Milwaukee Rep Announces First Round of Casting, Creative Teams for 2015-16 Season

Milwaukee Repertory Theater announces directors, creative teams, and initial casting for 2015/16, a season featuring a Tony Award-winning musical, a play by the Pulitzer Prize-winning Milwaukee playwright Ayad Akthar, and three world premieres.

The slate of directors selected for the 2015/16 Season includes several returning accomplished directors including Artistic Director Mark Clements, Randal Myler, Jeffrey Herbst, J.R. Sullivan, and Kevin Ramsey, Artistic Associate JC Clementz, as well as directors Sean Daniels, Lucie Tiberghien, and Lou Bellamy, all making their Milwaukee Rep directing debuts.

Directors, Creative Teams, and initial casting for The Rep's 2015/16 Season includes:

Back Home Again: On the Road with John Denver

September 11 - November 8, 2015 · Stackner Cabaret

Directed and co-created by Randal Myler, Back Home Again: On the Road with John Denver, is a world premiere which celebrates the folk musician John Denver's life and music. Myler returns to The Rep after directing the critically-acclaimed production Low Down Dirty Blues, currently running in the Stackner through May 24, 2015. Performer David M. Lutken, last seen at The Rep in the hit show Woody Sez: The Life and Music of Woody Guthrie (2014/15), is featured in this production.

The Creative Team includes: Vicki Smith (Scenic Designer); Lyndsey Kuhlmann (Costume Designer); Don Darnutzer (Lighting Designer); Megan B. Henninger (Sound Designer); and Artistic Associate JC Clementz (Casting Director), who is also the Casting Director for all other productions listed below for The Rep's 2015/16 Season.

Dreamgirls

September 22 - November 1, 2015 · Quadracci Powerhouse

Artistic Director Mark Clements will direct the ground-breaking and Tony Award-winning musical Dreamgirls. Helen Hayes Award winner Nova Y. Payton will play the role of Effie White.

The Creative Team includes: Associate Artist Dan Kazemi (Musical Director); Tony nominated and Olivier Award winner Stephen Mear (Choreographer); Associate Artist Todd Edward Ivins (Scenic Designer); Alexander B. Tecoma (Costume Designer); Thomas C. Hase (Lighting Designer); Barry G. Funderburg (Sound Designer); Associate Artist John Tanner (Music Supervisor); and Jamie Cheatham (Fight Choreographer).

The Lion

September 30 - November 8, 2015 · Stiemke Studio

Sean Daniels will direct his international musical hit, The Lion, which he created with writer and star of the show Benjamin Scheuer, the recipient of the 2014 Off West End Award for Best Musical, the 2013 ASCAP Foundation Cole Porter Award for songwriting, and the 2013 Musical Theatre Network Award for Best Lyrics. Daniels was the co-founding Artistic Director of Dad's Garage Theatre. He was an Associate Artistic Director at California Shakespeare Theatre, Actors Theatre of Louisville, and Geva Theatre and is the newly appointed Artistic Director of Merrimack Repertory Theatre near Boston.

Guys on Ice

November 13, 2015 - January 17, 2016 · Stackner Cabaret

Jeffrey Herbst returns to The Rep to direct and choreograph the hit musical Guys on Ice, back in the Stackner for the first time since 2001. Herbst has been the Artistic Director for Northern Sky Theater (formerly American Folklore Theatre) since 1993.

The show will feature favorite cast members Doug Mancheski and Steve Koehler reprising their roles, and Bo Johnson, seen earlier this season in The Doyle & Debbie Show, as Ernie the Moocher.

The Creative Team includes: James Kaplan (Music Director); and Jason Fassl (Lighting Designer).

The Mousetrap

November 17 - December 20, 2015 · Quadracci Powerhouse

Milwaukee Repertory Theater favorite J.R. Sullivan will direct Agatha Christie's masterful whodunit The Mousetrap. Sullivan returns to The Rep after directing The 39 Steps (2010/11), The Lady with All the Answers (2009/10) and Pride and Prejudice (2008/09), among others.

The Mousetrap will feature Rep Associate Artists Jonathan Gillard Daly and Laura Gordon as well as frequent guest actress Kelley Faulkner and former Acting Intern Ensemble Member Greta Wohlrabe.

The Creative Team includes: Jack Magaw (Scenic Designer); Jason Fassl (Lighting Designer); Rachel Laritz (Costume Designer); Lindsay Jones (Sound Designer); Jill Walmsley Zager (Dialect Coach); and Jamie Cheatham (Fight Choreographer).

Of Mice and Men

January 19 - February 21, 2016 · Quadracci Powerhouse

Artistic Director Mark Clements will direct Of Mice and Men, bringing his acclaimed and Barrymore Award-winning production to Milwaukee after its record-setting run in Philadelphia.

The cast will include Rep Associate Artists Jonathan Gillard Daly and James Pickering as well as guest actress Kelley Faulkner and accomplished actor Scott Greer as Lennie.

The Creative Team includes: Associate Artist Todd Edward Ivins (Scenic Designer); Rachel Laritz (Costume Designer); Jesse Klug (Lighting Designer); Jamie Cheatham (Fight Choreographer); and Literary Coordinator Leda Hoffmann (Associate Director).

The Devil's Music: The Life and Blues of Bessie Smith

January 22 - March 20, 2016 · Stackner Cabaret

Artistic Associate JC Clementz, who recently directed The Doyle & Debbie Show and last season's Forever Plaid, will direct The Devil's Music: The Life and Blues of Bessie Smith, an entertaining and unforgettable evening about "The Empress of the Blues."

The production will feature the incomparable Zonya Love, last seen at The Rep as Celie in The Color Purple, as Bessie Smith and Kenney M. Greene, last seen in the Stackner hit Ain't Misbehavin (2013/14), as Pickle.

The Creative Team includes: Joe C. Klug (Scenic Designer); Kenney M. Greene (Music Director); Jason Orlenko (Costume Designer); Aimee Hanykewski (Lighting Designer); and Jill Walmsley Zager (Dialect Coach).

The Invisible Hand

February 24 - April 3, 2016 · Stiemke Studio

Lucie Tiberghien will be making her directing debut at The Rep with The Invisible Hand, written by Ayad Akthar, the Pultizer Prize-winning Milwaukee playwright. Tiberghien has directed at La Jolla Playhouse, Arena Stage, Rattlestick Theater, Actors Theater of Louisville, and LAByrinth and has a close working association with the playwright.

The Creative Team includes: Victoria Deiorio (Lighting Designer); Jill Walmsley Zager (Dialect Coach); and Jamie Cheatham (Fight Choreographer).

American Song

March 15 - April 10, 2016 · Quadracci Powerhouse

Award-winning Australian playwright Joanna Murray-Smith's play American Song, commissioned by Milwaukee Rep, will be directed by Artistic Director Mark Clements. This world premiere production is one man's deeply moving examination of guilt and innocence, parental bonds, and life here and now.

Wisconsin favorite and American Players Theatre veteran James DeVita returns to The Rep in American Song after his tour-de-force performance in last year's production of An Iliad.

The Creative Team includes: Jared Mezzocchi (Projection and Video Designer); and Jill Walmsley Zager (Dialect Coach).

Sirens of Song

March 25 - May 29, 2016 · Stackner Cabaret

Sirens of Song will be directed and choreographed by creator Kevin Ramsey, whose Milwaukee Rep credits include From My Hometown (2011/12), Soultime at the Apollo (2009/10), Fire on the Bayou: A Mardi Gras Musical Extravaganza (2008/09), and Grafton City Blues (2007/08). This world premiere production is a musical celebration of the songs and stories that have defined women through history and will feature three powerhouse female singers.

August Wilson's Fences

April 26 - May 22, 2016 · Quadracci Powerhouse

Internationally-acclaimed, veteran director, Lou Bellamy, Founder and Co-Artistic Director of Penumbra Theatre Company in Minneapolis, will direct August Wilson's Pulitzer Prize-winning Drama Fences, a play which challenges the American dream through a poetic, powerful, and deeply personal story.

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Milwaukee Repertory Theater is a nationally-recognized company that presents compelling dramas, powerful classics, award-winning contemporary works, full-scale musicals, housed in its three unique performance venues -- the Quadracci Powerhouse, Stiemke Studio and Stackner Cabaret. The Rep also produces an annual production of A Christmas Carol at the beautiful and historic Pabst Theater. Under the leadership of Artistic Director Mark Clements and Managing Director Chad Bauman, The Rep is committed to creating plays that are meaningful and relevant to the society we live in -- plays that are challenging, visceral and engage the community through the issues they explore, demonstrating how a theater deeply rooted in its locality can also enjoy a richly influential and resonant national voice.