Baltimore's Everyman Theatre Announces 30th Anniversary Season

Everyman Theatre Founding Artistic Director, Vincent M. Lancisi announced today, the schedule today for the 30th Anniversary, 2020/2021 season at the Baltimore-based regional theatre. The landmark season will offer patrons full flexibility to participate at their own comfort level with both in-person, at-home, and combination options available throughout the year.

According to Lancisi,"This season is like no other, of course, but we've decided to embrace those challenges and meet our patrons where they feel the most safe and reassured that their experience at Everyman will be both welcoming and thoughtful. Being our 30th anniversary, it was important to me that we produce six dynamic stories from a wide range of authors and perspectives, that are worthy of such an epic milestone, while offering more access than ever before through the mix of live and digital experiences. Most importantly, these performances had to showcase our amazing Resident Company of artists who are at the center of the art we make at Everyman. We cannot wait to invite audiences back through our doors where we can celebrate the power and community that is so unique to theatre, whether it be here on Fayette Street, or in the comfort of our patrons' homes."

While exact run dates will not be announced until artists, staff, and patrons can safely return to the theatre, the plan is to begin in-person performances in November with a one-person show, then continue through early August, 2021. The season will include six mainstage productions and six additional digital experiences (6-Pack@Home) that will be a mix of radio plays, staged readings, and a special musical event. The season will also include a Salon Series of staged readings which will be announced at a separate date. If patrons do not feel comfortable returning to in-person performances, all mainstage productions will be available to view online through our Everyman@Home series.

According to Managing Director Marissa LaRose, "This year has tested us as individuals, as a business, and as an artform. We have planned for months what our return might look like and while we cannot predict exactly when it will ultimately be, we are committed to sharing stories with Baltimore as soon as we safely can. It will be a season of flexibility, adaptability, and perseverance, and I could not be prouder of the effort that's been made by our staff, Board, and Resident Company of artists to make it all happen."

As part of the Everyman@Home slate of offerings, Lancisi will also host a FREE, lunchtime interview series, The Kitchen Table, featuring Resident Company members and guest artists in 30-minute chats with the Founding Artistic Director. The first one is scheduled for Thursday, September 24 and features a conversation with Everyman's two Associate Artistic Directors, Paige Hernandez and Noah Himmelstein. Additionally, on five consecutive Wednesday evenings leading up to Halloween starting on September 23, Resident Company member Danny Gavigan has produced and will host a brand-new audio series called Resident Ghost Company, with details to follow in the coming weeks.

The mainstage season begins where Everyman left off last season, with Caleen Sinnette Jennings's QUEENS GIRL: BLACK IN THE GREEN MOUNTAINS. This third installment of the award-winning Queens Girl series stars Everyman's newest Resident Company member, Felicia Curry in a powerful one-woman tour de force. As the Vietnam War rages and the Kent State killings ignite college campuses across the country, Jackie arrives in Vermont to begin college. Caught between wildly divergent sets of friends - wealthy WASPS, militant Black activists, and passionate theatre people-Jackie is forced to confront the space between white and Black culture to find her place in the world. Taking the helm as director is Everyman's newly-appointed Associate Artistic Director, Paige Hernandez.

Next up is CRY IT OUT, written by Molly Smith Metzler and directed by Lancisi. Midnight feedings, dirty diapers, and other hazards of motherhood are enough to give anyone sleepless nights. This no-holds-barred modern comedy from the award-winning writer of Casual (Hulu), Orange Is the New Black (Netflix), Codes of Conduct (HBO), and Shameless (Showtime -writer/producer), holds a magnifying glass and megaphone to the joys and perils facing new parents today, and how class and judgment about and from others plays a big role in how we navigate the world.

BERTA, BERTA, written by Angelica Chéri and directed by Reginald L. Douglas is next in the season lineup. It's 1920s Mississippi and Leroy has returned to the doorstep of his long-lost lover covered in blood. With his freedom in the balance, the clock is ticking to make amends. As their quarrelsome beginning transforms into an impassioned consummation of their love, can the inevitability of his fate be averted? A hit from the 2018 Contemporary American Theatre Festival, this captivating fable is an intimate yet epic love story for the ages.

With the spring comes the fourth production from MacArthur Fellowship recipient Dominique Morisseau. In the riveting play, PIPELINE, a mother's hopes for her son clash with an educational system that's rigged against him. Nya, an inner-city high school teacher, is desperate to give her only son opportunities he'll never have. With profound compassion and lyricism, this play delves into urgent issues around class, race, parenting, and education in America today, leaving audiences to question the structures that continue to trap young men of color.

Up next at Everyman is Kate Hamill's lauded adaptation of Jane Austen's beloved novel, SENSE and SENSIBILITY. Told through a uniquely bold female lens, this playful adaptation is at once hilarious and heartbreaking. It follows the fortunes (and misfortunes) of the Dashwood sisters-sensible Elinor and hypersensitive Marianne-after their father's sudden death leaves them penniless and socially vulnerable. When reputation is everything, how do you follow your heart?

Rounding out the mainstage season is STEEL MAGNOLIAS by Robert Harling. In a beauty parlor in northern Louisiana, life is anything but boring. This heartwarming and uproarious story follows six culturally distinct Southern women over the course of three years as they gather to gossip and share each other's lives with wit, warmth, and intelligence. Steel Magnolias celebrates the power of female friendship through the highest highs and the lowest lows. The play received a Drama Desk Award nomination, and the perennially popular film adaptation was nominated for an Academy Award and two Golden Globes.

Everyman Theatre's department of Education and Community Engagement also offers seasonal classes and other opportunities for people of all ages -- 3 to 93 -- to discover their inner creativity. Through dynamic classes the imagination is excited, artistic expression is elicited, and theatrical skills are deepened. Live events, innovative digital content, and programs that ensure space for the whole family are all part of the offerings, all season long.

The 2020/21 reimagined season at Everyman Theatre is sponsored by P. Flanigan & Sons and supported in part by The Maryland State Arts Council (msac.org), The Baltimore County Commission on the Arts and Sciences and the Citizens of Baltimore County, Mayor Jack Young and the Baltimore Office of Promotion and the Arts. Individual production and programming sponsors include University of Maryland, Baltimore, Lee and Bea Robbins, National Endowment for the Arts, John and Marsha Ramsay for Queens Girl: Black in the Green Mountains; University of Maryland, Baltimore, Lee and Bea Robbins, Sandy and Mark Laken for Berta, Berta; University of Maryland, Baltimore, Lee and Bea Robbins, Susan W. Flanigan for Cry It Out; and the University of Maryland, Baltimore for Pipeline. Everyman@Home - the all-digital series - is supported by the Galanthus Foundation and the Salon Series is supported by The UMBrella Group and the Galanthus Foundation.

For more information on the 30th Anniversary, 2020/21 season, the organization's COVID safety plan, or our Education and Community classes and events, visit Everyman Theatre at: everymantheatre.org