THE LEHMAN TRILOGY Kicks Off The Repertory Theater Of St. Louis Season, September 5- 24

The Repertory Theater of St. Louis (The Rep) the leading regional performing arts theatre in the Midwest, kicks off its 2023/24 Season with The Lehman Trilogy, the 2022 Tony Award-winning Best Play by Stefano Massini, adapted to English by Ben Power, and directed by longtime American Conservatory Theater's Artistic Director Carey Perloff. The production runs from September 5 - 24, 2023 at the Loretto-Hilton Center on the Campus of Webster University. 

Performed entirely by three actors and one musician, The Lehman Trilogy is an epic tale of one family's passionate pursuit of the American Dream and the piercing cost of greed, excess and unbridled power. In 1844, a young man from Bavaria, along with his two brothers, arrived in New York City, full of hope and ambition. Over the course of two centuries, their family business grew to unimaginable heights and ultimately collapsed into bankruptcy. A can't-miss masterpiece that the Boston Globe calls “Absorbing! Ambitious! Superb in execution!”

“The Lehman Trilogy won the Tony Award for Best Play in 2022 for a reason,” said Danny Williams, Managing Director. “It's an all-encompassing exploration of capitalism and the American Dream told through the lens of one family over generations.  It's highly theatrical, messy, poetic and morally ambiguous with a dramatic arch and pace that will leave St. Louis audiences on the edge of their seats. It's the perfect play to kick off our 2023/24 Season and I can't wait for our audiences to experience this mesmerizing production.”

The cast of The Lehman Trilogy includes: 

Firdous Bamji as Mayer Lehman, the youngest brother, level-headed and a charming mediator; also plays Bobby Lehman and others. Credits include Mary Stuart at The Huntington Theatre in Boston and Indian Ink at the Roundabout in New York.

Joshua David Robinson as Emanuel Lehman, the middle brother, hot-headed and decisive; also plays Herbert Lehman, Lewis Glucksman, and others. Credits include The Minutes on Broadway and Arden of Faversham Off-Broadway at Red Bull.

Scott Wentworth as Henry Lehman, the eldest brother, resourceful and tenacious; also plays Philip Lehman, Pete Peterson, and others. Credits include a Tony nomination for his role in Welcome to The Club,a musical by Cy Colman and Macbeth at Stratford Festival among others.

Joe LaRocca as the Musician, playing music throughout the play providing temporal context as the story progresses through the generations. Credits include Jesus Christ Superstar (50th Anniversary National Tour) and Beautiful: The Carole King Musical (Ogunquit Playhouse in Maine).

“What drew me to The Lehman Trilogy is the incredibly impressive fact that only three actors play a multitude of roles and embody each with a detailed physicality,” commented Becks Redman, Associate Artistic Director.  “Audiences will be blown away by the nuanced performances as the cast and director lead us through decades upon decades of history in a way that can only be experienced live on stage.”

The creative team for The Lehman Trilogy includes scenic design by Sara Brown (Common Ground Revisited at The Huntington), costume design by Dede Ayite (A Soldier's Play, Broadway), lighting design by Robert Wierzel (Fela!, Broadway Tony Nomination), sound design and music composition by Mark Bennett (The Coast of Utopia, Broadway), also sound design by Charles Coes (A Confederacy of Dunces at The Huntington), projection design by Jeanette Oi-Suk Yew (Top Girls at The Huntington), and movement consulting by Misha Shields (K-I-S-S-I-N-G at The Huntington). The production stage manager is Emilee Buchheit, and the assistant stage manager is Shannon B. Sturgis.

The Lehman Trilogy is produced in association with The Huntington Theater in Boston, which is the first to originate the play in the US and be directed by an American director this past June. Perloff's unique vision for the production includes having a musician on stage, playing music throughout the performance to anchor the time and place of various scenes, and a scenic design that features wooden crates and barrels reminiscent of the containers used to store and ship cotton, the original source of the Lehman brothers' wealth.

The Lehman Trilogy has been translated into 24 languages and has received international acclaim from both critics and audiences.  This Tony Award-winning play first premiered in France in 2013 and in Italy in 2015, before the English adaptation debuted at London's National Theatre in 2018, then played the Park Avenue Armory in NYC in spring of 2019. After pandemic delays, The National Theatre production had a limited run-on Broadway (Sept 2021 – Jan 2022) and in Los Angeles (Mar – Apr 2022). Stefano Massini also adapted the play into a novel which was translated into English by Richard Dixon and published in 2020.

For more information, please visit repstl.org.

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