Yale Rep Announces 2018-19 Season
By: Stephi Wild Mar. 20, 2018
Yale Repertory Theatre (James Bundy, Artistic Director; Victoria Nolan, Managing Director), the multiple Tony Award-winning theatre dedicated to the production of new plays and bold interpretations of classic works, has announced its 2018-19 Season.
Artistic Director James Bundy said, "Yale Rep's 2018-19 season promises audiences four singular theatrical adventures, with a fifth production still to be announced. I am thrilled that Yale Rep audiences will be the first in the country to see the breathtaking new production created by legendary theatre artist Peter Brook and Marie-Hélène Estienne. And I am equally delighted to welcome some of the most exciting talents in the American theatre--Carl Cofield, Jesse Rasmussen, Tori Sampson, Charise Castro Smith, and Laurie Woolery--to create work on our stages in the year ahead." The season opens with the world premiere of El Huracán (September 28-October 20), a powerful take of family and forgiveness by Charise Castro Smith, directed by Laurie Woolery, presented in collaboration with The Sol Project.EL HURACÁN
By Charise Castro Smith
Directed by Laurie Woolery
Presented in Collaboration with The Sol Project
September 28-October 20, 2018
University Theatre, 222 York Street An epic hurricane threatens Miami. A mother and daughter ready themselves for the storm as Abuela takes shelter in a world of memory, music, and magic. A powerful tale of family and forgiveness, El Huracán reveals what can be rebuilt in the aftermath of life's most devastating tempests--and what can never be replaced.Charise Castro Smith is a playwright, television writer, and actor originally from Miami. Her playwriting credits include Feathers and Teeth (Goodman Theatre), Estrella Cruz [The Junkyard Queen] (Ars Nova/Halcyon Theatre), The Hunchback of Seville (Washington Ensemble Theatre/Trinity Repertory Company), Washeteria (Soho Rep.), and Boomcracklefly (Miracle Theatre). She was most recently a Supervising Producer on The Haunting of Hill House for Netflix, and prior to that, her pilot The Death of Eva Sofia Valdez was shot for ABC/ABCS. Smith is a recipient of a Van Lier Fellowship at New Dramatists and is an alumna of Ars Nova's Play Group and The New Georges Jam. She holds an MFA from Yale School of Drama. Laurie Woolery is a director/playwright/educator/producer who has worked at theatres across the country including The Public Theater, Oregon Shakespeare Festival, Yale Rep (Imogen Says Nothing, 2017), Trinity Repertory, Goodman Theatre, Cornerstone Theater Company, and South Coast Repertory. Recent projects include the world premiere of Mary Kathryn Nagle's Manahatta at Oregon Shakespeare Festival and the world premiere musical of As You Like It co-created with Shaina Taub for Public Works with The Public Theater. Laurie has developed new work with diverse communities ranging from incarcerated women to residents of a Kansas town devastated by a tornado. She creates site-specific work that ranges from a working sawmill in Eureka to the banks of the Los Angeles River. Currently, Laurie is the Director of Public Works at The Public Theater. Laurie is the former Associate Artistic Director of Cornerstone Theater Company and Conservatory Director at South Coast Repertory. Laurie teaches at universities across the country and serves on the Board of the Latino Producers Action Network and Latinx Commons, and she is a founding member of The Sol Project. The Sol Project (Jacob G. Padrón, Artistic Director) is a new theatre initiative dedicated to producing the work of Latinx playwrights in New York City and beyond. In partnership with leading theatres around the country, The Sol Project amplifies Latinx voices and hopes to build a kaleidoscopic body of work for the new American theatre. The Sol Project launched with the world premiere of Alligator by Hilary Bettis in collaboration with New Georges, followed by the New York premieres of Seven Spots on the Sun by Martin Zimmerman (Rattlestick Playwrights Theater) and Oedipus El Rey by Luis Alfaro (The Public Theater). Sol's founding artistic collective is Claudia Acosta, Elena Araoz, Adriana Gaviria, David Mendizábal, Kyoung Park, and Laurie Woolery. Partners include Atlantic Theater Company, Berkeley Repertory Theatre, Cara Mía Theatre Company, LAByrinth Theater Company, New Georges, MCC Theater, Oregon Shakespeare Festival, Playwrights Horizons, Rattlestick Playwrights Theater, The Playwrights Realm, The Public Theater, WP Theater, and Yale Rep. www.solproject.org U.S. Premiere
THE PRISONER
Text and Stage Direction by Peter Brook and Marie-Hélène Estienne
Commissioned by C.I.C.T. - Théâtre des Bouffes du Nord
Co-commissioned by National Theatre, London; The Grotowski Institute; Ruhrfestspiele Recklinghausen; Yale Repertory Theatre; Theatre for a New Audience, New York
November 2-17, 2018
Yale Repertory Theatre, 1120 Chapel Street Two-time Tony Award winner Peter Brook-widely hailed as the most influential director of the 20th century-and his longtime collaborator Marie-Hélène Estienne examine the complexities of crime, justice, and compassion in a breathtaking new international production. A man sits alone outside a prison. Who is he, and what is he doing there? Is he free, or is he the prisoner?Peter Brook was born in London in 1925. Throughout his career, he has distinguished himself in various genres: theatre, opera, cinema, and writing. He has directed over 70 productions in London, Paris, and New York. His work with the Royal Shakespeare Company includes Love's Labour's Lost, Measure for Measure, Titus Andronicus, King Lear, Marat/Sade, US, A Midsummer Night's Dream, and Antony and Cleopatra. In 1971, he founded with Micheline Rozan the International Centre for Theatre Research in Paris and in 1974, opened its permanent base in the Bouffes du Nord Theatre. There, he directed Timon of Athens, The Iks, Ubu aux Bouffes, Conference of the Birds, L'Os, The Cherry Orchard, The Mahabharata, Woza Albert!, The Tempest, The Man Who, Qui est la?, Happy Days, Je suis un Phe?nome?ne, Le Costume, The Tragedy of Hamlet, Far Away, La Mort de Krishna, Ta Mayn dans la Mienne, The Grand Inquisitor, Tierno Bokar, Sizwe Banzi, Fragments, Warum Warum, Love Is My Sin, 11 and 12, Une Flu?te Enchante?e, The Suit, and The Valley of Astonishment--many of these both in French and English. In opera, he directed La Bohe?me, Boris Godounov, The Olympians, Salome?, Le Nozze de Figaro (Covent Garden); Faust, Eugene Onegin (The Metropolitan Opera); La Trage?die de Carmen, and Impressions of Pelleas (Bouffes du Nord); and Don Giovanni (Aix en Provence Festival). Peter Brook's books include his autobiography, Threads of Time, as well as The Empty Space, The Shifting Point, There Are No Secrets, Evoking (and Forgetting) Shakespeare, and The Quality of Mercy. His films include Moderato Cantabile, Lord of the Flies, Marat/Sade, Tell Me Lies, King Lear, Meetings with Remarkable Men, The Mahabharata, and The Tragedy of Hamlet. Marie-Hélène Estienne In 1974, she worked with Peter Brook on the casting for Timon of Athens, and consequently joined the Centre International de Cre?ations The?a?trales (CICT) for the creation of Ubu aux Bouffes in 1977. She was Peter Brook's assistant on La trage?die de Carmen, Le Mahabharata, and collaborated on the stagings of The Tempest, Impressions de Pelle?as, Woza Albert!, and The Tragedy of Hamlet. She worked on the dramaturgy of Qui est la?. With Peter Brook, she co-authored The Man Who and Je suis un Phe?nome?ne shown at the The?a?tre des Bouffes du Nord. She wrote the French adaptation of Can Themba's play Le costume, and Sizwe Bansi est mort, by authors Athol Fugard, John Kani, and Winston Ntshona. She wrote the French and English adaptations of The Grand Inquisitor, based on Dostoevsky's The Brothers Karamazov; Tierno Bokar; and the English adaptation of 11 and 12 by Amadou Hampate? Ba. With Peter Brook, she co-directed Fragments, five short pieces by Beckett, and again with Peter Brook and composer Franck Krawczyk, she freely adapted Mozart and Schikaneder's Die Zauberflo?te into Une Flu?te Enchante?e. She also shared in the creation of The Suit and The Valley of Astonishment. TWELFTH NIGHT
By William Shakespeare
Directed by Carl Cofield
March 15-April 6, 2019
University Theatre, 222 York Street Separated from her twin brother in a shipwreck, Viola disguises herself as a man and falls in love with her new employer Orsino, who dotes on OIivia, who falls for Cesario, who's really Viola. And that's before Sebastian washes ashore in search of his missing sister. In director Carl Cofield's vibrant Afro-futurist production, Shakespeare's most wonderful romantic comedy brims with music and dances to the heartbeat of unrequited love. Twelfth Night is Yale Rep's 2018-19 Will Power! production. The run includes three 10:15AM performances on April 2, 3, and 4, 2019, available to high school groups. For information on Will Power!, please call 203.432.9734 or email yalerep@yale.edu.Carl Cofield directed One Night in Miami (Rogue Machine Theater, world premiere; Denver Center Theatre Company; numerous awards from the Los Angeles NAACP, including Best Director, and L.A. Drama Critics Circle; Huffington Post: Best of L.A., 2013). Other directing credits include A Raisin in the Sun (Two River Theater Company); Henry IV Part 2 (Oregon Shakespeare Festival); Disgraced (Denver Center); The Mountaintop (Cleveland Play House); the 50th-anniversary production of Dutchman (Classical Theatre of Harlem/National Black Theatre; AUDELCO nomination, Best Director); The Tempest, Macbeth (Classical Theatre of Harlem; AUDELCO nomination, Best Director). Additional credits: the world premieres of The White Card by Claudia Rankine directed by Diane Paulus (Associate Director, American Repertory Theater) and Camp David by Laurence Wright directed by Molly Smith (Assistant Director, Arena Stage). He also directed the reading of Camp David for President and First Lady Carter at the Carter Center retreat in Colorado. As an actor, he has been seen at Manhattan Theater Club (Ruined), Berkeley Rep, ALLIANCE THEATRE, Arena Stage, The Shakespeare Theater, Intiman Theatre, Actors Theatre of Louisville, Shakespeare Santa Cruz, Milwaukee Rep, Alabama Shakespeare, McCarter Theatre, The Acting Company, The Studio Theatre, and many others. Teaching: New York University, The New School. Education: MFA, Columbia University. carlcofield.com World Premiere
CADILLAC CREW
By Tori Sampson
Directed by Jesse Rasmussen
April 26-May 18, 2019
Yale Repertory Theatre, 1120 Chapel Street On the day of a much anticipated speech by Rosa Parks during the height of the Civil Rights Movement, four activists working in a Virginia civil rights office wonder whether the proclamation of equality amongst mankind includes women. With remarkable insight and unexpected humor, Cadillac Crew reclaims the stories of the forgotten leaders who blazed the trail for desegregation and women's rights and asks: when will the world be ready to embrace women in all their capacity?Tori Sampson is a native of Boston. Her plays include If Pretty Hurts Ugly Must be a Muhfucka (Playwrights Horizons, 2019), This Land Was Made (Vineyard Theatre, 2018), and Where Butterflies go in the Winter. Her plays have been developed at Great Plains Theatre Conference, Berkeley Repertory Theatre's The Ground Floor residency program, Victory Garden's IGNITION Festival of New Plays, Playwrights Foundation, and Ubuntu Theater Project. Tori is a 2017-18 Playwright's Center Jerome Fellow. Two of her plays appeared on the 2017 Kilroys List. Her awards and honors include the 2016 Relentless Award, Honorable Mention; the 2016 Paula Vogel Award in Playwriting from The Kennedy Center; the Lorraine Hansberry Playwriting Award, Second Place; the ALLIANCE THEATRE's 2017 Kendeda Prize, Finalist; the 2018 Susan Smith Blackburn Prize, Finalist. Tori is currently working on commissions from Berkeley Repertory Theatre, Yale Repertory Theatre, and Atlantic Theater Company. She holds a BS in sociology from Ball State University and an MFA in playwriting from Yale School of Drama. Jesse Rasmussen is a New York-based director, writer, and lyricist originally hailing from Melbourne, Australia. Since moving to New York in June 2017, she has directed Jeremy O. Harris's Xander Xyst, Dragon: 1 at Ars Nova's ANT Fest, a short film, and music videos for several artists including The Ah (Jeremy Gustin). Jesse received her MFA in directing from Yale School of Drama, where she directed John Ford's 'Tis Pity She's A Whore, Shakespeare's Macbeth, This Land Was Made by Tori Sampson, and Everything That Never Happened by Sarah Mantell. At Yale Cabaret, she directed David Harrower's Knives in Hens. Jesse served as Co-Artistic Director of Yale Summer Cabaret's 2016 Season, co-curating a four-play season titled Seven Deadly Sins, for which she directed the Manhattan Theatre Project's adaptation of Alice in Wonderland and Sarah Kane's Phaedra's Love to critical acclaim. Jesse is a founding member of award-winning theatrical collective Four Larks and worked with the company as writer, director, and co-creator from 2007-15. Jesse is a dual citizen of and has worked and studied extensively in the United States and Australia.
Yale Repertory Theatre, the internationally celebrated professional theatre in residence at Yale School of Drama, has championed new work since 1966, producing well over 100 premieres-including two Pulitzer Prize winners and four other nominated finalists-by emerging and established playwrights. Seventeen Yale Rep productions have advanced to Broadway, garnering more than 40 Tony Award nominations and ten Tony Awards. Yale Rep is also the recipient of the Tony Award for Outstanding Regional Theatre.
Established in 2008, Yale's Binger Center for New Theatre has distinguished itself as one of the nation's most robust and innovative new play programs. To date, the Binger Center has supported the work of more than 50 commissioned artists and underwritten the world premieres and subsequent productions of 30 new plays and musicals at Yale Rep and theatres across the country-including next season's El Huracán by Charise Castro Smith, The Prisoner by Peter Brook and Marie-Hélène Estienne, and Cadillac Crew by Tori Sampson.Yale Repertory Theatre offers a variety of subscription packages, starting at less than $35 per ticket for the general public and $10 for students.
Subscriptions are available online at yalerep.org, by phone at (203) 432-1234, and in person at the Yale Rep Box Office (1120 Chapel Street). Individual and group tickets for the entire season will go on sale on August 28.Yale Repertory Theatre is supported in part by the Connecticut Office of the Arts.Comments
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