The Public Theater and playwright, musician, filmmaker, and multi-talented performing artist Stew are currently in residence at Stanford University in California through March 11th workshopping Stew's new musical, Passing Strange. A work-in-progress presentation of the show will be performed on
March 10 and 11 (8 pm) in the university's Roble Studio Theater.
Written by Stew and collaborator Heidi Rodewald, directed and developed by Annie Dorsen, and choreographed by Karole Armitage,
Passing Strange is a theatrical work-in-progress "about a young man's emergence out of an incurious black middle-class world and his subsequent journey through various promised-land bohemias en route to an elusive sense of belonging." The show is billed as a "multi-disciplinary ensemble rock musical," and features "strong echoes of the experiences of legendary expatriates such as Josephine Baker and James Baldwin." It will feature Stew (as The Narrator) as well as De'Adre Aziza, Quincy Tyler Bernstine, Sherry Boone, Chad Goodridge, Julian Rozzell and Lawrence Stallings.
Commissioned by The Public Theater and Berkeley Repertory Theater, the piece began as a "subversive pop" cabaret show at Joe's Pub, and expanded versions have been seen at Symphony Space and the Sundance Theatre Lab; it also received a grant from the Jonathan Larson Performing Arts Foundation.
The Public Theater and Stew's residency recently launched Creative Risks, a new series bringing ground-breaking contemporary artists to Stanford to develop new works and participate in diverse campus-wide activities and workshops. For information visit
http://sica.stanford.edu. For tickets call the Stanford Ticket Office at 650.725.ARTS.
For more information on the Public Theater, visit
www.publictheater.org.
