PAGEANT, TRUE WEST & More Set for Cygnet Theatre's 12th Season

Cygnet Theatre has announced a Season 12 lineup that reveals common threads of identity, redemption and "what really makes a family." Cygnet Artistic Director Sean Murray and Executive Director Bill Schmidt have assembled a package of plays and musicals for the 2014-2015 season that will take theater-goers on a typical Cygnet-style journey from campy musicals and great American plays to works by up-and-coming young playwrights and audience favorites.

Cygnet's twelfth season will feature seven productions performed in their home, the Old Town Theatre in Old Town San Diego State Historic Park, including two plays performed in a rotating repertory, two musicals, a San Diego and a Southern California premiere and a holiday favorite. "This season of productions looks at the diverse, strange, challenging, wonderful and redeemable ways we look at family or build our own," explainEd Murray, who will direct several productions and appear in one. "It's a diverse and mixed season that truly captures the Cygnet spirit and one that our audiences have come to expect."

Cygnet kicks off the summer of 2014 with a return of audience favorite Pageant, just in time for San Diego Pride. James Vasquez directs this hilarious mash-up of a beauty pageant and a drag musical that let's audience members decide who is crowned the winner. The talented and hilarious David McBean returns as Miss Deep South with Phil Johnson the master of ceremonies.

In the fall, Cygnet offers two works by great American playwright and icon Sam Shepard. In what is becoming a Cygnet signature, the emotional and physical duo of Fool for Love and True West will be presented in a rotating repertory. Both plays will be performed on alternating nights throughout the run showcasing the extraordinary versatility and talents of Manny Fernandes and Francis Gerke.

In December, Cygnet continues its eight-year tradition of presenting a holiday classic. This season welcomes the return of Charles Dickens' A Christmas Carol, adapted by Sean Murray with an original Victorian score by Billy Thompson. While the airwaves of WCYG Playhouse of the Air will be silent this season, the production features music, puppets and the ever-popular foley sound effects.

Cygnet will continue its run of presenting Southern California premieres with Sons of the Prophet, the latest work by Stephen Karam (Speech and Debate). Premiering at New York's Roundabout Theatre in 2011, Karam was hailed as "a major new voice in American Theater." His brutally funny and explosive comedy was a finalist for the 2012 Pulitzer Prize.

Cygnet loves a good musical and you can't go wrong by turning to Lerner and Loewe. In the spring of 2015, audiences will delight to My Fair Lady featuring none other than Sean Murray as the world's most famous phonetics professor Henry Higgins. Murray will also direct this award-winning and record-setting musical for the first time on the Old Town Theatre stage . The stellar cast includes Ron Choularton and Tom Stephenson, a Critics Circle-winner for his past work in this production.

Season 12 ends in a big way, and we mean big, with the San Diego premiere of The Whale. Emerging playwright Samuel D. Hunter's (The Few) big hearted and fiercely funny play features a six hundred pound recluse and his families attempt to redeem him. The riveting and vivid family tale features sharp and provocative language and finds heart in challenging situations. Shana Wride will take the helm as director.

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