Signature Theatre News

Ars Nova one of the most adventurous Off-Broadway companies (New York Times), piece by piece productions and Z Space present the world premiere of The Lucky Ones, a new musical by The Bengsons and Sarah Gancher (Hundred Days), commissioned and developed by Ars Nova.

Iconic star of The Office actor and comedian Rainn Wilson will return to the stage in Steppenwolf Theatre Company's production ofThe Doppelg nger (An International Farce). Wilson leads the cast as Thomas Irdley/Jimmy in the world premiere production.

The Lyric Stage Company continues to meander through the works of Stephen Sondheim with ROAD SHOW, his most recent collaboration with librettist John Weidman. While not in the upper echelon of Sondheim's works, the score and the Lyric production make it worthwhile. This musical travelogue about the Mizner Brothers, a pair of entrepreneurs and con men who sought their fortunes in escapades from Alaska to New York to Florida in the early 20th century, is the story of their successes, failures, and the art of the deal, fitting right in with our American zeitgeist.

Following an extensive nationwide search,American Conservatory Theater (A.C.T.) Board of Trustees and Executive Director Peter Pastreich today named Tony, OBIE, and Drama Desk Award winner Pam MacKinnon the new artistic director of San Francisco's premier nonprofit theater organization. MacKinnon succeeds Carey Perloff who will depart from American Conservatory Theater at the end of the 2017-18 season after 25 years at the helm. MacKinnon will begin planning the 2018-19 season alongside Perloff effective immediately. In addition, she will begin partnering with the leaders of A.C.T.'s world-class actor training programs and ever-expanding community programs, ensuring A.C.T. continues its role as the Bay Area's leading theater arts educational organization.

Paper Mill Playhouse (Mark S. Hoebee-Producing Artistic Director, Todd Schmidt-Managing Director), recipient of the 2016 Regional Theatre Tony Award, presents the East Coast premiere of the new play The Outsider by Paul Slade Smith, directed by David Esbjornson (Driving Miss Daisy). Performances begin TOMORROW, Wednesday, January 24, 2018, at 7:30 p.m., for a limited run through Sunday, February 18, 2018, at Paper Mill Playhouse (22 Brookside Drive) in Millburn, NJ. Opening Night is Sunday evening, January 28, 2018, at 7:00 p.m.

The world premiere of the first English-language adaptation of the classic novella by Ghassan Kanafani, Returning to Haifa, adapted for the stage by Naomi Wallace and Ismail Khalidi, opens at the Finborough Theatre for a four week limited season on Tuesday, 27 February 2018 (Press Nights: Thursday 1 and Friday 2 March 2018 at 7.30pm).

Children's Theatre Company (CTC) in partnership with Penumbra Theatre will present The Wiz, adapted from L. Frank Baum's classic story The Wonderful Wizard of Oz.

PlayMakers Repertory Company will present a private reading of Jump by Carly Evon Simpson, as part of a nationwide celebration of International Women's Voices Day. A play about flickering lights, vapes that fall from the sky, old homes, and a young woman who finds solace on a bridge, Jump was featured at the National New Play Network's National Showcase of New Plays.

The Public Theater (Artistic Director, Oskar Eustis; Executive Director, Patrick Willingham) announced the line-up today for the 2018 Free Shakespeare in the Park season, continuing a 56-year tradition of free theater in Central Park.

La Mirada Theatre for the Performing Arts & McCoy Rigby Entertainment present the third show of its 2017-2018 season (and the 40th anniversary of the iconic theatre) with CABARET, book by Joe Masteroff (based on the play by John Van Druten and stories by Christopher Isherwood), music by John Kander, lyrics by Fred Ebb with musical direction by David O, choreography by Dana Solimando and directed by Larry Carpenter.

Theatre for a New Audience (TFANA; Jeffrey Horowitz, Founding Artistic Director) announces a free post-performance discussion moderated by Pulitzer Prize-winning theatre critic and Negroland: A Memoir author Margo Jefferson in connection with TFANA's world premiere production of Adrienne Kennedy's He Brought Her Heart Back in a Box. The talk, which begins at 8.30 PM is open to all and features director Charlotte Braithwaite and playwrights Lydia Diamond and Jackie Sibblies Drury, follows the January 20 performance of Kennedy's first new play in a decade, which begins at 7:30 that evening, at Polonsky Shakespeare Center (262 Ashland Place, Brooklyn, NY 11217). The discussion will also be streamed live on Theatre for a New Audience's Facebook page. He Brought Her Heart Back in a Box runs January 18-February 11. To reserve a seat to this panel, visit www.tfana.org/heartpanel.

The little OPERA theatre of ny(LOTNY), in collaboration with New York based period ensemble New Vintage Baroque,presents the New York City Premiere of Piramo e Tisbe at Baruch Performing Arts Center, 55 Lexington Avenue, NYC, from March 22-25, 2018, with performances on Thursday through Saturday at 7:30pm and Sunday at 3pm. Tickets are $35 and are available at https://web.ovationtix.com/trs/cal/35006.

MoMA World Premiere of Film About Maria Irene Fornes THE REST I MAKE UP

Actors Co-0p Theatre Company (Ovation Award-Winner 2014 Best Intimate Theatre Musical for 110 in the Shade) presents the Pulitzer Prize finalist and Tony Award nominated drama A Walk in the Woods written by award-winning playwright Lee Blessing, directed by Ken Sawyer, produced by Lauren Thompson. A Walk in the Woods will preview, Thursday, February 8 at 8:00 pm, and will open Friday, February 9 at 8:00 pm, and run through Sunday, March 18 at the Actors Co-op Crossley Theatre, 1760 N. Gower Street, 90028 (on the campus of the First Presbyterian Church of Hollywood) in Hollywood.

After several exciting and successful shows in the fall of 2017 (Only You, A Queer Cabaret; Love: A How (Not) To Guide; and No Way To Say Goodbye by artists Donnie and Rebecca Cianciotto, Jen Anaya and Deepali Gupta) The Tank (Meghan Finn and Rosalind Grush, Artistic Directors) is launching a full season of monthly cabaret events for 2018! Tank-aret: A Taste of Something Different, a new cabaret series featuring underrepresented artists, will kick off on Saturday, January 20 at 10:30pm, in the 99-seat theater space at The Tank (312 West 36th Street between 8th and 9th Avenues). Tickets ($14, with a 1 drink minimun) are available for advance purchase at www.thetanknyc.org.

Soho Rep. (Sarah Benson, Artistic Director; Cynthia Flowers, Executive Director) today announces the complete cast and creative team for the world premiere of Aleshea Harris's Relentless Award-winning Is God Is, directed by Taibi Magar (Ars Nova's Underground Railroad Game), February 6 - March 11, 2018. The play, with which Soho Rep. reopens its longtime Tribeca theater, dauntlessly cracks jokes as it eviscerates. Alfie Fuller and Dame-Jasmine Hughes play Anaia and Racine, twin sisters who undertake a murderous journey from the Dirty South to the California desert, seeking payback for a horrendous act. Is God Is treats both morality and genre as notions to be exploded, drawing on the ancient, the modern, the tragic, the Spaghetti Western, hip-hop and Afropunk in its subversion of theatrical constructs.

Theatre for a New Audience will present He Brought Her Heart Back in a Box, the first new work in nine years from Adrienne Kennedy.

Prospect Theater Company, under the leadership of Producing Artistic Director Cara Reichel and Managing Director Melissa Huber, will present MONUMENT, a collection of new mini-musicals in concert, the culmination of Prospect's 2018 Musical Theater Lab. MONUMENT, the company's 12th lab performance, will be presented on February 3, 2018 at 8pm at The TimesCenter (242 West 41st, NYC).

The Wilma Theater, in association with Evamere Entertainment, presents Stew and Heidi Rodewald's Tony Award-winning musical in this major Philadelphia revival.

Theatre for a New Audience (TFANA; Jeffrey Horowitz, Founding Artistic Director) announces a free post-performance discussion moderated by Pulitzer Prize-winning theatre critic and Negroland: A Memoir author Margo Jefferson in connection with TFANA's world premiere production of Adrienne Kennedy's He Brought Her Heart Back in a Box. The talk, which begins at 8.30 PM is open to all and features director Charlotte Braithwaite and playwrights Lydia Diamond and Jackie Sibblies Drury, follows the January 20 performance of Kennedy's first new play in a decade, which begins at 7:30 that evening, at Polonsky Shakespeare Center (262 Ashland Place, Brooklyn, NY 11217). The discussion will also be streamed live on Theatre for a New Audience's Facebook page. He Brought Her Heart Back in a Box runs January 18-February 11. To reserve a seat to this panel, visit www.tfana.org/heartpanel.