Performances End 7/11 For LCT3's ON THE LEVEE

Previews began Monday, June 14, for the LCT3 world premiere production of ON THE LEVEE, a play with music, conceived and directed by Lear deBessonet, with play by Marcus Gardley, and music and lyrics by Todd Almond, at The Duke on 42nd Street, a New 42nd Street® project (229 West 42 Street). ON THE LEVEE closes July 11. LCT3 is Lincoln Center Theater's programming initiative devoted to producing the work of new artists and developing new audiences. All tickets are $20.

The cast of ON THE LEVEE features Amari Cheatom, Brian D. Coats, Chuck Cooper, Maria Couch, Harriett D. Foy, Dion Graham, April Matthis, Jacob Ming-Trent, Seth Numrich, Stephen Plunkett, Michael Siberry and Shelley Thomas. The production has sets by Peter Ksander, costumes by Emily Rebholz, lighting by Justin Townsend, sound by Leon Rothenberg and projections by Austin Switser. Acclaimed visual artist Kara Walker has created new art for the production.

ON THE LEVEE tells the story of two fathers and sons - a white cotton farmer (Michael Siberry) and his poet son (Seth Numrich), and an African-American bootblack (Dion Graham) and his offspring (Amari Cheatom) - inspired by the Great Flood of 1927 in Greenville, Mississippi when 5000 black laborers were left stranded on a levee.

Conceiver-Director Lear deBessonet's productions include a site-specific Don Quixote in collaboration with playwright Lucy Thurber in Philadelphia, Brecht's Saint Joan of the Stockyards at PS 122, transfigures (Women's Project) and productions at the HERE Arts Center, NY Fringe and NYU's Experimental Theatre Wing. Marcus Gardley (play) is a playwright-poet who received the 2008 Helen Merrill Award for Emerging Playwright and the prestigious 2007 Kesselring Honoree Award. His plays include Love is a Dream House in Lorin (Shotgun Players, Berkeley, CA.), dance of the holy ghost (Yale Rep), (L)imitations of Life (Empty Space Theatre) and like sun fallin' in the mouth (National Black Theatre Festival). Todd Almond (music and lyrics) is a composer, lyricist and performer whose musicals include People Like Us (NY Musical Theatre Festival), Girlfriend (Berkeley Rep), Ahraihsak (Theatre Mitu) and the upcoming We Have Always Lived In The Castle (Yale Rep). His songs have been performed by such theatre performers as Victoria Clark, Cheyenne Jackson, Jayne Houdyshell, Laura Benanti and Stephen Pasquale.

Citing the need to develop strong relationships with new artists and to build new audiences, Lincoln Center Theater created LCT3 to offer these artists fully staged productions. LCT has just begun construction of a new theater, rehearsal and office space complex on the roof of the Vivian Beaumont Theater. The 131 seat theater, to be named the Claire Tow Theater, is scheduled to open in 2012 and will be the home of LCT3. Paige Evans is the Director of LCT3.

This world premiere of ON THE LEVEE will be the final production in Lincoln Center Theater's 25th Anniversary year during which it produced a season of entirely new work. In addition to ON THE LEVEE, LCT is currently presenting the world premiere of A.R. Gurney's The Grand Manner, directed by Mark Lamos, beginning Wednesday, June 2 at the Mitzi E. Newhouse Theater, and the Tony Award winning production of Rodgers & Hammerstein's South Pacific, directed by Bartlett Sher, which will end its record-breaking run at the Vivian Beaumont Theater on Sunday, August 22.

ON THE LEVEE is performed Monday through Saturday evenings at 8pm, with Wednesday and Saturday matinees at 2pm. (There is no Wednesday matinee on June 16.) Tickets, priced at $20, are available at The Duke on 42nd Street Box Office, by visiting Dukeon42.org or by calling 646.223.3010. For additional information on LCT3 please visit www.lct3.org.

About the organization: The New 42nd Street®
Founded in 1990, The New 42nd Street is an independent, nonprofit organization charged with long-term responsibility for seven historic theaters on 42nd Street between Seventh and Eighth Avenues. In addition to running The New Victory®, The New 42nd Street built and operates the New 42nd Street Studios - a ten-story building of rehearsal studios, offices and a 200-seat theater named The Duke on 42nd StreetSM - for national and international performing arts companies. Since its opening on June 21, 2000, the New 42nd Street Studios has been fully occupied by both nonprofit and commercial theater, dance and opera companies. With these institutions and the other properties under its guardianship, The New 42nd Street plays a pivotal role in fostering the continued revival of this famous street at the Crossroads of the World.

About the theater: The Duke on 42nd StreetSM
The Duke on 42nd StreetSM is an intimate 200-seat black box theater built and operated by The New 42nd Street. Since opening in 2000, the theater has been available to international and domestic nonprofit organizations to present their work. Companies that have presented at The Duke on 42nd Street include: Harkness Dance Project; The NYC Tap Festival; Rosie's Broadway Kids; Playwrights Horizons; London's National Theatre; Theatre for a New Audience, which continues to present work on a regular basis; Lincoln Center Theater's LCT3, which is in its second season, and The New 42nd Street's "New Victory at The Duke" series. Companies presented by The New 42nd Street have included: Karole Armitage; Chicago Shakespeare Theater; Naked Angels, The Classical Theatre of Harlem, and Steppenwolf Theater Company.

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