Michael John LaChiusa to Adapt Musical Version of Martyna Majok's COST OF LIVING

Williamstown Theatre Festival recently celebrated the playwright Martyna Majok. Majok's play Cost of Living won the 2018 Pulitzer Prize for Drama and the 2018 Lucille Lortel Award for Outstanding Play. Cost of Living had its world premiere at Williamstown Theatre Festival in 2016 and enjoyed an acclaimed run at Manhattan Theatre Club in 2017.

Michael John LaChiusa will create a musical adaptation of Cost of Living under the auspices of Williamstown Theatre Festival's Andrew Martin-Weber New Play & Musical Commissioning Program, with special funding from The Ted & Mary Jo Shen Charitable Gift Fund. LaChiusa, an American musical theatre and opera composer, lyricist and librettist, is best known for his score and book of Marie Christine and The Wild Party, receiving four Tony Award nominations in 2000 between the two productions. He also received a Tony nomination in 1996 for his work on Chronicle of a Death Foretold. LaChiusa's first season at Williamstown Theatre Festival was in 1997 as composer and lyricist for Broken Sleep: Three Plays, and he returned in 2004 as playwright of R Shomon, directed by Ted Sperling and featuring Audra McDonald.

Danny Mefford will join LaChiusa in the development of this new musical, based on the Pulitzer Prize-winning drama. Mefford's choreography credits on Broadway include Dear Evan Hansen in 2016, Fun Home in 2015 and Bloody Bloody Andrew Jackson in 2010. Mefford was also movement director for The Bridges of Madison County in 2014, which had its world premiere at Williamstown Theatre Festival in 2013.

Established in 2015, Williamstown Theatre Festival's Andrew Martin-Weber New Play and Musical Commissioning Program annually commissions and develops three to six projects from playwrights, composers, and other generative artists from across the career spectrum. Each commission includes at least one writing residency at the Festival. Commission recipients include Aziza Barnes, Big Dance Theater, Jocelyn Bioh, Fernanda Coppel, Nathan Alan Davis, Halley Feiffer, Meghan Kennedy, Sylvia Khoury, Michael John LaChiusa, Justin Levine, Matthew Lopez, Marsha Norman, Jiehae Park, Max Posner, Heather Raffo, Sharyn Rothstein, Zoe Sarnak, Benjamin Scheuer, Lucy Thurber, and Bess Wohl. The Andrew Martin-Weber New Play and Musical Commissioning Program is made possible by generous support from James & Virginia Giddens, The Ted & Mary Jo Shen Charitable Gift Fund, The Harold and Mimi Steinberg Charitable Trust, and Andrew Martin-Weber.

Photo Credit: Walter McBride / WM Photos