Playing On Air Reveals Summer 2023 Season Of Audio Plays Featuring John Patrick Shanley, Debra Messing & More

Playing on Air has revealed its Summer 2023 podcast season, featuring an exciting lineup of nine audio plays curated and produced by Founder and Consulting Director Claudia Catania.

Beginning Sunday, July 9, the new season will present exciting short plays like Aurin Squire's JFK TAXI, an otherworldly urban comedy directed by Marchánt Davis (Good Night, Oscar; Max's "Reality") and starring Toney Goins (Showtime's "Billions"), Kerry Warren (Much Ado About Nothing) and Louis Mustillo ("Mike & Molly"). Later in the season, the incomparable David Ives directs Danny Burstein (Moulin Rouge!, Fiddler on the Roof), Susie Essman ("Curb Your Enthusiasm," "Broad City"), Steven Boyer (Kimberly Akimbo), Brittany K. Allen (The Good John Proctor) and Lee Wilkof (Waitress, Wicked) in the world premiere of his preternatural play SECOND SIGHT, in which a retired historian's minor surgery brings up major questions.

The season will also include acclaimed playwright Lloyd Suh's HAPPY BIRTHDAY, MR. ABERNATHY, starring Len Cariou and Ken Leung, and James McLindon's I DON'T KNOW, starring Jay O. Sanders, Bobby Moreno, Sue Jean Kim, Jeff Biehl and Brittany K. Allen, as well as gems from playwrights Amanda Quaid (ECHO AND NARCISSUS) and Cary Gitter (THE ARMY DANCE, directed by Emily Bergl). Mid-season, the podcast will present world premieres of Rehana Lew Mirza's MARY MARY QUITE CONTRARY and Mike Lew's TYPHOID MARY, a Wordsmith Duo Commission supported by the Axe-Houghton Foundation. Both comedies, inspired by infamous real-life cook "Typhoid" Mary Mallon, were directed by Moritz von Stuelpnagel and feel all too relevant in these still "unprecedented times."

In August, the season ends on a high note with the world premiere of BONNET, a marital (and martial) comedy written and directed by Tony Award and Pulitzer Prize-winning playwright John Patrick Shanley, starring Debra Messing ("Will & Grace," "Smash") and John Turturro ("Severance, "The Plot Against America"), and recorded live during Playing on Air's 10th anniversary benefit celebration at 54 Below.

New episodes will be released each Sunday morning via podcast and on our website, playingonair.org. To listen, subscribe on Apple Podcasts or search 'Playing on Air' on your favorite podcast platform.

"Our purpose," said Founder and Consulting Director Claudia Catania, "has always been threefold-to deliver first-rate audio drama that supplements the theater diet of devotees; cultivate theater newcomers with high-quality audio shorts followed by insightful interviews with featured artists; and to provide entertainment to those who may not have the time, means or access to a treasure trove of extraordinary contemporary one-acts. Our Summer 2023 audio continues this tradition. And I'm excited to work with Yvie Jones, Playing on Air's new executive director, to share these lovingly selected and produced plays with listeners everywhere."

About Playing on Air

The long-running audio drama series is the home of America's greatest playwrights, actors, and directors - a new way to experience theater for free and on demand. Every episode includes an interview between the creators, ranging from actors' theatrical process, to the playwright's method, to the quirks and themes of each particular work.

Recent episodes have featured Timothée Chalamet, Audra McDonald, Amy Ryan, Zoe Kazan, Adam Driver, David Harbour, Rosie Perez, and Bobby Cannavale in plays by Dominique Morisseau, David Ives, Lynn Nottage, Donald Margulies, Julia Cho, and David Lindsay-Abaire.