59E59 Theaters Sets 5A Season, New Membership Option

59E59 Theaters, now celebrating 10 years of presenting ground-breaking theater in New York, is thrilled to announce the creation of the 5A Season, a new Theater A season of five tremendous new plays for New York theater lovers. The 5A Season also includes a new membership option expanding on 59E59's popular membership program.

Presenting five new plays from celebrated theater makers across the US and around the world, 59E59's new 5A Season is an exciting addition to its already eclectic year-round programming. For $245, the 5A Season Bundle includes a ticket to each of the new 5A shows, including guaranteed same seating for all shows, plus the benefits of the regular 59E59 Membership (30% off all shows, discounts at partner dining establishments, $3 off drinks at the E:Bar, parking discounts, and more). The 59E59 Membership is included with the 5A Season Bundle.

The single ticket prices for the 5A Season will be $70 ($49 for 59E59 Members). Tickets to the 5A Season go on sale on May 27, with a special pre-sale for current 59E59 Members beginning May 19. The 5A Season Bundle is on sale now. Tickets are available by calling Ticket Central at 212-279-4200 or online at www.59e59.org.

"We are excited to now program Theater A year-round with the challenging, wonderful and sometimes funky shows that shore-up 59E59's reputation as an Off Broadway risk-taker," said Founder and Artistic Director Elysabeth Kleinhans. "We've assembled a season filled with exciting new voices telling extraordinary stories."

"The amount we've grown over the past ten years is truly phenomenal," added Executive Producer Peter Tear. "We are thrilled to offer this new option to our members, many of whom have supported us since we first opened our doors. Being able to give them more Theater A shows that really represent the heart and soul of 59E59 Theaters is quite exhilarating."

The 5A Season:
Week commencing July 7 - August 24
THE PIANIST OF WILLESDEN LANE, adapted and directed by Hershey Felder
Based on the book The Children of Willesden Lane: Beyond the Kindertransport: A Memoir of Music, Love, and Survival (Grand Central Publishing, 2003) by Mona Golabek and Lee Cohen
With Mona Golabek
Produced by Geffen Playhouse in association with Eighty-Eight Entertainment and Berkeley Rep

Set in Vienna in 1938 and in London during the Blitz, THE PIANIST OF WILLESDEN LANE tells the true story of Lisa Jura, a young Jewish pianist who is dreaming about her concert debut at Vienna's storied Musikverein concert hall. But with the issuing of new ordinances under the Nazi regime, everything for Lisa changes, except for her love of music and the pursuit of her dream. Featuring some of the world's most beloved piano music played live, THE PIANIST OF WILLESDEN LANE is performer Mona Golabek's true family story, a story of music, family survival, and hope. THE PIANIST OF WILLESDEN LANE makes its NYC premiere after critically acclaimed, sold out runs in Chicago, Boston, Berkeley, and Los Angeles.

Week commencing August 25 - October 12
BAUER by Lauren Gunderson, directed by Bill English
With Ron Guttman, Susi Damilano, and Stacy Ross
Produced by San Francisco Playhouse

World-renowned artist Rudolf Bauer was so driven to create, he sketched on scraps in a Nazi prison. Yet he eventually stopped painting forever when a feud erupted amongst himself, his patron and benefactor Solomon Guggenheim, and Bauer's lifetime love, Baroness Hilla Rebay - one of Guggenheim's most trusted curators. The Guggenheim Museum, originally built to house Bauer's works, opened without a single Bauer exhibited.

Commissioned by San Francisco Playhouse, BAUER is a compelling and controversial imagined face-off between Bauer and the two women he loved most as they each confront the passions of his life and art.

Rudolf Bauer is considered by many art historians and critics to have had a major impact on modern artists such as Jackson Pollock and William de Kooning, and yet his name and work mysteriously disappeared from the art world in the 1950s and many of his paintings remain banished to the basement of the Guggenheim Museum.

Week commencing October 20 - November 30
GHOST STORIES, written by Jeremy Dyson and Andy Nyman, directed by Jeremy Dyson, Andy Nyman, and Sean Holmes
Cast to be announced
Produced by Ghost Stories NYC Joint Venture and originally presented by the Lyric Hammersmith, London and Liverpool Everyman and Playhouse

Direct from the West End, GHOST STORIES is the hit heart-stopping play by masters of the macabre Jeremy Dyson and Andy Nyman (of the BBC's cult show The League of Gentlemen). Three men gather, each with an uncanny tale to tell: their chilling stories bleed off the stage and into your dreams. Not for the faint hearted, Time Out London called GHOST STORIES "an immaculately crafted evening of entertainment. Play the game and you'll have a scream!"

Week commencing January 12 - February 22
Show to be announced

Week commencing March 2 - April 12
LONESOME TRAVELER, created and directed by Jim O'Neil
Cast to be announced
Produced by the Rubicon Theater (Ventura, California)

LONESOME TRAVELER celebrates the legacy of folk as the soundtrack of social change and moral revolution. Employing nine singer/musicians dramatizing some of the key moments in the history of the American folk revival, LONESOME TRAVELER features classic songs such as "Will the Circle Be Unbroken," "This Land Is Your Land," "Puff the Magic Dragon," and "Maggie's Farm." Weaving together a tapestry of the venues and historic circumstances that put folk at the core of the great changes that swept American society from 1958 through to the early 1970s, LONESOME TRAVELER celebrates the legacy of folk as the soundtrack of social change and moral revolution.

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