Second and Final Extension Announced for SWEPT AWAY at Berkeley Rep

On the first day of rehearsals and following an overwhelmingly demand from audiences, Berkeley Rep has announced that the world premiere musical Swept Away will extend for an additional second and final week. The new musical will now run through Sunday, March 6.

Starting today, tickets for the added eight performances can be purchased online at berkeleyrep.org and by phone at 510 647-2949.

Tony Award-winning director Michael Mayer (Spring Awakening, Hedwig and the Angry Inch) blew the roof off Berkeley Rep in 2009 with Green Day's American Idiot. Now he returns with a captivating world premiere musical, this time featuring a book by Tony Award-winning stage and screen writer John Logan (Red, Broadway's Moulin Rouge!, Skyfall, Gladiator), and music and lyrics by "America's biggest roots band" (Rolling Stone) and multiple Grammy Award nominee The Avett Brothers.

Swept Away is set in 1888, off the coast of New Bedford, MA. When a violent storm sinks their whaling ship, the four surviving souls-a young man in search of adventure, his older brother who has sworn to protect him, a captain at the end of a long career at sea, and a worldly first mate who has fallen from grace-each face a reckoning: How far will I go to stay alive? And can I live with the consequences?

Swept Away is produced by special arrangement with Matthew Masten, Sean Hudock, and Madison Wells Live.

Cast members include John Gallagher, Jr. (Mate), Stark Sands (Older Brother), Adrian Blake Enscoe (Little Brother), and Wayne Duvall (Captain). Members of the ensemble include Taurean Everett, Cameron Johnson, Ben Toomer, Vishal Vaidya, and Jacob Keith Watson.

The creative team includes Rachel Hauck (scenic designer), Susan Hilferty (costume designer), Kevin Adams (lighting designer) Kai Harada (sound designer), and David Neumann (choreographer).