Works by David Lindsay-Abaire and Martyna Majok Join MTC 2025-26 Season

Manhattan Theatre Club has revealed two additional shows that will be a part of the company’s 2025-2026 season.

MTC will present the world premiere of The Balusters, by Tony Award and Pulitzer Prize winner David Lindsay-Abaire, directed by Tony Award winner Kenny Leon, which will open in Spring 2026 on Broadway at the Samuel J. Friedman Theatre and a newly imagined version of Queens by Pulitzer Prize winner Martyna Majok, directed by Trip Cullman, which will open in Fall 2025 Off-Broadway at NY City Center Stage (i).

“We are thrilled to welcome back David Lindsay-Abaire and Martyna Majok, both of whom received the Pulitzer Prize for plays produced by MTC,” said Artistic Director Lynne Meadow. “David’s history with us began over two decades ago, when we premiered Fuddy Meers Off-Broadway. I’m so proud that his newest work is the seventh world premiere David Lindsay-Abaire play we've produced at MTC. We welcome back director Kenny Leon, who staged King James for us in 2023. We’re also excited to reunite with Martyna after producing Cost of Living both on and Off-Broadway. Her play Queens is a powerful portrait of female immigrants facing difficult circumstances in our city. We are delighted that the production will be helmed by Trip Cullman. We treasure our rich relationships with these extraordinary artists, and we’re so happy to bring them ‘home’.”

The Balusters is a raucous, wild ride through a small community with big feelings. The Vernon Point Neighborhood Association is a passionate bunch, whether squabbling over historically inaccurate porch railings or debating trash can protocol. Still, no one is prepared for the neighbor-versus-neighbor battle royale that ensues when a newcomer to the board suggests the unthinkable: installing a stop sign on the corner of the enclave’s prettiest block. The Balusters was commissioned by MTC through the Bank of America New Play Program.

"Manhattan Theatre Club has been my artistic home since I was a baby-playwright, so of course I’m thrilled to be back with The Balusters, my newest play about well-intentioned people behaving really badly,” commented David Lindsay-Abaire. “The only thing more exciting than having a new show on Broadway? Having it helmed by the brilliant director Kenny Leon. After twenty-five years of plays with MTC, I’ve never looked forward to sharing a story with an audience more than I am with The Balusters."

David Lindsay-Abaire’s previous work at MTC has included the Pulitzer Prize-winning Rabbit Hole, the Tony Award-nominated Good People, Ripcord, Wonder of the World, Fuddy Meers, and Kimberly Akimbo, which he later adapted with Jeanine Tesori into the Tony Award-winning musical. 

Kenny Leon, whose Broadway credits include A Raisin in the Sun (Tony Award), Fences, Topdog/Underdog, Purlie Victorious, Our Town and Othello, returns to MTC, where he previously directed Rajiv Joseph’s King James in 2023.

From Pulitzer Prize winner Martyna Majok comes an epic drama about hunting for the American Dream, finding family, and facing the ghosts you left behind.  In an illegal basement apartment in Queens, multiple generations of immigrant women fight to launch a new life. But when a young Ukrainian woman comes searching for the mother who abandoned her years ago, she forces a reckoning with the impossible choices the women made to survive. Directed by Trip Cullman, Queens chronicles the strivers who sacrificed whole worlds for the chance at something remarkable.

“Queens means the world to me,” said Martyna Majok. “I first began writing it in 2016 and I’ve been searching for it ever since, in various workshops, productions, and late nights and early mornings. I worried I’d never write another original play again until I figured out this one; so haunted was I by these women, so driven to do right by them. It’s with tears that I now write that I finally feel like I’ve found their story. These characters are some of the dearest creations of my life. They’re like family. And I’m bursting with love and pride to share them with this city. I’m immensely indebted to the many generous artists and institutions that have supported and cared for this play over the years. And I’m especially grateful to MTC for encouraging me and producing this newly reimagined version of Queens. It moves me so very much that it’s finding a home in one of the theatres that first gave me one. As I read the headlines and witness this country, I hope this story can offer a place at the hearth of the impossibly complicated experience of immigrant women -- an experience that, for some, costs entire lives.”

Martyna Majok returns to MTC following the Broadway premiere of her Pulitzer Prize-winning play Cost of Living, which was also Tony-nominated for Best Play in 2023. MTC also produced the New York premiere of Cost of Living at NY City Center in 2017. This newly imagined version of Queens was commissioned by The Hermitage Greenfield Prize (The Hermitage Artist Retreat, Andy Sandberg, Artistic Director) and co-commissioned by The Almeida Theatre, Rupert Goold, Artistic Director, Denise Wood, Executive Director, and Manhattan Theatre Club, Lynne Meadow, Artistic Director, Barry Grove, Executive Producer through the Edgerton Foundation New Play commission program.

Trip Cullman directed MTC’s critically acclaimed world premiere of Joshua Harmon’s We Had a World this season, and previously directed the MTC productions of Choir Boy and Murder Ballad. His other major credits include the Broadway productions of Cult of Love, The Rose Tattoo, Lobby Hero, Six Degrees of Separation, and Significant Other, among others. 

As previously announced, MTC’s 2025-26 season will also include the Broadway premiere of the critically acclaimed new play Punch by Olivier Award winner James Graham (Ink at MTC, Dear England, Best of Enemies, This House), directed by Adam Penford, and the Off-Broadway world premiere of The Monsters, written and directed by Ngozi Anyanwu (Good Grief, The Homecoming Queen), in a co-production with Two River Theater.

James Graham’s Punch, based on the autobiography Right from Wrong by Jacob Dunne, earned ecstatic five-star reviews when it premiered last year at Nottingham Playhouse and recently played a critically acclaimed limited engagement at The Young Vic in London. It will transfer to the West End this fall. 

A powerful account of a fatal act of random violence and a path toward understanding and forgiveness, Punch has been hailed as “James Graham’s most moving work yet” by The Times, “a story that needs to be told” by The Independent and “a compelling examination of the human cost and consequences of violence” by The Telegraph. 

Adam Penford returns to Broadway to direct MTC’s production, having previously been the Associate Director on the Tony Award-winning One Man, Two Guvnors. Punch is presented in association with Nottingham Playhouse, where Penford serves as Artistic Director. James Graham returns to MTC, where his play Ink received six Tony Award nominations in 2019, including Best Play. Punch will open MTC’s Broadway season at the Samuel J. Friedman Theatre.