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Burton, Wong, Turner, Etc. Part of Williamstown '07 Season
By: BWW News Desk Jan. 29, 2007
Williamstown Theatre Festival's '07 season, featuring ten works on three stages, will include three world premieres: Dissonance by Damian Lanigan, Villa America by Crispin Whittell and Daniel Goldfarb and David Kirshenbaum's musical Party Come Here.
The season will also feature performances by Kate Burton (in The Corn is Green), and B.D. Wong, as well as a production of Crimes of the Heart directed by Tony Award-nominated film and stage star Kathleen Turner.
In addition to presenting work on the Main Stage and Nikos Stage of the '62 Center for Theatre and Dance, this season, the Festival will present two productions on the Center Stage, a studio theatre with an industrial character. On the Center Stage, the Festival will present Wong in the one-man musical Herringbone, book by Tom Cone, music by Skip Kennon, lyrics by Ellen Fitzhugh, and directed by Williamstown Artistic Director Roger Rees, and The Physicists by Friedrich Dürrenmatt, translation by James Kirkup, directed by Kevin O'Rourke, in association with the Williams College Summer Theatre Lab.
A complete performance schedule follows:
B. D. Wong in Herringbone
Book by Tom Cone, Music by Skip Kennon, Lyrics by Ellen Fitzhugh
Directed by Roger Rees
"Tony-award winner B.D. Wong stars in this one-man musical that recounts the childhood of vaudeville wunderkind George after he is possessed by the angry spirit of a toe-tapping dwarf. This unconventional work deals with the exploitation of child stars and the drive to perform. Adult situations presented," state press materials.
June 27 – July 8, Nikos Stage
Dissonance by Damian Lanigan - world premiere
Directed by Amanda Charlton
"Members of the Bradley String Quartet have their artistic differences. How will they be resolved when one of rock and roll's biggest stars enters their world? Damian Lanigan, novelist and author for BBC Radio, explores the collision of two musical sensibilities in this engrossing new play."
July 4 – 15, Main Stage
The Front Page by Ben Hecht and Charles MacArthur
Director to be announced
"Concocted criminal charges, wily politicians, love nests and the daily grind of creating and selling newspapers are all in a day's work in the classic Broadway comedy set in a Chicago newsroom. This much-loved work is presented in a crackling and humorous new production."
July 11 – 22, Nikos Stage
Villa America by Crispin Whittell – world premiere
Directed by Crispin Whittell
"Gerald and Sara Murphy were at the center of the circle of artists, including F. Scott Fitzgerald, Ernest Hemingway and Pablo Picasso, who migrated to France in the 1920s. Set on the sun-soaked coast of the French Riviera, this new play commissioned by the Festival and written by Crispin Whittell (Darwin in Malibu), explores the lives, loves and losses of what Gertrude Stein called 'the Lost Generation.' In a happy scheduling coincidence, the Murphys and their circle will also be celebrated in an exhibition at the Williams College Museum of Art that opens right before the play premieres. "
July 18 – 29 Main Stage
The Autumn Garden by Lillian Hellman
Directed by David Jones
America's foremost woman playwright, Lillian Hellman, believed The Autumn Garden to be her best play. The setting is a summer resort on the Gulf of Mexico in 1949. Seven friends confronting middle age assess the choices they have made and are about to make. The work is compassionate, savagely funny and perhaps Hellman's most perceptive comment on the difficulties of "the great art of living together."
July 25 – Aug. 5, Nikos Stage
Crimes of the Heart by Beth Henley
Directed by Kathleen Turner
"Winner of the Pulitzer Prize, this dramatic comedy takes us into the lives of the Magrath sisters. Past resentments bubble to the surface as they are forced to deal with assorted relatives and past relationships while coping with the latest incident to disrupt their lives. The play is warm-hearted, humorous and teeming with humanity."
Kate Burton in The Corn is Green by Emlyn Williams
Directed by Nicholas Martin
"Miss Moffat is a strong-willed Welsh schoolteacher working in a small poverty-stricken coal mining town. Under her guidance, an illiterate teenager, Morgan Evans, transforms from bully to brilliant student. The distinguished lineage of actresses who have played Miss Moffat are Ethel Barrymore in the original Broadway production, Bette Davis in the film, Katherine Hepburn in the made-for-TV movie and Cicely Tyson in the Broadway revival. Now, Kate Burton takes on this classic role. Adding to the poignancy of the teacher-student relationship portrayed, Miss Burton's son, Morgan Ritchie, plays the role of Morgan Evans."
Aug. 7 – 18, Center Stage
The Physicists by Friedrich Dürrenmatt, translated by James Kirkup
Directed by Kevin O'Rourke
In Association with the Williams College Summer Theatre Lab
"Three inmates at the Cherry Trees Sanatorium believe themselves to be world famous physicists: Albert Einstein, Isaac Newton, and Johann Mobius. But are they indeed insane? And what are their actual identities: madmen, murderers or scientists? Dürrenmatt's 1962 comedy is a provocative examination of the impact of nuclear science on global power and the moral tolls of sanity."
Aug. 8 – 19, Nikos Stage
Party Come Here, book by Daniel Goldfarb, music and lyrics by David Kirshenbaum – world premiere
Directed by Christopher Ashley
"A nervous groom, a statue of Christ and a 500 year-old Jewish caveman converge to make miracles happen during a tropical storm on one magical night in Rio. Part farce, part fable, Party Come Here is a musical comedy that promises a collision of cultures as tantalizing as the sexiest city in the world."
Play to be announced
Directed by Maria Mileaf
Tickets will be available by mail in April. The box office and phones open in June. Additional information is available at www.wtfestival.org.
Photo of Kate Burton by Walter McBride/Retna Ltd.
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