A.C.T. Welcomes Bay Area Back To Live, In-Person Theater With $5 Tickets To FREESTYLE LOVE SUPREME!

Tony Award winner and American Conservatory Theater Artistic Director Pam MacKinnon and Executive Director Jennifer Bielstein announced today that single tickets for A.C.T.'s upcoming productions of Freestyle Love Supreme, Fefu and Her Friends, and The Lehman Trilogy are now on sale. These three productions-in addition to the world premiere pre-Broadway musical, Soul Train-make up the company's 2022 season. To purchase, visit act-sf.org or call the A.C.T. Box Office at 415-749-2228. Single tickets for Soul Train will be made available at a later date.

"The pandemic continues to teach us that A.C.T. is more than our buildings," said MacKinnon. "But we are so eager to share space and story again with audiences. I cannot wait to make a curtain speech in front of the stage; see you all-our audience; hear laughter loud and small; walk through the lobbies, eavesdropping on folks' conversations-satisfied, happy, full, and still searching. We cannot wait to have some fun back at our theaters with you. In 2022, let's make this your theater again, San Francisco!"

Kicking off 2022 with a beat-with major support from lead sponsor Salesforce-A.C.T. will present the hip-hop improv sensation, Freestyle Love Supreme (January 21-February 13, 2022). With this production, A.C.T. is throwing open the doors of the Geary Theater as a gift to the San Francisco Bay Area to welcome the community back to live theater. Ensuring everyone is welcome and able to attend, A.C.T. is offering 15,000 tickets to Freestyle Love Supreme for as little as $5. A.C.T. is able to remove the financial barrier thanks to the generosity of Salesforce through a lead sponsorship contribution and additional matching funds inspiring others to support this initiative-including a generous grant from Koret Foundation. Additional supporters include Jill Cowan and Stephen Davis; The Sakurako and William Fisher Family; Celeste and Kevin Ford; The Marymor Family Fund; Gerine Ongkeko; Perkins Coie LLP; Robina Riccitiello; Steven and Mary Swig; and three (3) anonymous supporters-to underwrite the cost of these tickets.

"It is important to us that the work we are creating is accessible to a wide range of people across the Bay Area," adds Bielstein. "To that end we have made low-priced tickets available for every performance of each production of the season. And, because of the leadership support of Salesforce, we are able to offer 1000's of tickets to Freestyle Love Supreme for free to A.C.T. community partners and for as little as $5 to the general public! These tickets are available for each of the 29 performances of this spectacular production. It is our gift to the Bay Area and a way to welcome everyone back to in-person theater after so many months without."

"I had the pleasure of seeing Freestyle Love Supreme on Broadway in 2019 and was immediately drawn to the show's unending fountain of creativity and world-class talent," said Salesforce CEO Marc Benioff. "I believe the arts have the power to transform lives and lift communities. As we begin to safely return to live, in-person performances, I am honored to assist A.C.T. in making this production more accessible for all in the San Francisco Bay Area."

Before Hamilton, before In the Heights, there was Freestyle Love Supreme, the critically acclaimed Broadway hit from the minds of longtime friends Thomas Kail, Lin-Manuel Miranda, and Bay Area artist Anthony Veneziale. Launching its American tour at the Geary Theater, Freestyle Love Supreme pays homage to John Coltrane's improvisational musical style as it takes audiences on a freestyle, never-before-seen-and-never-to-be-seen-again hip-hop comedy ride. Hailed as "a hugely entertaining dream of a show" (Time Out), no two shows will be alike as performers-and surprise guest artists-take suggestions from the audience and spin them into instantaneous riffs and full-length musical numbers. Bay Area audiences will be the very first to see this slam-dunk hit from today's most celebrated theater makers, conceived over 17 years ago and as fresh as today's Twitter feed.

Freestyle Love Supreme is the recipient of a special 2020 Tony Award. The Hulu documentary, We Are Freestyle Love Supreme, earned rave reviews when it premiered at Sundance Film Festival in early 2020, and was nominated for a 2021 Grammy Award. The production returns to Broadway for a strictly limited engagement beginning October 7, 2021.

Performances of Freestyle Love Supreme will take place at A.C.T.'s Geary Theater. Press night for Freestyle Love Supreme will be held on Wednesday, January 26, 2022.

Next, Tony Award winner and A.C.T. Artistic Director Pam MacKinnon will direct an all-Bay Area cast of María Irene Fornés's Fefu and Her Friends (March 24-May 1, 2022). Hailed as game-changing, provocative, and genius, Fefu and Her Friends is one of the most influential-and invisible-plays of the 20th century. An innovation of immersive theater, Cuban American playwright María Irene Fornés's rapturous comedy-drama allows the audience to be a fly on many walls in this unconventional tale of eight women gathering at a New England country home in 1935. Utilizing the multi-storied, multi-roomed Strand Theater as non-traditional theater space, audiences will be broken up into four groups that independently tour Fefu's home. Stories and histories come into play as you happen across conversations as Fefu's bohemian and raucous cohorts gossip, question, flirt, provoke, and ultimately reveal (or obscure?) the collective power of this group of women. As muscular and searing in her deliberate use of language as Albee and Miller at their best; as acidic as Clare Boothe Luce's iconic play The Women; and patron saint to blockbuster hits like Sleep No More-Fornés's Fefu and Her Friends is an invitation to a theatrical experience like none other. A.C.T.'s production of Fefu and Her Friends is dedicated in memory of long-time A.C.T. Trustee Olympia Dukakis.

Performances of Fefu and Her Friends will take place at A.C.T.'s Strand Theater. Press nights for Fefu and Her Friends will be held on Wednesday, April 6 and Thursday, April 7, 2022.

In spring, A.C.T. will present The National Theatre and Neal Street Productions' international theatrical sensation, The Lehman Trilogy (April 20-May 22, 2022). Written by Stefano Massini, adapted by Olivier Award-nominated Ben Power, and directed by multiple Olivier Award, Tony Award, and Academy Award winner Sam Mendes (Cabaret, The Ferryman, Skyfall, 1917), The Lehman Trilogy is the epic story of a family and a company that changed the world. On a cold September morning in 1844, a young man from Bavaria stands on a New York dockside dreaming of a new life. He is soon joined by his two brothers and an American epic begins with a small store in Alabama. One hundred and sixty-three years later, the firm they establish-Lehman Brothers-spectacularly collapses into bankruptcy and triggers the largest financial crisis in history. Told in three epic parts over one evening, The Lehman Trilogy is a modern theatrical classic.

The Lehman Trilogy is currently playing a limited Broadway engagement at New York City's Nederlander Theatre. The National Theatre's past Broadway productions include War Horse, The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time, and Angels in America.

A.C.T.'s production of The Lehman Trilogy is made possible by Anonymous; Jerome L. and Thao Dodson; The Ray and Dagmar Dolby Family Fund; Frannie Fleishhacker; Priscilla and Keith Geeslin; Fred M. Levin, in honor of Nancy Livingston Levin, The Shenson Foundation; Robina Riccitiello; Rusty and Patti Rueff; and Kay Yun and Andre Neumann-Loreck. A.C.T.'s presentation of The Lehman Trilogy is dedicated in memory of long-time A.C.T. Trustee and Chair Emerita Nancy Livingston Levin.

Performances of The Lehman Trilogy will take place at A.C.T.'s Geary Theater. Press night for The Lehman Trilogy will be held on Wednesday, April 27, 2022.

As part of A.C.T.'s ongoing work around equity, diversity, and inclusion, and making its spaces more accessible and welcoming to all, A.C.T. is pleased to offer open-captioned performances for each production in the 2022 season. Open captioning displays text alongside live speech, dialogue, and singing. The open-captioned schedule is as follows: Freestyle Love Supreme (Saturday, February 12, 2022 at 2 p.m.); Fefu and Her Friends (Saturday, April 23, 2022 at 2 p.m.); and The Lehman Trilogy (Saturday, May 14, 2022 at 1 p.m.).

Single tickets range in price from $5-$130 for Freestyle Love Supreme; $25-$130 for The Lehman Trilogy; and $25-$60 for Fefu and Her Friends. To purchase, visit act-sf.org or call the A.C.T. Box Office at 415-749-2228.

A.C.T. cares about the safety of patrons, artists, technicians, and staff. Since March 2020, A.C.T. has updated HVAC systems at the historic Geary Theater and optimized safety protocols across all venues in alignment with COVID-19 health orders and guidelines. A.C.T.'s safety protocols will be updated in accordance with any changes relevant to San Francisco, county, and state guidance. Currently A.C.T. has endorsed Theatre Bay Area's shared protocols mandating vaccinations, except where there are legal exemptions, and requiring masks while indoors. Given how quickly guidelines can change, details about safety protocols for in-person performances will continually be updated and reminders will be sent to ticket holders and posted on A.C.T.'s website close to the run dates of each production.

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