Mainstage Season
THE 2019 MAINSTAGE SEASON
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May 28 - June 16
The World Premiere of
A New Comedy by Wade Dooley
Directed by Scott Schwartz (Bay Street's Intimate Apparel, Golda's Balcony starring Tovah Feldshuh)
By popular demand, the hit of Bay Street's 2018 New Works Festival takes its premiere bow! THE PROMPTER follows veteran actress Irene Young, who, after a forty-year absence, is returning to the Broadway stage. But now, she can’t do it alone; so the production hires a young actor to be her prompter. But, this isn’t her story, it’s his. Based on real events, THE PROMPTER is a funny, heartfelt, untold, behind-the-scenes look at Broadway through the eyes of a young dreamer.
June 25 - July 21
The World Premiere of
A new play by Alan Fox
Directed by three-time Tony Award winner Jack O'Brien (Hairspray, The Coast of Utopia, All My Sons)
STARRING
Tony & Academy Award Winner
Mercedes Ruehl
Torch Song, Hustlers, Viva La Vida!
Rodney Richardson
The Day Shall Come, CBS's FBI, Somebody's Daughter
Sasha Diamond
Blindspot, The Romanoffs, Murphy Brown
Passion and politics collide in this searing new drama. Safe Space is set at an elite university and explores political correctness and the reaction to triggers on campus in America today. When a star African-American professor faces accusations of racism from a student, the head of the college must intervene, setting off an explosive chain of events where each of them must navigate an ever-changing minefield of identity politics, ethics, and core beliefs.
Playwright Alan Fox burst onto the scene with his play SAFE SPACE, which is set to premiere this summer at Bay Street Theater. SAFE SPACE caught the attention of Amy Pascal, who is now producing Alan’s feature adaptation of the play, as well as his untitled movie about Charlie Chaplin. On the TV side, Alan is adapting his novel A Mannequin Life as a TV series with ABC Signature and Kerry Washington’s Simpson Street producing.
Director Jack O’Brien is a three-time Tony & Drama Desk Award-winning director, member of the Theatre Hall of Fame, and author of Jack Be Nimble, a memoir published by Farrar, Straus & Giroux in 2013. Jack won the Tony for Best Direction of a Musical and Drama Desk Award for Outstanding Director of a Musical for his 2003 Broadway production of Hairspray. He received the Tony Award for Best Direction of a Play and Drama Desk Award for Outstanding Director of a Play for Henry IV and The Coast of Utopia I, II, & III. Additional Broadway credits include Porgy & Bess (Tony & Drama Desk Nom.), Damn Yankees, Lillian Hellman’s The Little Foxes, The Full Monty (Tony Nom. & Drama Desk Winner), Tom Stoppard’s The Invention of Love (Drama Desk Winner), Dirty Rotten Scoundrels (Tony Nom.), Catch Me If You Can, Dead Accounts, Macbeth, It’s Only a Play, The Front Page, and Charlie and the Chocolate Factory. His production of The Good Doctor and Broadway revival of Most Happy Fella were produced for PBS, and Jack’s Street Scene was televised on “Live from Lincoln Center.” Most recently, Jack directed the Spring 2018 Broadway revival of Rogers & Hammerstein’s Carousel and the Fall 2018 production of Tom Stoppard’s new play The Hard Problem at Lincoln Center.
SPECIAL BONUS 4TH PRODUCTION!
July 17 - 22
My Witch: The Margaret Hamilton Stories
A new play written by John Ahlin
Directed by Will Pomerantz
Starring Jean Tafler
The amazing tale of how a gentle kindergarten teacher from Cleveland scared the living daylights out of every last one of us...and the brains, heart, and courage it took to be America's character woman.
In a surprising, fun, haunting and delightful evening, Jean Tafler portrays Margaret Hamilton, whose Wicked Witch of the West has left an indelible mark on us all. If there is one movie we all share it’s The Wizard of Oz, but it is time to pay attention to the woman behind the cackle.
Spend 85 wonderful minutes with Margaret Hamilton, for she has true and terrific stories to tell.
or
ADD IT TO YOUR EXISTING MAINSTAGE SUBSCRIPTION FOR JUST $39.99! CALL THE BOX OFFICE FOR DETAILS.
July 30 - August 25
Book by Herbert & Dorothy Fields
Music & Lyrics by Irving Berlin
Directed by Sarna Lapine (Sunday in the Park with George, Bay Street's Frost/Nixon)
Irving Berlin’s ANNIE GET YOUR GUN is one of the most beloved musicals of Broadway’s Golden Age. It tells the story of sharpshooter Annie Oakley, who starred in Buffalo Bill’s Wild West Show, and her tempestuous romance with fellow sharpshooter Frank Butler. Acclaimed director Sarna Lapine will bring a fresh, modern approach to the story, incorporating elements from Dorothy Fields’ original book to create the strongest and most revolutionary Annie Oakley you’ve ever seen. This musical includes such beloved songs as There’s No Business Like Show Business, Anything You Can Do, and I Got Sun in the Morning which will be performed by a country western, bluegrass band.
Irving Berlin, the composer of the music and lyrist for ANNIE GET YOUR GUN, was born in Tyumen, Russia, on May 11, 1888, and immigrated to New York as a child. He would become one of the most popular songwriters in the United States, with hits like Alexander's Ragtime Band, What'll I Do, God Bless America, and White Christmas. His music forms a great part of the Great American Songbook.
Herbert & Dorothy Fields are the brother and sister team who wrote the book for ANNIE GET YOUR GUN. Dorothy started writing songs for Tin Pan Alley and Broadway in the 1920s. From the 1930s on, Dorothy also worked for Hollywood with her partner, composer Jimmy McHugh. She won an Oscar for the song The Way You Look Tonight from Swing Time (1936), which she had written with Jerome Kern. Herbert was a writer and actor, known for Hit the Deck (1955), 50 Million Frenchmen (1931) and Joy of Living (1938). Dorothy and Herbert won two Tony Awards in 1959 for Redhead including Best Musical and shared the award for Best Book/Libretto with Sidney Sheldon and David Shaw.
ANNIE GET YOUR GUN director Sarna Lapine is a New York-based director and developer of new work. Upcoming: The Rape of Lucretia (Boston Lyric Opera), Kate Hamill’s adaptation of Little Women (Primary Stages) and Radioactive, a new musical by Eric Price and Will Reynolds (Manhattan School of Music). Recent: Into the Woods (Juilliard), Noises Off (Two River Theater) Frost/Nixon (Bay Street Theater), You Are Here, a new musical (Goodspeed Musicals); Photograph 51, Japan premiere (Umeda Arts Theater); Sondheim on Sondheim with the Boston Pops and the L.A. Phil; and the critically-acclaimed Broadway revival of Sunday in the Park with George, starring Jake Gyllenhaal and Annaleigh Ashford. Sarna directed the second national tour of Lincoln Center Theater’s South Pacific and was Associate Director of The National Theatre’s War Horse (North American Tour and Japan production). She started out at Lincoln Center Theater as Bartlett Sher’s assistant director on The Light in the Piazza and worked with him on the Tony-award winning revival of South Pacific, as well as the new musical Women on the Verge of a Nervous Breakdown and Clifford Odets’ Awake and Sing!. She holds an MFA from Columbia University.
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