Signature Theatre has announced that the Signature Center Opening Gala Celebration will take place on Monday, January 30th and will be a first look at the Company’s new home, the Frank
Gehry-designed Signature Center.
Guests will enjoy Dewar’s cocktails, a chef’s tasting menu, and entertainment as they explore the Company’s new home Signature Center (480 West 42nd Street between Dyer and 10th Avenues), which features three intimate theatres connected by a lobby with café, bar and bookstore, a Studio Theatre, a rehearsal studio and the Company’s administrative offices. The first performance at
Signature Center takes place the following day, with Athol Fugard’s BLOOD KNOT inaugurating The Alice Griffin Jewel Box Theatre.
Signature Theatre will honor actor, trustee and long-time supporter Edward Norton with the Company’s Playwrights’ Award, created to recognize those individuals and organizations who, through their vision and leadership, have placed their own signatures upon American theatre. Norton, who made his professional debut at Signature Theatre in Edward Albee’s Fragments and later returned in the Company’s production of Lanford Wilson’s Burn This, is being recognized for his unwavering championship of Signature and the building of Signature Center as Capital Campaign Chair. Previous recipients of the award include The Shubert Foundation, Time Warner Inc., Margot Adams, American Express and Hallie Foote.
In addition to Edward Norton, guests will include Edward Albee, Lee Blessing, Athol Fugard, Frank Gehry, John Guare, Hugh Hardy, Tony Kushner, Leslie Lee, Charles Mee, Tonya Pinkins and Kevin Spacey. John and Amy Griffin, who named The Alice Griffin Jewel Box Theatre in honor of theatre historian Alice Griffin, will also be in attendance. Additional guests will be announced at a later date.
DEWAR’S ® Signature is the sponsor of the evening.
2011-2012 SEASON OVERVIEW
RESIDENCY ONE - Athol Fugard SERIES
BLOOD KNOT
Written and Directed by Athol Fugard
January 31 – March 11, 2012
Tickets on sale now
Between patchwork walls in a one-room shack, two biracial South African brothers grapple with crippling poverty and lonely isolation. Fugard’s revolutionary breakthrough play is a searing indictment of apartheid and one of his most celebrated works.
The production will feature Colman Domingo (The Scottsboro Boys) as Zachariah and Scott Shepherd (Gatz) as Morris.
MY CHILDREN! MY AFRICA!
By Athol Fugard
Directed by Ruben Santiago-Hudson
May 1 – June 10, 2012
Written in 1989 shortly before the end of apartheid, My Children! My Africa! presents an honest and unflinching portrait of a country on the brink of revolution, and is a testament to the power and potential of youth, hope, and ideas.
