Huntington Theatre Company Extends Pulitzer Prize-Winning Play SWEAT

Huntington Theatre Company has announced the extension of the Boston premiere of the Pulitzer Prize-winning drama Sweat. Due to high ticket SWEAT will now run at the Huntington Avenue Theatre (264 Huntington Avenue, Boston) from Friday, January 31, 2020 through Sunday, March 1, 2020.

Five new performances have been added; the dates are Thursday, February 27 at 7:30pm; Friday, February 28 at 8pm; Saturday February 29 at 2pm and 8pm; and Sunday, March 1 at 2pm.

Hailed as "a gripping play with humor and humanity" by Time Out New York, Sweat is based on playwright Lynn Nottage's interviews with residents of Reading, Pennsylvania. The play chronicles years in the lives of a group of friends from this working-class community who are struggling to stay connected as the local factory industry, which has employed them for generations, crumbles. In a neighborhood bar, each of them reaches for their piece of the American dream while their friendships are put to the test. Nottage weaves a tale of trust and doubt, longtime bonds and short-term possibilities. The New York Times raves "Superb...Nottage is writing at the peak of her powers."

Sweat was first performed at the Oregon Shakespeare Festival in 2015, the following year it opened Off-Broadway at The Public Theater and transferred to Broadway at the beginning of 2017. After a run on Broadway, numerous regional productions throughout the United States and a stop at London's West End, Sweat comes to Boston in this moving and urgently relevant new production. Kimberly Senior (The Niceties and the upcoming, Our Daughters Like Pillars at the Huntington) takes the reigns of this play that The New Yorker designated "the first theatrical landmark of the Trump era" at the beginning of what could be our nation's most important presidential election year in history.

As previously announced, the cast of Sweat features (in alphabetical order) Tyla Abercrumbie (Magnolia at The Goodman Theatre, Showtime's "The Chi") as Cynthia, Norton Award winner Marianna Bassham (Yerma and Romeo and Juliet at the Huntington) as Jessie, Norton Award winner Brandon G. Green (An Octoroon at Company One, The Scottsboro Boys at SpeakEasy Stage Company) as Chris, Shane Kenyon (Buzzer at The Goodman Theatre, Hushabye at Steppenwolf Theatre Company) as Jason, Norton Award winner Maurice Emmanuel Parent (Romeo and Juliet, Skeleton Crew at the Huntington) as Evan, Jennifer Regan (Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf on Broadway, How I Learned to Drive at Second Stage Theatre) as Tracey, Tommy Rivera-Vega (A View from the Bridge at Teatro Vista, Three Sisters at Steppenwolf Theatre Company) as Oscar and Guy Van Swearingen (The Time of Your Life and Taking Care at Steppenwolf Theatre Company) as Stan. Actor Alvin Keith (Cat on a Hot Tin Roof on Broadway, Novenas for a Lost Hospital at Rattlestick Playwrights Theater) joins the cast as Brucie.

The creative team for Sweat includes set design by Cameron Anderson (Yerma and The Niceties at the Huntington), costume design by Junghyun Georgia Lee (Tiger Style!, Smart People at the Huntington), lighting design by D.M. Wood (The Niceties at the Huntington, 4.48 Psychosis at the Royal Opera House), fight direction by Ted Hewlett (Quixote Nuevo and Yerma at the Huntington), and sound design and composition by Pornchanok Kanchanabanca (Skylight at the McCarter Theater, The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time at Steppenwolf Theatre Company). The production stage manager is Emily F. McMullen and stage manager is Kelsy Durkin and Sam Layco.

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