These seasons' greetings are neither highly belated nor extremely premature, since it's not sleigh bells we are hearing, but rather the trumpets of several area theaters heralding what shows will carry them through the 2014-15 season. But much like the piles of wrapped presents beneath a Christmas tree, the contents will variously produce smiles, frowns, shrugs, and a few heads scratched in bemusement. Here are some of the highlights, starting with one of the expected smiles.
In on the ACT
ACT recently revealed which show would fill the opening spot in its season. For those who remember Bill Irwin and David Shiner's runs in Fool Moon in 1998 and 2001, the news that their reunion show Old Hats will open the season should be joyful news. These new-age vaudevillians performed Old Hats to wide acclaim last year in New York, and they will be bringing with them the evocatively quirky chanteuse Nellie McKay.
The precise dates for Old Hats and other productions will be announced later. In addition to Old Hats, the current roster includes Anne Washburn's Mr. Burns, a Post-Electric Play, which can briefly be described as a dystopian paean to The Simpsons; Colm Toibin's Testament, a one-woman play that looks in uncharacteristically real-life terms at how Mary deals with being the mother of Jesus; a return to Tom Stoppard's Indian Ink, a time-traveling study of the after-effects of British colonialism; and the Stephen Sondheim waltzing musical A Little Night Music .
Two more titles are still to be announced, and one of the seven shows will apparently be done at ACT's newly restored Strand Theater on Market Street. Season info is available at act-sf.org.
Tarell Alvin McCraney.
Photo: Courtesy of the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation
Headed up north
There are two plays in Marin Theatre Company's newly released 2014-15 season that are specifically underlined here. Perhaps you remember back in 2010 when ACT, Magic Theatre, and MTC each took one play in Tarell Alvin McCraney's acclaimed Brother/Sister trilogy to introduce the Bay Area to this young gay African-American playwright. MTC will present McCraney's newest play, Choir Boy, as the capper for the upcoming season, with another of his highly individualistic looks at the American gay black experience �" this one through a competition for the top spot in a school choir that unravels friends, family, and history, with a cappella gospel music as a recurring motif.
Playwright Samuel D. Hunter, another new and celebrated gay voice, was first represented in the area last year with A Bright New Boise at Aurora Theatre. In The Whale, which MTC has set for October, Hunter focuses on the declining fortunes of an obese gay man who is eating himself to death following the loss of his lover, and the unexpected events that begin to pull him out of his isolation.
The new MTC season also includes Will Power's Fetch Clay, Make Man, which imagines a friendship between boxer Muhammad Ali in his prime and the infamously stereotyped actor Stepin Fetchit; the Reduced Shakespeare Company in a holiday-timed production of The Complete History of Comedy (abridged); Danai Guira's The Convert, the story of a young Rhodesian girl who escapes an arranged marriage by refuge in a remnant of colonial missionaries; and Mona Mansour's The Way West, a family saga of a mother who tries to rally her daughters through an onslaught of adversities. Tickets for the season are available at marintheatre.org.
Headed down south
First to TheatreWorks of Mountain View and Palo Alto, and then on to San Jose Rep. The July world premiere of David West Read's The Pretender gives TheatreWork a head start on new seasons. Described as a bittersweet comedy about a children's TV host who mourns the death of a beloved puppeteer, it comes with a "mature language" advisory.
Also in the season: Quiara Alegria Hudes' Pulitzer Prize-winning Water by the Spoonful, about a webmaster who moderates a group for troubled souls whose own life is crumbling; Stephen Sondheim's musical penny-dreadful Sweeney Todd; Rick Elice's Peter Pan prequel Peter and the Starcatcher; Ted Dykstra and Richard Greenblatt's much-produced 2 Pianos 4 Hands; Rajiv Joseph's The Lake Effect, set in a shuttered Indian restaurant where the owner's children ponder their legacy; Randal Myler and Dan Wheetman's Fire on the Mountain, a bluegrass revue about Appalachian mining families; and Noel Coward's Fallen Angels, a seldom-revived 1925 comedy about married friends who entertain a shared old flame while husbands are away. Ticket information can be found at theatreworks.org.
San Jose Rep opens its season in late August with the world premiere of Robert Schenkkan and Neil Berg's musical The 12, which uses new and classic rock music to tell of how a dozen ordinary people of the time cope in the aftermath of the crucifixion of Jesus Christ; Herbert Siguenza's A Weekend with Pablo Picasso, a fantastical imagining of the life of the great artist; the world premiere of Kristen Brandt's adaptation of Wuthering Heights; Oscar Wilde's The Importance of Being Earnest, to star Danny Scheie as Lady Bracknell; the musical revue Jacques Brel Is Alive and Well and Living in Paris; and one show still to be announced. More info at sjrep.com.
Tickets to Broadway
All five musicals in SHN's upcoming season are currently playing on Broadway, four of them of recent creation and the fifth being, well, Phantom of the Opera, although promised in "a spectacular new production." Starting in August, the season includes Motown the Musical, a memory-lane journey through Barry Gordy's career; Harvey Fierstein and Cyndi Lauper's Tony Award-winning Kinky Boots, based on the 2005 movie about a floundering shoe factory and the drag queen who saves the day; Newsies, based on the 1992 Disney movie musical about a newsboy strike in 1899; and Matilda, the London import about put-upon schoolchildren who rise up against a tyrannical teacher. Season ticket info at shnsf.com.