THE PIANO LESSON, MUCH ADO ABOUT NOTHING Among Juilliard Drama's 2026-27 Season
THE MOORS and THE LEARNED LADIES round out the season at The Juilliard School.
The Juilliard School's Drama Division has announced its fourth-year productions for the 2026–27 performance season. Actors in their final year of study are featured in four productions, including works written or directed by Juilliard Drama alumni.
The season opens with August Wilson's Pulitzer Prize-winning The Piano Lesson directed by alum LisaGay Hamilton (Group 18), October 7–10. An award-winning actor and director, Hamilton appeared in the original Broadway companies of Wilson's The Piano Lesson and Gem of the Ocean. November 11–16, Gaye Taylor Upchurch directs Jen Silverman's The Moors. Silverman, a three-time MacDowell Fellow and two-time Blackburn Prize finalist, received an Artist Diploma in playwriting from Juilliard in 2015. Molière's The Learned Ladies, translated by Richard Wilbur and directed by Jackson Gay, will run December 11–14.
Fourth-year students conclude their performance season with Shakespeare's Much Ado About Nothing February 18–22. Alum Craig Baldwin (Group 31), who recently adapted and directed Red Bull Theater's Richard II, returns to Juilliard to direct.
Tickets for all performances are on sale at Juilliard.edu.
August Wilson's The Piano Lesson
Directed by LisaGay Hamilton (Group 18)
October 7–10, 2026
In the midst of the Great Depression, Boy Willie arrives in Pittsburgh with a truck filled with watermelons, a dream of buying his own land, and a complicated relationship with the past. As he battles his sister, Berniece, over the sale of their inherited piano, old traumas resurface. In August Wilson's own words, The Piano Lesson asks: “Can you acquire a sense of self-worth by denying your past?”
The Moors by Jen Silverman (Playwrights '15)
Directed by Gaye Taylor Upchurch
November 12–16, 2026
In an ancient mansion on the savage English moors, Agatha crochets while her sister, Huldey, hopes for fame. A mastiff searches for God, and the scullery maid watches it all unfold. When a new governess arrives from London to care for the young master of the house, matters spiral out of control. Jen Silverman's The Moors is a gothic comedy about power, longing, and how we fill our days.
The Learned Ladies by Molière
Translated by Richard Wilbur
Directed by Jackson Gay
December 11–15, 2026
Molière's penultimate play satirizes literary pretension and pseudo-intellectualism as a family argues over who should win the youngest daughter's hand. The Learned Ladies is a rollicking comedy about the struggle between head and heart.
Much Ado About Nothing by William Shakespeare
Directed by Craig Baldwin (Group 31)
February 18–22, 2027
Fresh from battle, celebrated soldier Claudio has his sights set on Hero, the governor's daughter. Meanwhile, the self-proclaimed bachelor Benedick and Hero's cousin Beatrice engage in their longstanding war of wits while those around them conspire to bring the two together. When a plot by the prince's half-brother threatens these connections, love and loyalty are put to the test in Shakespeare's enduring romantic comedy.
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