MTC Announces Writers in Performance Series

MANHATTAN THEATRE CLUB (Lynne Meadow, Artistic Director; Barry Grove, Executive Producer) has announced the lineup for the 35th anniversary season of its famed "WRITERS IN PERFORMANCE" (WIP) literary series. Under the direction of Steve Lawson, WIP's eclectic five-event program will celebrate the best in drama, literature and song with tributes to Tennessee Williams, Kurt Weill, Cervantes' Don Quixote, George S. Kaufman and an appearance by opera great (and first-time author) Renee Fleming. All events take place at 8pm on MTC's Stages I at City Center, 131 West 55th Street.

Monday, March 21: BLANCHE AND BEYOND

"The Selected Letters of Tennessee Williams: Vol. II: 1945- 1957" Richard Thomas interprets the letters - edited by Albert J. Devlin, co-edited by Nancy M. Tischler - that Tennessee Williams wrote to friends, family, lovers, and fellow artists during a period of intense creativity and self-doubt (A Streetcar Named Desire, The Rose Tattoo, Camino Real, Cat on a Hot Tin Roof). Success on Broadway and in Hollywood coupled with deepening anxiety about the high cost of celebrity made this period an emotional and artistic roller coaster for Williams. Adapted and directed by Steve Lawson, "Blanche and Beyond" is the sequel to 2001's "A Distant Country Called Youth," which focused on Tennessee's earliest letters and after its WIP premiere went on to play at Hartford Stage, Williamstown, the Goodman Theater, and the Kennedy Center. The acting edition of "Distant Country" will be published by Samuel French this spring. Both evenings are presented through special arrangement with The University of the South, Sewanee, Tennessee.

Monday, March 28: "KURT WEILL: A Life in Pictures and Documents"

Showcasing this nighly-praised book by David Farneth, Elmar Juchem, and Dave Stein, WIP celebrates the musical career of the extraordinary composer Kurt Weill. The first lavishly illustrated document of Weill's complete work ever published, "Kurt Weill: A Life in Pictures and Documents" highlights the composer through photos and his own words, ranging from a German-Jewish heritage through legendary relationships with Bertolt Brecht and Lotte Lenya to later experiments with the "concept musical" on the American stage.

Monday, April 4: THE DON: "Don Quixote" AT 400

WIP honors Cervantes' masterpiece in its 400th anniversary year. Widely regarded as the world's first modern novel, "Don Quixote" chronicles the picaresque adventures of the knight-errant Don Quixote and his faithful squire Sancho Panza as they travel through Spain "tilting at windmills." Interpreted by actors Mario Cantone and Daphne Rubin-Vega, among others, with a live score by Julie Lyonn Lieberman, this theatrical salute to a landmark will be introduced by acclaimed "Don Quixote" translator Edith Grossman.

Monday, April 18: Renee Fleming: "The Inner Voice"

One of the most celebrated voices of our time (described by critics as "the gold standard of soprano sound"), singer Renee Fleming comes to WIP to talk about her remarkable autobiography. In The Inner Voice: The Making of a Singer, Fleming offers a refreshingly candid, behind-the-scenes look at the complex life of an opera singer - from the early struggles of her career to the selection of roles and the artistic and commercial pressures of the trade. This will be an insightful, personal discussion with a luminous artist.

Monday, April 25: "KAUFMAN & CO."

An hommage to George S. Kaufman. As co-author of such classic plays as The Man Who Came to Dinner, the Pulitzer Prize-winning You Can't Take it With You, Animal Crackers and The Royal Family, no other comic dramatist enjoyed more success or was happier in his choice of collaborators - among them George and Ira Gershwin, Ring Lardner, Moss Hart, and Edna Ferber. The playwright's daughter Anne Kaufman Schneider and Laurence Maslon, editor of the new Library of America edition, will be joined by actors performing scenes and songs from the plays.

Steve Lawson, returning for his sixth season as director of "Writers in Performance," is also Executive Director of the Williamstown Film Festival. Lawson has been a journalist, playwright, and dramaturg and received the Christopher Award and Emmy and Humanitas Prize nominations for his work in television.

One of the most prominent and innovative literary series in New York, Manhattan Theatre Club's Writers in Performance series - now launching its 35th anniversary season -- is dedicated to melding fiction, non-fiction and poetry with the stage in creative and provocative ways. Writers who have been represented include Eric Bogosian, T.S. Eliot, F. Scott Fitzgerald, Jonathan Franzen, Toni Morrison, Arthur Rimbaud, Flannery O'Connor and Oscar Wilde, while performers have included Alec Baldwin, Gabriel Byrne, Blythe Danner, Rosemary Harris, Campbell Scott, Frances McDormand, and Sam Shepard.

Individual tickets are $17.50, with the entire five-event series at a discounted $75. For tickets and more information, call Manhattan Theatre Club at 212/399-3030.