Sarah Leach News

​​​​​​​Barnesville High School was lucky enough to get the local premier of the Broadway smash hit! This is the very first production in the brand new auditorium at Barnesville. The show was originally planned for March, but they pushed it back to make sure their beautiful new home was ready.

The Wilbury Theatre Group proudly presents The Olneyville Expo: A Celebration of Olneyville Past, Present, and Future. Created by Jesse Hawley, James Stanley, and Resident Playwright Darcie Dennigan, The Olneyville Expo is being presented as part of FRINGEPVD The Providence Fringe Festival and the Woonasquatucket River Greenway Arts Project in Olneyville's Donigian Park as free programming July 25, 26, and 27 from 7pm-9pm.

Sponsored by David and Ellen Galkin, on behalf of the Ira S. and Anna Galkin Charitable Trust, FUN(d) HOME The 2019 Wilbury Group Gala honored stage and film Actor Richard Donelly with the 5th Annual Kerry Callery Award for Outstanding Commitment to the Arts, and introduced the Arthur Richter Spirit of Giving Award to the man himself, Arthur Richter.

The Wilbury Theatre Group continues its record-breaking 2018/19 season with National New Play Network Rolling World Premiere of RED BIKE, a new play by award-winning playwright Caridad Svich. 

The Wilbury Theatre Group Presents National New Play Network Rolling World Premiere of RED BIKE Presented by The Wilbury Theatre Group in collaboration with Pygmailion Productions (Salt Lake City), Simpatico Theatre (Philadelphia), and Know Theatre (Cincinnati) PROVIDENCE, RI (January 30, 2019) - The Wilbury Theatre Group continues its record-breaking 2018/19 season with National New Play Network Rolling World Premiere of RED BIKE, a new play by award-winning playwright Caridad Svich. Joining productions by Pygmalion Productions (Salt Lake City), Simpatico Theatre (Philadelphia), and Know Theatre (Cincinnati), The Wilbury Theatre Group is proud to bring Providence this timely and rollercoaster ride of a story of the city on the verge of change in performances February 21 thru March 3, 2019.

The Burn runs until February 3 at the The Wilbury Theatre Group in Providence, R.I.

The Wilbury Theatre Group kicks off the New Year with the New England premiere of Philip Dawkins' The Burn, presented in conversation with More Weight: A Derivative New Work inspired by Arthur Miller's 'The Crucible' by director Logan Serabian. Performances for The Burn and More Weight are scheduled for January 10 - February 3, 2019.

This subversive, loopy, and fantastically eccentric take-think banjos, beach balls, and guitars-on Gilbert and Sullivan's preposterous musical took audiences in Chicago by storm when presented by rebel theatre-makers The Hipocrites. Frederic was mistakenly apprenticed as a young boy to a band of sentimental pirates. Now 21, he falls head-over-heels for the Major-General's daughter and forswears the buccaneer's life forever, or so he thinks. This buoyant, award-winning Pirates of Penzance by Sean Graney and Kevin O'Donnell and featuring just 12 actors (who also serve as the orchestra) is an irrevent and fresh homage to a world turned upside-down for Gilbert and Sullivan diehard fans and newcomers alike.

The Wilbury Theatre Group launches into 2018 with a bold new staging of Thornton Wilder's tragicomic masterpiece The Skin of Our Teeth directed by Wilbury Founder/Artistic Director Josh Short with music direction by Matt Requintina (Spring Awakening), January 18 through February 4 at their new home and performance space at 40 Sonoma Court, Olneyville.

The Wilbury Theatre Group launches into 2018 with a bold new staging of Thornton Wilder's tragicomic masterpiece The Skin of Our Teeth directed by Wilbury Founder/Artistic Director Josh Short with music direction by Matt Requintina (Spring Awakening), January 18 through February 4 at their new home and performance space at 40 Sonoma Court, Olneyville.

There is nothing quite like a powerfully delivered sermon. Even non-believers may find themselves getting chills in the presence of impassioned oratory, regardless of the subject matter. That seems to be a central point of young Jean Lee's CHURCH, currently playing at The Wilbury Theatre Group. Similar to last year's production of Lee's Straight White Men, she again toys with typical expectations, this time of religious services, and manages to be somewhat heartwarming while also being confounding. But lack of solid direction and movement leaves the production feeling much longer than it is, despite an exceptionally talented cast.

In CHURCH, 'the best playwright of her generation' (The New York Times) Young Jean Lee transforms her life-long struggle with Christianity into an exuberant church service. This church of celebration is designed to test the expectations of religious and non-religious alike. Never content with simple parody, Lee aims to give herself and her audiences a true religious experience.

Inspired by Roger Williams, Bill T. Jones and Everett Stage and School, New and Dangerous Ideas is the world premiere play by internationally known slam poet Christopher Johnson and directed by Johnson and Wilbury Artistic Director Josh Short.

THE YELLOW WALLPAPER, a short story written by Charlotte Perkins Gilman, was published in 1892.  The first-person narrative takes the reader inside the mind of an unnamed woman suffering from postpartum depression, who has been prescribed “The Rest Cure”, which calls for her to be confined to a room, alone, to let her mind rest and heal itself.  The cure turns out to be worse than the disease, and the seemingly innocuous yellow wallpaper in the room where she lives starts to play tricks on her already fragile mind, eventually leading her into total madness.  The short story is all within the woman's mind, but in order to dramatize it, OUT LOUD Theatre has put The Woman center stage in a kind of freak show/mental hospital setting where the audience observes different aspects of her struggle for sanity.  Meticulous stage design and costumes managed to convey volumes of information and set the tone perfectly, and the wordless performances are powerful and haunting.

BWW Rhode Island welcomes the four-woman cast of OUT LOUD Theatre's THE YELLOW WALLPAPER to the BroadwayWorld guest blog. This production presents a fully immersive, four-part experience; each part tells a complete story from beginning to end, but the individual pieces provide meditations on Charlotte Perkins Gilman's THE YELLOW WALLPAPER through varying lenses. Erika Rethorn joins BWW RI to explore 'Escape' in the fourth and final part of the guest blog series.

BWW Rhode Island welcomes the cast of OUT LOUD Theatre's THE YELLOW WALLPAPER to the BroadwayWorld guest blog. This production presents a fully immersive, four-part experience; each part tells a complete story from beginning to end, but the individual pieces provide meditations on Charlotte Perkins Gilman's THE YELLOW WALLPAPER as viewed through varying lenses. Sarah Leach joins BWW RI to explore 'Color' in the third part of the guest blog series.

BWW Rhode Island welcomes the cast of OUT LOUD Theatre's THE YELLOW WALLPAPER to the guest blog. THE YELLOW WALLPAPER, directed by Kira Hawkridge, presents a fully immersive, four-part experience; each individual piece provides a meditation on Charlotte Perkins Gilman's THE YELLOW WALLPAPER as viewed through varying lenses. Ottavia De Luca joins BWW RI to explore 'Light.'

BWW Rhode Island welcomes the cast of OUT LOUD Theatre's THE YELLOW WALLPAPER to the guest blog. This production is presented in four parts; each tells a full story, but the individual pieces - RITUAL, LIGHT, COLOR, and ESCAPE - provide varying meditations on Charlotte Perkins Gilman's THE YELLOW WALLPAPER. Siobhan LaPorte-Cauley joins BWW RI to explore 'Ritual.'

Explore OUT LOUD Theatre's 5-part Immersive Experience (Ritual, Light, Color, Escape, and Compulsion) based on THE YELLOW WALLPAPER by Charlotte Perkins Gilman, with our first look at 'The Woman'. 

MR. BURNS, A POST-ELECTRIC PLAY takes place in the near future, and then further into the future, and then way into the future as the world as we knew it becomes increasingly distorted and warped seemingly via a century long game of telephone.  It's a play that analyzing will just leave a person more discombobulated, so it's probably best to just strap in any enjoy the ride.  Regardless of whether or not you understand it, you will come away thoroughly entertained by the phenomenal cast and skillful music direction of Wilbury favorite David Tessier.  The people Wilbury Theatre Group are masters of the strange and unexpected, and even if the audience can't completely grasp what's going on, the cast has everything handled, so that it's best to just sit in their thrall and trust that we're all going to make it out ok.