RUTHLESS; TICK, TICK...BOOM!; and More Set For New Conservatory Theatre Center's Upcoming Season

New Conservatory Theatre Center has announced the line-up for a daring 2023-24 Season, continuing their decades-long commitment to creating new works with three world premieres, as well as producing two cult-hit musicals, a West Coast premiere, and an exciting limited holiday engagement with Katya Smirnoff-Skyy.

Nationally and internationally renowned as San Francisco's premier LGBTQIA+ and Allied theatre center, NCTC welcomes audiences to a Season of Connection. These six stunning productions are sure to inspire with fresh, groundbreaking stories, while at the same time honoring the organization's illustrious history with a few well-known tales.

In celebration of a new season, NCTC is also unveiling a brand new website. This redesign will feature extensive improvements to load time, accessibility, and user experience. Finally, due to popular demand, weeknight performances during the 2023-24 Season will now be moved to the earlier start time of 7:30pm.

"With the blink of an eye, we are opening a new season at NCTC and a juicy one at that, filled with intrigue, mystery, desire, love, and no shortage of big dreams." says NCTC's Founder and Artistic Director Ed Decker, "I'm thrilled to welcome a brilliant array of playwrights including familiar favorites and newcomers to NCTC that we've been eager to work with for years."

In response to San Francisco County's current low-risk status for COVID-19 transmission as defined by the CDC, masks are now recommended, but not required at NCTC, and food and drink are allowed in the theatre. To ensure the safety of our artists and audience, NCTC's Front-of-House staff will remain masked during all performances. We have also upgraded our facilities, installing new air sanitizers and sanitizing stations, and implementing additional cleaning protocols. An enhanced safety performance with mask enforcement, vaccine checking, and additional COVID safety precautions has been added to every production in the 23-24 Season.

This trailblazing new season opens with the beginning of a legend, with the world premiere of Andrew Alty's Before the Sword. In a small British village in 1936, author T.H. White stares at the blank pages that will become his future masterpiece. Upon meeting Freddie, a troubled young man with a mysterious past, White begins to write the modern classic The Sword in the Stone - inspired by his new student and the ancient tale.

Playwright Andrew Alty (pronouns: he/him) has written extensively for theatre, radio, and television. His first play, The Left-over Heart won the Charringtons Award for Best First Play in 1993 and was subsequently broadcast on Radio 3. Other plays include Asylum (Royal Court Theatre,1993), Something About Us (Lyric Hammersmith, 1995, U.S. Premiere at NCTC, 1996 ), and The Road to Hell (Birmingham Repertory, 1996). His original play for radio, Buried Treasure, was broadcast on Radio 4 in 1996, and he has recently delivered a new piece for radio, Halfway to Heaven. He is the founding Artistic Director of Fast Forward Theatre Company and the Creative Learning Projects Manager at New Wimbledon Theatre.

October heralds the return of critically acclaimed NCTC veteran playwright Harrison David Rivers with the West Coast premiere of we are continuous, a semi-autobiographical story that explores how people can change and how love can evolve. Before Simon came out, his mother Ora was his best friend and biggest supporter, but now there's an ocean between them of what can't be said, especially around his father. After a life-changing secret comes to light, will the family's bond survive?

Playwright Harrison David Rivers (pronouns: he/him) is an award-winning playwright, librettist, and television writer based in St. Paul, Minnesota. His plays include The Bandaged Place (Roundabout, New York Stage & Film), This Bitter Earth (NCTC, Seattle Public, TheatreWorks Hartford, InterAct, The Road, Richmond Triangle Players, Theater Alliance, About Face, Penumbra), Where Storms Are Born (Williamstown Theatre Festival), When Last We Flew (Out Front, Real Live Arts, TheatreLAB, Diversionary, NYFringe), and the musicals Five Points with Douglas Lyons and Ethan Pakchar, We Shall Someday with Ted Shen, and I Put A Spell On You with Nubya Garcia. His television credits include One Of Us Is Lying (Peacock) and The Nevers (HBO).

The year closes out with RUTHLESS!, a razor-sharp and outrageously funny Outer Critics Circle and Drama Desk Award-winning hit from Marvin Laird and Joel Paley. Tina Denmark is an adorable and talented 8-year-old with a tiny murderous streak. When the lead role of Pippi Longstocking in the school play is up for grabs, she knows she'll get the part - even if it means leaving a few bodies along the way. Spoofing classics from The Bad Seed to Gypsy, this cult-hit musical is a deliciously diabolical look at fame, ambition, and the perils of musical theatre.

Marvin Laird's (Music, pronouns: he/him) recent piece, The Yiddish are Coming...! The Yiddish are Coming...! is currently playing regionally throughout North America. He has conducted and written dance and vocal arrangements for over two dozen Broadway and West End shows, including the award-winning production of Annie Get Your Gun, and the 2003 Broadway revival of Gypsy.

Joel Paley (Book & Lyrics, pronouns: he/him) directed the first production of RUTHLESS!! at The Players Theater, which won the 1993 Outer Critics Circle Award for Best Off-Broadway Musical, and for which Joel won the Drama Desk Award as Best Lyricist. Additional highlights of a diversified career include: appearing on Broadway, National Tour, and on television with Shirley MacLaine in Where Do We Go From Here?; directing the ABC comedy/variety series SHE-TV (Carsey/Werner Productions); conceiving and staging an all-singing, all-dancing showroom parody for Bob Newhart; and writing (with Laird) and staging the opening production sequence of the Academy Award-nominated live action short film, A Different Approach.

This holiday season, NCTC is making the Yuletide gay with a limited run of a seasonal special event, Katya: A Holiday Spectacular, starring Bay Area icon J. Conrad Frank as the dazzling Katya Smirnoff-Skyy. A beloved San Francisco tradition celebrating its 16th year, Katya: A Holiday Spectacular returns to the NCTC basement for three nights only this holiday season. With songs ranging from classic holiday fare, and madcap medleys, to full-on disco Klezmer lunacy, see why Countess Katya Smirnoff-Skyy was named "Best Drag Act" by the San Francisco Bay Guardian. You and your loved ones are invited to experience the holidays as seen through the heavily lashed eyes of your Auntie Katya.

The Countess Katya Smirnoff-Skyy (star; pronouns "Auntie") has enthralled San Francisco audiences for a long ... long time, with her unique blend of opera, pop, and booze-drenched comedy. Once Eastern Europe's most sought-after Mezzo Soprano - understudy - the Countess now spends her evenings crooning and drinking her way through the finer theaters, bars, and bathhouses of America. She was the winner of the 2019 "Bestie for Cabaret Performer" and has sold out runs at NCTC, the Razz Room, Feinstein's, Oasis, Don't Tell Mama's, and 18 years of monthly shows at Martuni's. Katya played Blanche Hudson in Billy Cliff's film Baby Jane and Mildred in Hush Up Sweet Charlotte. Follow her on TikTok @katyasmirnoff, and Instagram @katyasmirnoffskyy.

J. Conrad Frank (writer/performer; pronouns he/him) has delighted Bay Area audiences and critics alike for nearly twenty years in such productions as The Rocky Horror Show, Sweeney Todd, Clue, Jungle Red, and in Buyer and Cellar, The Temperamentals, Die, Mommie, Die!, and Red Scare on Sunset, at NCTC, in both couture and pants.

NCTC rings in 2024 with the world premiere of the final entry of LAMBDA Literary Award winner Jewelle Gomez's Word and Music Trilogy, Unpacking in P'Town. Every summer, former vaudevillians Buster, Lydia, Minty, and Scottie reunite in Provincetown to drink, dance, and forget about the real world. But this year is different. It's 1959, the fight for Civil Rights is heating up, and a restlessness hangs heavy in the humid air. In between the reminiscing, this chosen family is forced to face changes they've been hiding from for so long. An evocative new play with music, Unpacking in P'Town is a portrait of the queer artists of color who paved the way for others to live out loud.

Playwright Jewelle Gomez (pronouns: she/her) is a novelist, poet, and playwright. She is the author of seven books including the double Lambda Literary Award-winning, Black lesbian vampire novel, The Gilda Stories. Waiting for Giovanni, her play about James Baldwin, and Leaving the Blues, about Alberta Hunter, were commissioned and premiered at NCTC. She has written for numerous publications including The Village Voice, MS Magazine, The Advocate, San Francisco Chronicle, and Black Scholar.

Next up is a world premiere present in association with Golden Thread Productions, Torange Yeghiazarian's provocative look at the cost of telling the truth in The Tutor. Growing up in Iran, Baran learned the importance of keeping secrets - especially when it came to love. Now living in the Bay Area with her new husband Kayvon, she's putting that skill to use. Shortly after Kayvon asks his lifelong friend Azar to tutor Baran on living in the U.S., the two women begin an intense affair that threatens to engulf all of their lives.

Playwright Torange Yeghiazarian (pronouns: she/her) founded Golden Thread Productions in 1996 and served as its Executive Artistic Director for twenty-five years. She received a Gerbode-Hewlett Playwright Commission Award for Isfahan Blues and a commission from the Islamic Cultural Center of Northern California to write and direct The Fifth String - Ziryab's Passage To Cordoba. Other plays include 444 Days, Waves, Behind Glass Windows, Dawn At Midnight, Abaga, Thanksgiving at Khodabakhshian's, Publicly Resting, and Call Me Mehdi, included in the anthology Salaam. Peace - An Anthology of Middle Eastern-American Drama (TCG, 2009).

Finally, this season of connection concludes with a "moving and amusing portrait of a struggling artist" (The Hollywood Reporter) from the mind of Pulitzer Prize and Tony Award winner Jonathan Larson. Before Rent, the musical that defined a generation, there was tick, tick... Boom! Jon is a young composer on the eve of his 30th birthday. Stuck waiting tables and struggling to write the next great American musical, he can feel the time to make his mark on the world slipping away. As the people Jon loves move on to new careers and new places, Jon is faced with a choice: find security or follow his destiny. With Larson's trademark style of pop-rock score blended with traditional musical theatre, this exuberant and charming tale will speak to anyone who's ever gotten lost on their way to finding their dreams. Originally slated for the 2022-23 Season, but postponed due to winter storm damage, NCTC is thrilled to open this production in 2024 in the newly repaired Decker Theatre.

Jonathan Larson (Book, Music, and Lyrics, pronouns: he/him) was an American composer, lyricist, and playwright who created the mega-hit musical Rent, which went on to win a Pulitzer Prize for Drama, multiple Tony Awards, and Drama Desk Awards, and New York Drama Critics' Circle Award for Best Musical.

David Auburn (Script Consultant, pronouns: he/him) is best known for his Tony Award-winning play, Proof, in addition to screenplays for The Lake House, The Girl in the Park, and Georgetown.

Stephen Oremus (Vocal Arrangements and Orchestrations, pronouns: he/him) has composed music for many award-winning Broadway theatre productions including Avenue Q, Wicked, The Book of Mormon, and Kinky Boots.

As always, subscribers get the best seats at the best prices. There are four ways to join as a subscriber for the 23-24 Season including the full-season subscription package, four-show sampler, the weekday six-ticket flex pass- offering all the benefits of a season subscription with the flexibility to use six tickets on any weekday performance, the brand new anytime four-ticket flex pass- offering four tickets at a discounted rate to be used for any performance, and our most flexible package, the anytime six ticket flex pass - offering the benefits of a season subscription, with the flexibility to use six tickets for any performance. Subscriber benefits include huge savings on ticket prices, access to the best seats, free and easy ticket exchanges, 40% off guest tickets, savings on non-subscription shows, and much more. Subscriptions are now available at nctcsf.org/subscribe or by calling the Box Office at 415.861.8972.

New Conservatory Theatre Center has been San Francisco's premier LGBTQ+ and Allied performing arts institution and progressive arts education conservatory since 1981. NCTC is renowned for its diverse range of innovative, high-quality productions, touring productions, and shows for young audiences; its foundational anti-bullying work with youth and educators through YouthAware; and its commitment to developing new plays to continue expanding the canon of queer and allied dramatic work.

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