Theater Works Announces 2022-2023 Season Productions

Theater Works has announced a new lineup full of family favorites, a holiday mainstay hit and glorious musicals. Theater Works' Mainstage series features musicals, drama and a return to large scale productions sure to stir imagination and maybe even some singing-a-long. The YouthWorks series is family-friendly fun, while the After Dark series is for mature audiences only.

The three-show package, which offers the best seating options and best price for mainstage shows, will be available for $138 through the Box Office by phone only, beginning Monday, March 28. Single performance tickets for all productions will go on sale to the public on Friday, July 1, 2022.

Mainstage Series

The fall kicks off on the mainstage with the Tony Award®-winning Roald Dahl's Matilda The Musical (9/30/22-10/16/22 Gyder Theater).This show revels in the anarchy of childhood, the power of imagination and the inspiring story of a girl who dreams of a better life. Packed with high-energy dance numbers, catchy songs and an unforgettable star turn for a young actress, Matilda is a joyous girl power romp.

TheaterWorks then rings in the holiday season, with A Christmas Carol, (12/2/22-12/24/22 Gyder Theater) resurrecting our original production with new visual designs for the most well-known of all Holiday classics. See the legendary transformation of an old miser taken on a journey of self-redemption, courtesy of several mysterious Christmas apparitions. Cherished characters like Ebenezer Scrooge, Bob Cratchit, and Tiny Tim come to life with the magic only live theatre can create. Spend your holidays experiencing this traditional and magical production that shows us the meaning of Christmas.

The Hunchback of Notre Dame (2/17/23-3/5/23 Gyder Theater)is based on the Victor Hugo novel and songs from the Disney® animated feature and showcases the film's Academy Award®-nominated score, as well as new songs by Alan Menken and Steven Schwartz.

The musical begins as the bells of Notre Dame sound through the famed cathedral in fifteenth-century Paris. Quasimodo, the deformed bell-ringer who longs to be "Out There," observes all of Paris reveling in the Feast of Fools. Held captive by his devious caretaker, the archdeacon Dom Claude Frollo, he escapes for the day and joins the boisterous crowd, only to be treated cruelly by all but the beautiful Romani woman, Esmeralda. As suitors vie for her attention, Frollo embarks on a mission to destroy the Roma - and it's up to Quasimodo to save them all.

Youth Works Series

Junie B. Jones Jr. (8/12/22-8/28/22 Gyder Theater) is the first of two YouthWorks shows in a delightful adaptation of four of Barbara Park's best-selling books, brought to life in a genuinely comical (and not strictly-for-kids) musical. Awaken a young person's desire to read with the sassy little diva, Junie B. Jones, and her adventures in first grade. Youth Works' second show is to be announced and will happen May 5 through 21, 2023.

After Dark Series

5 Lesbians Eating a Quiche (1/20/23-2/12/23 McMillin Theater)

"5 Lesbians Eating Quiche," co-written by Andrew Hobgood and Evan Linder and directed by Sarah Gitenstein, finds five women assembled in a church basement (along with the audience) for the 1956 annual meeting of the Susan B. Anthony Society for the Sisters of Gertrude Stein's annual quiche breakfast.

The normally idyllic gathering, where the motto is "no men, no meat, all manners," is upended when the Society's matriarchs must confront the startling revelation that an atom bomb may be falling on their fair city. As fears are confronted and confessions fly, the chipper ladies stay firm in their commitment that the quiche is a mighty thing and that one must "respect the egg."

William Shakespeare's Land of the Dead (3/31/23-4/23/23 McMillin Theater)

A true and accurate account of the 1599 Zombie plague. London, 1599. Shakespeare's Henry V opens the Globe Playhouse, but while the actors strut and fret, an excess of bile plagues the populace outside.

As the plague spreads through London, the Globe is placed in quarantine and the survivors within must fight for their lives. Can they escape? Is there a cure? Is artistic integrity ever worth dying for? This show is for mature audiences only.

For more information, visit Theaterworks.org.

The Theater Works Box Office can be reached at 623.815.7930 Monday - Friday 10am to 4pm.Theater Works is located at the Peoria Center for the Performing Arts (10580 N 83rd Drive, Peoria).

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