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Taylor Mac's 'POPULAR MUSIC' Rounds Out Magic Theatre's 2017-18 Season
By: BWW News Desk May. 03, 2017
"It has been Magic Theatre's great privilege to support the shapeshifting work of visionary Taylor Mac over the last eight years," says Artistic Director, Loretta Greco. "We are over-the-moon to be a part of bringing Mac's latest masterwork, A 24-DECADE HISTORY OF POPULAR MUSIC, to San Francisco in this unprecedented partnership with Pomegranate Arts, The Curran and Stanford Live."
A 24-DECADE HISTORY OF POPULAR MUSIC is Mac's multi-year effort to chart a subjective history of the United States through 246 songs that were popular throughout the country, and in its disparate communities, from 1776 to the present day. In performing the work, Mac is joined by an orchestra-led by Music Director Matt Ray, who created new arrangements of all 246 songs-plus an ensemble of "Dandy Minions" and a variety of local special guests, including members of the audience cast as colonial needleworkers, World War I soldiers and Yum Yum from The Mikado. Costume designer Machine Dazzle, a longtime Mac collaborator, has handmade an outrageously imaginative, world-unto-itself costume specific to each decade. Over four performances, audience members can experience Mac's pièce de résistance.
For the upcoming performances at the Curran-made possible by an unprecedented collaboration between these esteemed Bay Area institutions-the concert will be reworked into four six-hour Chapters.
A 24-DECADE HISTORY OF POPULAR MUSIC recently won the 2017 Edward M. Kennedy Award for Drama inspired by American History and was a 2017 Pulitzer Prize Finalist for Drama, in addition to being included on an unprecedented three New York Times "Best of..." lists in 2016: Performance, Theater and Classical Music.
As previously announced, Magic's 2017-2018 season will also include World Premiere of Barbara Hammond's THE EVA TRILOGY (Fall 2017); the World Premiere of John Kolvenbach's REEL TO REEL (Winter 2018) and the World Premiere of Jessica Hagedorn's THE GANGSTER OF LOVE (Summer 2018). The season will also include the annual Martha Heasley Cox Virgin Play Festival (showcasing exciting new work from bold emerging playwrights), and marks the fifty-first year of operations and the tenth year under the leadership of Artistic Director Loretta Greco. Complete casting and creative teams for each production will be announced at later dates.
The 2016-2017 season concludes with Han Ong's World Premiere GRANDEUR (May 31 - June 25, 2017). The production is helmed by Magic's Artistic Director Loretta Greco. Tickets are on-sale now.
The Company is led by Carl Lumbly (ABC's Alias, CBS' Cagney & Lacey) as "Gil Scott-Heron," and features Safiya Fredericks as "Julie Toussaint" and Rafael Jordan as "Steve Barron." GRANDEUR imagines a meeting between an ambitious young journalist and the shape-shifting music legend, Gil Scott-Heron. Questions of legacy, art, hope, and redemption drive this funny and gut-wrenching exchange. It's a homecoming for MacArthur Genius award winner Han Ong, who returns to Magic after a 25-year hiatus.
Now celebrating its 50th year, Magic Theatre is dedicated to the cultivation of bold new plays, playwrights, and audiences - and to producing explosive, entertaining, and ideologically robust plays that ask substantive questions about, and reflect the rich diversity of, the world in which we live. Magic believes that demonstrating faith in a writer's vision by providing a safe yet rigorous artistic home, where a full body of work can be imagined, supported, and produced, allows writers to thrive. 22 of the last 25 new plays produced at Magic have enjoyed extended life beyond its stage, throughout the U.S. and abroad including Mac's The Lily's Revenge and the World Premiere of Mac's HIR. Connect at www.magictheatre.org.
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