Long Beach Shakespeare Company Unveils 2025 NEW WORKS FESTIVAL

This May, June and October, the Long Beach Shakespeare Company will present its 2025 New Works Festival-a vibrant showcase of fresh voices, untamed imagination, and theatrical reinvention.

Held at the intimate Helen Borgers Theatre and produced by Holly Leveque, the festival invites audiences into an eclectic tapestry of world premieres and spirited stagings, where up-and-coming playwrights, musicians, and performers breathe new life into the stage.

The festival opens May 10 with Student Shakespeare Shorts, a curated reading of three original one-acts written, directed, and performed by local college students. From a classroom satire that deconstructs the lyrics of "Stacy's Mom" (Film Study by Zachary Scrima) to the metaphysical limbo of Stage Exit by Grady Monroe, and a stirring hospice-room drama (Ripples on a Blank Shore by Stryder Larsen), these shorts reveal the depth, wit, and wonder of a new generation.

On May 16 and 17, acclaimed author Deanne Stillman (Twentynine Palms) returns to the stage with On Such a Winter's Day, a poignant holiday mosaic that captures the fragile poetry of life in California. Directed by Dana Schwartz, the piece weaves the ordinary and the extraordinary with meditative grace.

The momentum builds May 17-18 with Ever Will, an original musical by Pamela Gilbreath Kelly that imagines Shakespeare in twilight-retired, restless, and reckoning with ghosts of characters and regrets. Also on the weekend bill: a double feature of sharp new comedies. In Dairy Girls by Julianne Holmquist, sisterhood and mischief collide in a historical romp, while Coming & Going by Jaymie Bellous offers a buoyant, queer-affirming romantic comedy steeped in drag and miscommunication.

The following weekend brings noir flair and narrative invention. The Department (May 23-25), a throwback radio drama by Chris Bucca Taylor, channels 1940s mystery with live sound effects and a vintage sensibility. Alongside it, two staged readings promise thrills and twists: The Tomb by Darren Nash, a chilling tale of children trapped in an otherworldly underground, and Double Barreled by Glenn Kelman, where Sherlock Holmes finds himself sleuthing across the American West.

The festival concludes in June with a final flourish of theatrical ambition. Steve Treuting's The Apollo Waltz (June 21-22) delves into literary legacy and familial estrangement, paired with Chris Callard's Death Takes a Vacation, a surreal comedy in which the Grim Reaper overstays his welcome as a houseguest. Other June highlights include Charissa J. Adams's Speak I Will, a provocative reframing of Shakespearean text through a gender-conscious lens (June 20 & 22), and The Lives to Come (June 21-22), a futuristic romance by Darren Nash that mixes biotech and betrayal. The festival concludes this fall with The Life and Undeath of Lucy Westenra (Oct. 5,29-31): Cara Sanchez's gothic, psychological reimagining of Dracula, directed by Teddy Pagee.

Whether it's radio drama or speculative sci-fi, poignant memoir or poetic comedy, LBSC's New Works Festival celebrates storytelling in all its theatrical forms. Each performance affirms the company's dedication to innovation, inclusion, and imagination-hallmarks of its enduring mission.

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