Hedgerow Theatre Company Announces 2022 Winter and Spring Line-up

Hedgerow Theatre Company will continue their 99th season welcoming audiences back to live theatre with three new productions throughout the winter and spring of 2022. Hedgerow returned to indoor performances this fall with two full-scale productions under the leadership of new Executive Artistic Director Marcie Bramucci. The resident repertory theatre in Rose Valley will follow up a fall of sold-out performances with Cowboy Versus Samurai, Good Grief, and In the Next Room, or the vibrator play.

Continuing a season exploring the vital nature of human connection, Hedgerow's 2022 play selections highlight the intricacies of relationships and self-discovery. "In these upcoming productions we plunge significant depths and at the same time have much-needed playfulness in full swing," notes Bramucci.

Running January 19th - February 6th, the fast-paced and witty Cowboy Versus Samurai, by playwright Michael Golamco, will be presented in partnership with Philadelphia Asian Performing Artists (PAPA) and directed by Cat Ramirez. Travis and Chester, a high school English teacher and emerging activist, respectively, are the entire Asian American population of Breakneck, Wyoming. Enter Veronica Lee, a Korean American biology teacher from NYC, who expands and challenges their world. Love triangles ensue in this turn-of-the-millennium rom-com retelling of Cyrano de Bergerac as the trio reckon with how to be Samurai in a Cowboy-town.

"Cowboy Versus Samurai is a play about finding community and the vulnerability, messiness, and personal growth that comes along with that search." says Ramirez. "This storyline vibrates in my bones and I am honored to bring this silly and tender play to life in a place I call home." "This play shows that diversity of thought and experiences exists among people of Pan-Asian descent," PAPA's Outreach Coordinator, Liana Irvine. "It portrays things familiar to our local Pan-Asian performance community, such as tokenism, racial trauma, and intersections of race and gender. PAPA values this opportunity to bring its mission: building communal, economic, and artistic opportunities, into the greater Philadelphia region. We're excited to work with Hedgerow on this play asking 'what is identity without community?"

Continuing the season, Good Grief, by 2020 Steinberg Playwright Award winner Ngozi Anyanwu, will run March 23rd - April 9th. Fresh off the success of Last of the Love Letters, which opened the Atlantic Theatre Company, Anyanwu has been hailed by The New York Times as a playwright who "is developing new forms!" In this cosmic, hilarious, and heart-breaking coming-of-self story, the young Nkechi navigates the loss of her high school love in her childhood home in the Philly suburbs. The play traverses the liminal space between the past and the present while navigating the process of grief and loss with charm and poignancy. Executive Artistic Director Marcie Bramucci adds, "I am thrilled to produce Ngozi's work in my first season with Hedgerow, and am excited for this play specifically, Good Grief - which explodes with heart and humor - to find its way home, for its Philadelphia Regional premiere."

Good Grief will be directed by internationally recognized director, actor and educator, Nemuna Ceesay. "Good Grief is of course a story of loss, grief, and sadness, but it also leans into the beauty of love, connection, resilience, and hope," offers Ceesay. "In a lot of ways, this show mirrors our current reality through the specific lens of Nkechi - a first-generation, Black, Nigerian, Female-Identifying character who, through her grief, comes to a greater understanding of herself and those around her. I am so honored to bring the regional premiere of Ngozi Anyanwu's Good Grief to the Pennsylvania suburbs, where our show takes place. I have no doubt Hedgerow Theatre audiences will feel connected to the rich and complex characters in this world."

Later in spring of 2022, Hedgerow will stage In the Next Room, or the vibrator play from June 1st - 19th, written by award-winning playwright, author, and essayist Sarah Ruhl. It is the dawn of the age of electricity in the 1880s when the Victorian household of Dr. and Mrs. Givings is complicated by a new revelation. The Doctor is a single-minded devotee of progress who has innocently invented a new treatment for "hysteria": the vibrator. His wife is a young mother and bystander listening from the other side of the door as he implements his curious new cure. This heartfelt, provocative, and funny play by Ruhl, MacArthur "Genius" award-winner, harkens back to a time of discovery and examines the human hunger for connection.

Barrymore award-winning regional director Harriet Power returns to Hedgerow to direct, following the acclaimed 2019 production of Three Sisters. "For me, In the Next Room... is most crucially about loneliness...and connection," says Power. "It's about what truly turns us on: fun, friendship, adventure; feeling seen and understood, daring to love, seeing beyond our own limitations."

Patrons can currently purchase a 2022 three-show package for $90, granting them one discounted ticket each to Cowboy Versus Samurai, Good Grief, and In the Next Room, or the vibrator play. Individual tickets will go on sale in the coming weeks.

Accessibility options will be available for productions including Audio Description for patrons who are blind or experience low vision, and Relaxed Performances, which are sensory-friendly shows that create a judgment-free and inclusive environment for patrons with a range of sensory and communication differences, including individuals on the autism spectrum and people of all abilities who would benefit from a relaxed theatre-going environment. Pre-performance sensory tours will be given 45 minutes prior to curtain on the evening of Audio-Described and Relaxed Performances.

For more information, visit www.hedgerowtheatre.org.

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