DEEP BLUE SOUND Regional Premiere is Coming to Harbinger Theatre

Harbinger Theatre will present their 18th production and 17th Capital Region Premiere with Deep Blue Sound by Abe Koogler, directed by Chris Foster. The play is another scheduling coup for Harbinger, securing the rights to the off-Broadway hit which recently had an extended run at The Public Theatre in April of this year. Performances will be held at the Steamer No. 10 Theatre in Albany from September 12th to the 21st. Steamer 10 is the seventh different venue that Harbinger has performed in since their debut with The Christians at Albany Barn in December of 2021.

“Deep Blue Sound is a portrait of a community in transition. People are dying, jobs are lost and the whales have disappeared. Everyone in the play must face themselves and life as it is and try to grab on to a connection to help them make it through,” director Chris Foster said. Foster has directed The Agony and the Agony, Mrs. Packard, Maggie May, and At The Wedding for Harbinger.

On a picturesque island in Puget Sound, we find a town in a crisis: The whales have gone missing. While (unofficial) Mayor Annie searches for a solution, Chris tries to get back together with Mary; John reaches out to help Homeless Gary; Leslie longs for a faraway pen pal; Ali has come home to care for her mother; and Ella has a secret she only wants to share with local journalist Joy Mead, who she barely knows. But what about the whales? Is their absence just a seasonal glitch, or is it a sign of our collective failure to take care of the Earth? Deep Blue Sound is a funny and moving play about the connections we make—and the ones we long to make—to other people, and to the world around us. Friendships fray, tumors grow, new love blooms, wood is chopped, poems are written. The seasons change. Will the whales ever return?

“The play was riddled with disquieting and eerie moments…All of these moments, even ones with little on-stage resolution, compounded the unsettling feeling of the audience as both they and the characters in the play reckoned with the state of the world amidst a warming climate with the power to change the familiar forever,” Frankie DeGiorgio from BWOG said. “And in such a destabilizing global time, Deep Blue Sound argues that there is no better thing to do than turn to each other, to accept help when you need it, to find comfort in the people that love you, and to try to be better for those you love.”

Maryann Plunkett received an Obie Award for her performance as Ella in the Clubbed Thumb production of the play in 2023. The Obie Award committee called the play “devastatingly beautiful.”

Harbinger is thrilled that six of the actors are new to Harbinger: Carol Charniga, Jessica Córdova, Christine Kenefick, Tony Pallone, Joyce Reynolds & Quinn Solace. Harbinger is delighted to welcome back three actors who have been essential to the company's artistic growth: Kathleen Carey (Hurricane Diane, Mrs. Packard), J. Scala (Mrs. Packard), and getting his “5 Timer Jacket”, Dennis Skiba (The Christians, Exit Strategy, The Agony and the Agony, The Squirrels).

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