Wilbury Theatre Group to Present HIR By Taylor Mac This Winter
A sly, subversive comedy that challenges the dynamics of family, gender, and identity.
By: Chloe Rabinowitz Dec. 18, 2023
Wilbury Theatre Group will present the professional Rhode Island premiere of Hir by Taylor Mac and directed by Brien Lang from January 18 - February 4, 2024. Tickets for all performances are $5-$55 through the Wilbury Theatre Group's innovative "All-Access" ticketing program, and are available at thewilburygroup.org/hir.
Somewhere in the suburbs, Isaac has returned from the wars to help take care of his ailing father, only to discover a household in revolt. The insurgent: his mom. Liberated from an oppressive marriage, with Isaac's newly out transgender sibling as her ally, she's on a crusade to dismantle the patriarchy. But in Taylor Mac's sly, subversive comedy, annihilating the past doesn't always free you from it.
MacArthur Genius Award-winner, Taylor Mac is the innovative theater-maker behind A 24-Decade History of Popular Music and Holiday Sauce. The New York Times calls Hir, "A remarkable, audacious, uproarious black comedy with a daring combination of realism and madcap absurdity." Vulture adds, "Smart. Dark. Difficult. Deliberately disorienting. If you don't know whether to laugh or cry at this spectacle, I suspect that's how Taylor Mac likes it."
"It's an honor for us to be bringing Taylor Mac's work to the stage for our audiences," says Wilbury Theatre Group's Artistic Director, Josh Short. "Mac has been hailed as among the greatest performance artists working today, and Hir has all of the biting humor, shock, and surprise that audiences love about Mac's work, while still challenging the dynamics of family, gender, and identity of today. In the hands of this incredibly talented cast and creative team we've assembled, and under the steady hand of Brien Lang, this production is sure to challenge our audiences to reconsider the boundaries of what theater can be in the best ways possible."
For tickets and more information, visit thewilburygroup.org/hir.
Performance Details:
About the Wilbury Theatre Group Production
Hir
By Taylor Mac
Directed by Brien Lang
Featuring
Zach Gibb
Will Malloy
Jim O'Brien*
Scenic Design by Monica Shinn
Lighting Design by Alexander Sprague
Costume Design by Matt Oxley
Videography by Robert Isenberg
Puppet Design by Jason Miller
Technical Direction by Dave Carney
Dramaturgy by Am Wyckoff
Stage Manager James Kane*
Assistant Stage Manager Kerin Hagin
Production Assistant / Understudy Edward Galts
Costume Assistant Arianna C. Davey
Front of House Management by Christine Treglia
Volunteer Management by Renee Bessette
Production Photos by Erin X. Smithers
*Appears courtesy Actors' Equity Association, the Union of Professional Actors and Stage Managers in the United States.
About the Playwright
Taylor Mac (who uses "judy", lowercase sic, not as a name but as a gender pronoun) is a playwright, actor, singer-songwriter, performance artist, director and producer. "A critical darling of the New York scene" (NY Magazine), TimeOut NY has called Mac "One of the most exciting theater artists of our time" (naming judy a future theater legend). Judy's work has been performed at New York City's Lincoln Center, The Public Theatre and Playwrights Horizons, Los Angeles's Royce Hall, Minneapolis's Guthrie Theater, Chicago's Steppenwolf Theatre, the Sydney Opera House, Boston's American Repertory Theatre, Stockholm's SodraTheatern, the Spoleto Festival, San Francisco's Curran Theater and MOMA, and literally hundreds of other theaters, museums, music halls, opera houses, cabarets, and festivals around the globe. Judy is the author of seventeen full-length plays and performance pieces including HIR (placed on the top ten theater of 2015 lists of The New York Times, New York Magazine, and Time Out NY; published by North Western University Press and in American Theater Magazine), THE LILY'S REVENGE (Obie Award), THE WALK ACROSS AMERICA FOR MOTHER EARTH (named One of the Best Plays of 2011 by The New York Times), THE YOUNG LADIES OF (Chicago's Jeff Award nomination for best solo), RED TIDE BLOOMING (Ethyl Eichelberger Award), THE BE(A)ST OF Taylor Mac (Edinburgh Festival's Herald Angel Award) and in collaboration with Mandy Patinkin, Susan Stroman and Paul Ford, Mac created THE LAST TWO PEOPLE ON EARTH: AN APOCALYPTIC VAUDEVILLE. Mac is the recipient of multiple awards including the Doris Duke Performing Artist Award, a Guggenheim Award, the Herb Alpert Award in Theater, the Peter Zeisler Memorial Award, the Helen Merrill Playwriting Award and an Obie. An alumnus of New Dramatists judy is currently a New York Theater Workshop Usual Suspect and the Resident playwright at the Here Arts Center.
About WILBURY THEATRE GROUP:
An award-winning, not-for-profit professional theatre company, The Wilbury Theatre Group engages our community in thought-provoking conversation through new works, reimagined classics and adventurous playmaking. We are idealistic, ambitious, and stubborn in our resolve to create theatre that entertains, enlightens, and inspires. www.thewilburygroup.org
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