public in 06/07

The Public Theater's Artistic Director Oskar Eustis and Executive Director Mara Manus announce its 2006-07 Season, exciting new productions that will usher in The Public's next 50 years as one of the nation's leading producers of Shakespeare and new work.

The 2006-07 Season will lead with Shakespeare, whose works are central to The Public's artistic vision uptown at Shakespeare in the Park and downtown at 425 Lafayette Street. A Shakespeare production downtown will be directed by James Lapine and feature Kevin Kline, who has a 

long and acclaimed history performing Shakespeare at The Public including leading roles in Richard III, Much Ado About Nothing, Henry V, and two productions of Hamlet.  In summer 2007, Tony Award-winning Brian Dennehy will make his Public Theater debut in Shakespeare in the Park.

 

Also coming to The Public's stages downtown this season are ambitious new works by three American masters – Wrecks by Neil LaBute, The Singing Forest by Craig Lucas, and 365 Days / 365 Plays by Suzan-Lori Parks. Exciting new work by new voices will also be heard – Durango by Julia Cho and directed by Chay Yew, Passing Strange by Stew in collaboration with Heidi Rodewald and Director Annie Dorsen, and Emergence-SEE! by Daniel Beaty. 

 

 Every month at The Public will be the continued presence of America's greatest actors. Following Liev Schreiber and Meryl Streep's performances at Shakespeare in the Park will be Kevin Kline performing Shakespeare and Ed Harris, who will return to The Public with Wrecks, written and directed by Neil LaBute. Harris last appeared in The Public's 1994 production of Sam Shepard's Simpatico, for which he won a Lucille Lortel Award for outstanding performance. Additionally, Philip Seymour Hoffman will appear in the LAByrinth Theatre Company's production of Jack Goes Boating.  

 

 In addition to seven new productions downtown, the 2006-07 Season will feature the return of two popular free readings series – New Work Now! and New Work Then!, which showcases new works and landmark plays developed during The Public's history, respectively; two annual festivals – Under The Radar, which highlights cutting-edge theater from around the world, and globalFEST, an all-star musical performance event at Joe's Pub featuring the latest in world music, co-produced by The Public Theater, World Music Institute and World Music/Crash Arts, Boston.  

 

 The Public will also produce with the Center Theatre Group in Los Angeles the world premiere of Yellowface, a biting new satire about ethnicity and cultural identity by the Tony Award-winning playwright David Henry Hwang.  The production will be staged at the Mark Taper Forum in spring 2007 and at The Public the following fall.  

The Public welcomes back LAByrinth Theater Company for its fourth season of residency; it is proud to give a home to one of America's most daring, innovative and talented theater companies dedicated to developing and producing new plays that reflect the very fabric of New York City. At The Public this season, LAByrinth will stage A Small, Melodramatic Story directed by Lucie Tiberghien and featuring Carlo Alban, Ron Cephas Jones, Chris McGarry and Portia, and Jack Goes Boating by Bob Glaudini, directed by Peter Dubois and featuring Beth Cole, Daphne Rubin-Vega, John Ortiz and Philip Seymour Hoffman. For more information, please visit www.labtheater.org.

2006-07 SEASON

 

To Be Announced

By WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE / Directed by James Lapine / Fall
Featuring Kevin Kline
America's leading Shakespearean actor Kevin Kline returns to The Public in a new production of one of Shakespeare's greatest epics, directed by Tony Award-winning director James Lapine.

 

WRECKS

Written and directed by NEIL LABUTE / October

Featuring Ed Harris

U.S. PREMIERE

First produced at Everyman Palace Theatre in Cork, Ireland.

 

Two of Americas most exciting artists team up to create a theatrical tour de force in this new solo work. In true LaBute fashion, this new play promises to thrill, surprise and challenge your assumptions about love, family and marriage.

 

DURANGO

Written by JULIA CHO / Directed by CHAY YEW / November
WORLD PREMIERE

 

Single father Boo-Seng decides it's time for a family road trip to Durango, Colorado. As he and his two teenage sons get closer to their destination, secrets are revealed that intensify the sons' struggle with growing up in the shadow of their father, who left Korea to pursue the American Dream. From the award-winning playwright who brought you BFE, Durango is new American drama at its best. A co-production with the Long Wharf Theatre.

 

EMERGENCE-SEE!

Written and performed by DANIEL BEATY / November
NEW YORK PREMIERE

 

In 2006, a slave ship rises out of the Hudson River in front of the Statue of Liberty, sending New York into a whirlwind of emotion. Through slam poetry and song, award-winning actor/singer and writer/composer Daniel Beaty portrays a multitude of characters whose responses to the slave ship reflect on issues of identity and personal freedom. This explosive one-man play presents a stirring commentary on modern black life.

 

PASSING STRANGE

Book and lyrics by STEW / Music by STEW & HEIDI RODEWALD / Directed and created in collaboration with ANNIE DORSEN / January
WORLD PREMIERE

From Los Angeles to Amsterdam to Berlin and back, Passing Strange takes musical theater on a whole new trip. From singer-songwriter and performance artist Stew comes Passing Strange, a daring new musical that takes you on a journey across boundaries of place, identity, and theatrical convention. Stew, a popular performer at Joe's Pub, was commissioned by The Public to develop this moving and hilarious Story of a young black bohemian in search of self and home who charts a course for "the real" through sex, drugs, and rock and roll. Passing Strange is a co-production with Berkeley Repertory Theatre.
THE SINGINGFOREST

By Craig Lucas / Directed by Bartlett Sher
NEW YORK PREMIERE / Spring

 

The writer who brought us The Light in the Piazza, Reckless and Prelude to a Kiss now interrogates how history collides with the human heart in the aftermath of the Holocaust. The Singing Forest takes you on a passage through time — from today's world of Starbucks, celebrity and therapy to Freud's inner circle in 1930s Vienna and to Paris at the end of WWII. It's the story of three generations of a family whose lives are intertwined despite the secrets that have torn them apart.

365 DAYS / 365 PLAYS

By SUZAN-LORI PARKS
NEW YORK PREMIERE

 

In November 2002, the Pulitzer prize-winning Suzan-Lori Parks sat down and committed to writing a play a day for the next 365 days. For the 2006-07 Season, The Public will produce the New York premiere of these works by gathering together a widely diverse cross-section of New York's theater companies to participate in this project. Over the course of one year, the selected theaters - curated by The Public, Suzan-Lori Parks and Producer Bonnie Metzger - will perform these brief, brilliant snapshots from the imagination of one of America's leading playwrights. This will be part of a yearlong national festival of the play cycle that will take place in major cities around the country including Atlanta, Los Angeles and Denver. Tickets at The Public will be FREE.

 

 

Founded by Joseph Papp as the Shakespeare Workshop and now one of the nation's preeminent institutions, The Public is an American theater in which all the country's voices, rhythms, converge. Under the leadership of Artistic Director Oskar Eustis and Executive Director Mara Public's mandate to create a theater for all New Yorkers continues to this day on stage and extensive outreach and education programs. Over 250,000 people annually attend Public Theater events at its six downtown stages including Joe's Pub, and at Shakespeare in the Park.