Santa Fe Playhouse to Present SWEAT, A GENTLEMAN'S GUIDE TO LOVE & MURDER, and More for 2023 Season

Santa Fe Playhouse's 2023 season offers six mainstage productions, three installments of the Skeletal Series, a reading series, youth programming, theater classes, and new ticketing accessibility initiatives.

The exciting performance schedule includes the Tony Award-winning musical A Gentleman's Guide to Love & Murder and the Pulitzer Prize-winning labor rights drama, Sweat. The first play, The Baby Monitor, written by Santa Fe resident David Stallings, opens March 4.

"The plays this season are very literary-they tell stories," says Artistic Director Robyn Rikoon. "All the plays focus on families, and many deal with class issues, though that's not always right on the surface. Some of the plays are dark comedies, and all of them have a degree of humor. But what unites all of the plays is that there are no heroes. These are not stories that tell you who you should listen to or who you should identify with. These are characters in a specific place in time, and you get to choose who you side with. These are not plays with easy answers."

The 2023 season also has new ticketing accessibility initiatives designed to break any economic barriers that might keep audiences from seeing our shows. With Pay-What-You-Will, patrons decide how much they want to pay for a general admission ticket to preview performances. Five-dollar Rush Tickets are available after opening night, five minutes before showtime. (A general admission full-price ticket is $30.)

The complete 2023 season is below. Individual tickets go on sale Monday, January 9.

For information on our FlexPass subscription packages, available now, please visit santafeplayhouse.org.

Mainstage

The Baby Monitor
Written by David Stallings
Directed by Colin Hovde

Previews: March 2-3 Opening Night: March 4
When Claire's concerns over the welfare of her two-year-old second cousin are dangerously validated, she begins to question the family's principles and parenting skills. This topical new play explores same-sex parenting, race, class, and family values in today's America, as well as the danger of making assumptions. It was a finalist for the 2014 National New Play Network and has been produced in New York, Serbia, Ireland, and Italy. Stallings holds a bachelor of fine arts in theater from the College of Santa Fe and serves on the advisory board of LiveArts Santa Fe.

Skeletal Series

Alex and Olmsted presents HUBBA HUBBA
Begins April 6
The Playhouse welcomes back Maryland-based puppeteers Alex and Olmsted, who brought us Marooned! in 2022. HUBBA HUBBA is a collection of vignettes using puppetry and movement to explore romantic love. HUBBA HUBBA is a comedy that incorporates handmade mechanical objects, puppets, trick costumes, and masks to investigate love's triumphs and obstacles. Featuring singing and music, shadow puppetry, physical comedy, and-as is expected from an Alex and Olmsted production-audience participation. All ages are welcome.

Mainstage

Sweat
Written by Lynn Nottage
Directed by Robyn Rikoon
Previews: May 11-12 Opening Night: May 13

Rust Belt factory workers share drinks, secrets, and laughs, but when layoffs and picket lines begin to chip away at their trust, two close friends find themselves on opposite sides of a labor battle in this fast-paced drama that spans generations and includes a cast of characters ages 18 to 70. The winner of the 2017 Pulitzer Prize in Drama, the play explores class, addiction, rage, racism, and the loyalties and betrayals that make up our social fabric.

Skeletal Series

Where Did We Sit on the Bus?
Written by Brian Quijada
Starring Satya Jnani Chavez

Begins June 15

In this solo show, a Latina child asks, during a school lesson on Rosa Parks, "Where did we sit on the bus?" Follow her from childhood to adulthood as she explores her family's history, her identity as a first-generation American, and what the world will be like for her future children. Originally an autobiographical show by Quijada, Chavez performs this journey of self-discovery with Latin beats, hip-hop, and dance. All music is played live and looped by Chavez.

Mainstage

A Gentleman's Guide to Love & Murder
Book by Robert L. Freedman; Music by Steven Lutvak; Lyrics by Robert L. Freedman and Steven Lutvak; Based on a novel by Roy Horniman
Previews: July 13-14 Opening Night: July 15

When British, newly orphaned Monty Navarro discovers he's ninth in line to inherit the Earldom of Highhurst, he decides to murder every member of the high-society D'Ysquith family standing in his way, all the while keeping a mistress, Sibella Hallward, and courting the young Phoebe D'Ysquith. In this laugh-filled musical, the same actor plays all eight of the doomed heirs. A Gentleman's Guide won four Tony Awards in 2014, including Best Musical and Best Book of a Musical.

Skeletal Series

Bear Grease

Written by LightningCloud
Begins August 17

Featuring an all-Indigenous cast, this hilarious twist on the 1978 classic, Grease, reimagines the beloved musical as culturally relevant with Indigenous humor and pride. Bear Grease is the brainchild of Crystle Lightning (Cree) and MC RedCloud (Huichol), a husband-and-wife hip-hop duo who go by the name LightningCloud.

Mainstage

Fiesta Melodrama
Written by Brave and Talented Santa Feans
Directed by Felix Cordova

Begins August 24

Now in its 101st year, the Fiesta Melodrama is Santa Fe's oldest theatrical tradition, written in-house by anonymous locals. The Melodrama is our community's farcical Year in Review, skewering politicians, public-school policy, police, the press, and everything else that makes Santa Fe so "different." In 2023, 10-year Melodrama veteran Felix Cordova will step into the director's chair.

Mainstage

On Clover Road
Written by Steven Dietz
Directed by Robyn Rikoon

Previews: October 19-20 Opening Night: October 21

At an abandoned motel on a desolate American road, a distraught mother waits to be reunited with her runaway daughter. Out of desperation, she puts her trust in a private investigator, but no one is who they seem in this edge-of-your-seat, noir-style thriller. Family bonds are pushed to their limits in a gritty story of shocking twists.

Mainstage

The Night Before Christmas
Written by Anthony Neilson

Previews: November 28-29 Opening Night: November 30
Twas the night before Christmas, when all through The Warehouse, a creature was stirring-an elf! It's Christmas Eve and two men in a warehouse of borderline-legal merchandise discover an intruder in an elf costume. Or is he on a mission from the North Pole, sent to London to spread the truth about Christmas? Things get more complicated when Cherry arrives, demanding some hard-to-get swag-a Power Ranger for her kid. A seriously twisted, blatantly irreverent holiday comedy for the adults in the family.

Additional Programming:

PLAYHOUSE READING SERIES
January 27-29, 2023

Developmental readings of new plays by local and national playwrights.

PLAYHOUSE CO-PRESENTS

Art + Sol Santa Fe Winter Arts Festival
EVERY BRILLIANT THING by Duncan MacMillan with Jonny Donahoe
February 13
Based on true and untrue events, Every Brilliant Thing is a life-affirming story of depression, resilience, and the power of human connection. This internationally acclaimed story is humorous and sincere, a celebration of finding joy in the everyday.

Art + Sol Santa Fe Winter Arts Festival
CloudTop Comedy presents
LOVE SUCKS: A Comedy Tribute to The Single Life
February 14
If you're burnt out on dating apps, out of town weddings, and the commercialism of Valentine's Day, join us for a night of throwing shade and so much more!

PLAYHOUSE SUMMER YOUTH INTENSIVE
Last summer, the Santa Fe Playhouse invested in its first-ever Youth Theater Intensive Program. We welcomed young artists, ages 12-17, to experience two weeks of focused pre-career theater training that ended with mock auditions and a public performance of A Midsummer Night's Dream. As part of our 2023 Season, we are proud to announce a three week program, focusing on As You Like It and a musical component.

PLAYHOUSE STUDIO
Playhouse Studio workshops and intensives return in 2023 with a more robust and extensive curriculum. By offering classes to the Santa Fe community, we seek to deepen our bonds to local actors and theater artists, whether they are professionals or just dipping their toes in the water of this form.

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