Mixed Blood Theatre Sets 2016-17 Season

Mixed Blood Theatre today announced a new season with daring works and world premieres. From wildly irreverent comedies to deeply moving dramas, the company continues its tradition of putting the full spectrum of the ever-changing face of the US on stage, celebrating the breadth of our humanity in content and in form.

Artistic Director Jack Reuler offers, "While Mixed Blood isn't categorically a Latino theater, an Asian American theater, an African American theater, a Muslim theater, an LGBTQIA theater, a physical theater, or an ensemble theater, our body of work - within a season or over decades - would suggest otherwise. It is the confluence of influences that allows us to eschew categorization." He continues, "Our space is reconfigurable. Our politics are irreverent. Our aesthetic is predictably unpredictable. Our value is egalitarian. Our aspirations are virtuosic. Our admission is free. Our access is unlimited. And the upcoming season magnifies all that we do and have done for 40 years, models the successful coexistence of people with difference, and embodies the intersection of authenticity and virtuosity in ways never before attempted or accomplished."

The 2016-17 season features the following productions:

BARBECUE

by Robert O'Hara, directed by Thomas W. Jones II

Featuring Jevetta Steele, Regina Marie Williams, Sue Scott, and Stephen Yoakam

September 30-October 16, 2016

BARBECUE is a cruelly funny new play that shrewdly turns the American domestic comedy on its head, forcing hilarious and uneasy revelations about the facile presumptions we make about poverty, race and social class. It is the hybrid child of Looney Tunes and Quentin Tarantino.

A pill-popping, chain-smoking, whiskey-swilling, crack-addicted, foul-mouthed family gathers in a public park for an intervention masquerading as a barbecue. What follows is a farcical tale of drugs, race, religion, movies, fame, money, and cancer, with a twist that leaves audiences vacillating between screaming laughter and shock.

BARBECUE roasts its raw characters while basting the audience, turning the tables on the appropriation of African-American culture by white cultural institutions.

ORANGE

by Aditi Brennan Kapil, directed by Jack Reuler

WORLD PREMIERE

November 11-December 4, 2016

This adventure through Orange County charts a journey as hilarious, surprising, and terrifying, as the unique young woman whose story it is. ORANGE is a deeply soulful exploration of youth, fearlessness, family, and difference, on the cusp of childhood and adulthood.

Told from the point of view of a young woman on the Autism Spectrum who joins her cousin and her cousin's boyfriend on a joyride the night before a family wedding, ORANGE chronicles the adventures of 3 teens over the course of one ill planned night full of detours, mythic encounters, 9 year old villains, thrilling heights, lurking dangers, and the search for a perfect orange. All three discover that a lot can happen over the course of one night without a safety net.

Flanked by projected illustrations, ORANGE is Mixed Blood Playwright in Residence Aditi Brennan Kapil's seventh world premiere produced by Mixed Blood (Displaced Hindu Gods Trilogy '13, Agnes Under the Big Top '11, Love Person '08), and a highly theatrical new work by a writer who consistently puts marginalized voices center stage. ORANGE was commissioned by South Coast Repertory Theatre, where it will have its west coast premiere in March, 2017.

CORAZÓN ETERNO (Always in My Heart)

A play with songs by Caridad Svich, directed by José Zayas, based on the novel by Gabriel Garcia Marquez

February 3-March 4, 2017

Rights pending

This epic romance by Obie Award-winning playwright Caridad Svich based on the novel by of Nobel Prize winner Gabriel Garcia Marquez (one of the greatest writers of magical realism in the western canon), imagines lovesickness and extreme passion as a disease comparable to cholera.

Following the love story of Florentino Ariza and Fermina Daza from thwarted youth to the maturity of their senior years, the emotional landscape of CORAZÓN ETERNO (Always in My Heart) spans decades and distances in an unnamed Latin American port city replete with multifarious characters at the turn of the last century.

Performed in Spanish with projected supertitles in English, CORAZÓN ETERNO (Always in My Heart) marks the third adaptation of a significant Latin American novel by Caridad Svich produced by Mixed Blood (preceded by Isabel Allende's THE HOUSE OF THE SPIRITS '10 and Julia Alvarez's IN THE TIME OF THE BUTTERFLIES '13).

SAFE AT HOME

by Gabriel Greene and Alex Levy, directed by Jack Reuler with the creators

Performed in the innards of CHS Field in St. Paul's Lowertown in partnership with the St. Paul Saints

WORLD PREMIERE

March 7-12, 2017

This 18-character 9-scene thriller uses baseball as a vehicle to examine flawed US immigration policies, racial politics, Major League's exploitation of Dominican players, America's obsession with celebrity, and the collision of personal ethics and massive entertainment and media dollars.

Audience members will journey for 90 minutes in small groups throughout the St Paul Saints' brand new minor league stadium, encountering scenes in a locker room, batting cage, press box, luxury suite, concourse, men's room, coach's office, front office, dugout, pitcher's mound, and more. They will be voyeurs into the intimate conversations of umpires, managers, mascots, political candidates, fans, vendors, military color guards, and players performed by a multi-national league-of-nations cast - all while venturing into stadium spaces rarely visited by the public.

SAFE AT HOME is a treat for theater connoisseurs, baseball aficionados, families, thrill seekers, and the simply curious. SAFE AT HOME marks Mixed Blood's 17th sports play (The Last Champion '78, Brother Champ '76 & '77, Ohio Tip-Off '85, How To improve Your Golf Game '87 &'01 , Ali '89, League of Nations '02, The History of Bowling '02, Bleacher Bums '79 , Take Me Out '05, Colossal '14, The Boy's Own Story '82, and The Elaborate Entrance of Chad Deity '10) demonstrating the truth of Sports Illustrated's feature of Mixed Blood as the most sports-oriented theater in America. As is the case with all of Mixed Blood's work, it is fully accessible for all patrons.

TBA

April 7 - 30, 2017

This irreverent new comedy on its way to Broadway is so fantastically in demand that it can't be formally announced, but we promise it'll be worth the wait!