BWW Previews: KANSAS CITY REPERTORY THEATRE at Posinelli Conference Center

Kansas City, MO-Kansas City Repertory Theatre on Monday evening announced the 2019/2020 prospective season in front of a packed Posinelli Conference Center audience including members of the news media. Executive Director Angela Gieras, Interim Artistic Director Jason Chanos, and Assistant Artistic Director Kim Martin- Cotton announced the plays and musicals slated for the new season beginning in September 2019 at the Spencer Theatre on the UMKC campus and at the Copaken Stage downtown.

"Over the last six months, I've had the honor of helming the 2019/2020 season planning process with our passionate and conscientious artistic and administrative teams. Our commitment to excellence, and to our beloved Kansas City patrons, has been second to none. I am proud and excited to present a season that reflects that commitment with offering a balance of modern classics viewed through a fresh new lens, the intense and daring storytelling of our New Works Festival, and a much-needed escape from our day-to-day lives with both a brilliant comedy and a Tony Award winner for Best Musical. I feel confident that this season honors our founder Dr. Patricia McIlrath by supporting our celebrated authors with great female directors, a special commitment to our UMKC partners, and our talented pool of Kansas City artists," said Jason Chanos, Interim Artistic Director.

The selected productions included in KCRep's diverse 2019/20 season range from reimagined classics and a Tony winner for Best Musical to an exciting world premiere and a family holiday tradition. Ambitious and satisfying, the 2019/20 season offers great stories from great storytellers to Kansas City audiences.

CAT ON A HOT TIN ROOF
By Tennessee Williams
Directed by Lisa Rothe

SEP 6 - 29, 2019 | SPENCER THEATRE

One of the most powerful plays of our time written by one of the giants of American theatre! A southern family celebrates the 65th birthday of their patriarch, but the mood is somber and strange because of the secrets among the gatherers. Brimming with intensity and wit, this treasured work features motifs such as social mores, greed, superficiality, decay, desire, repression, and death. Filled with everything you'd ever want in a truly great play - conflict, complications, suspense, climax, and a stunning conclusion.

FOR COLORED GIRLS WHO HAVE CONSIDERED SUICIDE / WHEN THE RAINBOW IS ENUF

By Ntozake Shange

OCT 18 - NOV 10, 2019 | COPAKEN STAGE

At a time when there were almost no stories about women of color, poet, activist, novelist, and playwright, Shange penned a play that has become a seminal and treasured work of American theatre. Seven African American women, each identified solely by a color, traverse class, gender, sexuality, and geography in this intensely personal

"choreo-poem" that weaves spoken word and dance. Only the second play by a black woman to be produced on Broadway, it won Obie and Tony Awards and has been mounted on university campuses in every state in the U.S.

A CHRISTMAS CAROL

By Charles Dickens
Directed by Jason Chanos

NOV 22 - DEC 29, 2019 | SPENCER THEATRE

For the 39th year, KCRep is pleased to announce the return of its special holiday event for children, adults, and patrons from every background! Ebenezer Scrooge, a miserly, cold-hearted creditor, continues his stingy ways, even on Christmas Eve. He rejects a dinner invitation from his nephew, Fred; he yells at charity workers; and overworks his earnest employee, Bob Cratchit. Later that evening he is visited one-by-one by the ghost of his dead partner, Jacob Marley and the ghosts of Christmas Past, Present, and Yet to Come, who show him the errors of his ways until he ultimately discovers what's really worth celebrating in his life.

FUN HOME

Book and Lyrics by Lisa Kron: Music by Jeanine Tesori
Based on the Graphic Novel by Alison Bechdel

JAN 24 - FEB 16, 2020 | SPENCER THEATRE

When her father dies unexpectedly, graphic novelist Alison dives deep into her past to tell the story of the volatile, brilliant, man whose temperament and secrets defined her family and life. Moving between past and present, Alison is introduced to us at three different ages as she relives her unique upbringing at the family's funeral home, her growing understanding of her own sexuality, and the looming questions surrounding her father's hidden past. Winner of the 2015 Tony Award for Best Musical, few shows are more honest, relatable, and funny.

OriginKC: NEW WORKS FESTIVAL
Two productions run in repertory; please visit kcrep.org for specific times and dates

MAR 6 - APR 5, 2020 | COPAKEN STAGE

FRANKENSTEIN - A World Premiere
By Kyle Hatley

A storyteller, accompanied by a live musician, unravels Mary Shelley's iconic 200-year-old science fiction tale as a haunting and heartbreaking cautionary tale like none other. That this tale is as important today as it was then, speaks to the human condition. "We tell stories because they teach us we're not alone in our misery, or our fear - or in our joy. And while this story is fictional, it comes from a place of real pain, real loneliness, and real confusion over what it means to be alive."

LEGACY LAND
By Stacey Rose

Barbara is a 42-year-old recluse who has hunkered down for an intimate weekend with her barely-legal lover, Marcus during a freak Thanksgiving weekend blizzard. When Barbara's bubbly younger sister, Denise, and her loutish fiancé, Freddie arrive, all bets are off. As the storm renders them immobile, the group reconciles themselves to their situation until Freddie, in his arrogance, reveals the real reason for his and Denise's visit and the sisters are forced to grapple with the painful legacy of their dysfunctional family.

NOISES OFF
By Michael Frayn

MAR 27 - APR 19 | SPENCER THEATRE

It is only hours before the opening of a new British farce, and the company is hurriedly running through a final dress rehearsal before the first audience arrives. This play-within-a-play captures a theatre troupe's production in three stages: dress rehearsal, the opening night performance, and a performance towards the end of a less than stellar run. Frayn's hysterical, precision-timed inner workings looks at flubbed lines, missed cues, slamming doors, falling trousers, ever-mounting comedy, and of course - flying sardines!

KCRep's 2019/2020 season is underwritten by ArtsKC, Copaken Family Fund, Hall Family Foundation, Hallmark Corporate Foundation, Muriel McBrien Kauffman Foundation, Shubert Foundation, UMKC, and the Missouri Arts Council, a state agency, whose gift is supported in part by an award from the National Endowment for the Arts.

Current Subscribers may renew their tickets now by visiting kcrep.org/renew or by calling the box office at 816-235-2700. First-time subscribers may sign up for the 2019/20 season starting on March 18, 2019.

KCRep is nationally known as an incubator of new plays and producer of innovative musicals and reimagined classics. Together with an active board of directors, a year-round, part-time, and seasonal staff of 210, and over 300 volunteers, KCRep serves patrons from more than 40 states on their two stages, the Spencer Theatre and Copaken Stage in downtown Kansas City. More than 12,000 school students and educators see live theatre productions at KCRep annually, many of whom are experiencing the genre for the first time. The company dedicates itself to producing works which are compelling, passionate, and entertaining. Visit www.kcrep.org.

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Photos by Alan Portner