The Middletown Press (Middletown, CT)
Theater for the people
Long Wharf, Yale Rep, Hartford Stage launch new slates
Connecticut’s apple barrels are flush, signaling the arrival of a new theater season that likewise brims with fresh productions at three of the area’s Tony Awardwinning regional theaters.
The selection is wide and, as we see with the coming of each new season, includes more stories from underrepresented theater artists than the previous seasons.
Jacob G. Padron, Long Wharf Theatre’s new artistic director, is not only charged with introducing new, challenging works and traditional classics to loyal patrons, but also restoring the good faith in his job title in the wake of Gordon Edelstein’s departure. Though Padron said his literary staff had most of the new season set by the time of his appointment last November, he is poised to start lining up the 202021 season now that he’s getting to know his neighbors.
“In many ways, people in your community are
“(They wanted) a worldclass theater for the city of New Haven. One that told the stories of our community, which the community could really celebrate.” Jacob G. Padron, on the Long Wharf Theatre’s founders’ vision in 1965
your best teachers,” said Padron, who earned his MFA in theater management from Yale School of Drama in 2008. “It’s about really activating a really meaningful conversation with activists, cultural leaders and politicians.”
Padron’s new neighbors express “an appetite for change and appetite for Long Wharf ’s leader to be in conversation with our city,” he said. “An appetite to defy the status quo.”
Padron stressed that he sees Long Wharf returning to its founders’ original design to make “a theater of, by and for the city,” Padron said.
“Jon Jory and Harland Kleiman, that’s what they wanted,” he said, referring to the initial artistic director and business manager who introduced Long Wharf to audiences in 1965. “A worldclass theater for the city of New Haven. One that told the stories of our community, which the community could really celebrate.”
Though Padron arrived late to the selection process for this season, he suggested two plays that appear on the bill: the world premiere of Ricardo Perez Gonzalez’s “On the Grounds of Belonging,” a tale of forbidden love in 1950s Texas, which kicks off Long Wharf ’s season Oct. 9; and Lloyd Su’s “The Chinese Lady,” which opens March 18, 2020.
Diversity of fare has long been the practice at Yale Repertory Theatre, which features world premieres of Branden JacobsJenkins’ “Girls,” a modern adaptation of Euripides’ “The Bacchae” opening at the University Theatre Friday, as well as Will Eno’s “The Plot,” a land lover’s comedy at Yale Rep starting Nov. 29.
Hartford Stage also offers a new take on a classic with “Quixote Nuevo,” Octavio Solis’ reimagining of “Don Quixote,” through Oct. 13. Produced in association with Huntington Theatre Company and Alley Theatre,” it stars Emilio Delgado who, as the 50 and under crowd will tell you, was Luis on “Sesame Street” forever.
Hartford Stage also brings David Seidler’s “The King’s Speech” to the capital March 19, 2020, hoping to capture the magic (and box office) of the Oscarwinning film starring Geoffrey Rush and Colin Firth.
While world premieres and newtous plays provide theatergoers plenty of edgy options, Hartford Stage’s spring production of Eugene O’Neill’s only comedy, “Ah, Wilderness!” and Elizabeth Williamson’s adaptation of Charlotte Brontë’s novel “Jane Eyre” in February cover, in part, the classics
“The wonderful thing about theater,” Padron said, “is that it’s big enough to hold all of our stories.
“It’s about creating a culture of abundance.” LONG WHARF 201920 “On the Grounds of Belonging”
By Ricardo Pérez González
Oct. 9 — Nov. 3
A world premiere A breathtaking new story of forbidden love in 1950’s Jim Crow Texas.
In Houston at the height of Jim Crow, segregation pervades society in every way, including the underground and illegal gay bar scene. One night a chance encounter between Russell, a local at the blacksonly Gold Room, and Tom, from the whitesonly Red Room, leads to a forbidden romance that could destroy them both. “Pride and Prejudice”
A Modern Adaptation of a Classic Work
Nov. 27 — Dec. 22 “I Am My Own Wife”
By Doug Wright
Feb. 5 — March 1
The timeless Pulitzer Prizewinning play about survival and identity under the cloak of World War II Germany. “The Chinese Lady”
By Lloyd Suh March 18 — April 12 Inspired by the true story of America’s first female Chinese immigrant and her journey through the 19th century. “The Great Leap ”
By Lauren Yee May 6 — May 31 A thrilling underdog story of basketball and foreign relations in 1980’s China that will leave you speechless. YALE REPERTORY THEATRE “Girls” (After “The Bacchae” by Euprides) World Premiere By Branden JacobsJenkins
Friday — Oct. 26 Exiled to boarding schools for his entire life, Deon returns to his birthplace with a vengeance — luring the women of the town to the woods for a night of uninhibited partying. Meanwhile, a young reactionary with a big social media following condemns the debauchery and vows to restore order. Pulsing with a beat that is as dangerous as it is seductive, ”Girls” is a contemporary spin on Euripides’s “The Bacchae” with a DJ, bumping dance music and livestreaming video. “The Plot”
World Premiere By Will Eno Nov. 29 — Dec. 21 “Manahatta”
East Coast Premiere By Mary Kathryn Nagle Jan. 24—Feb. 15
It’s 2008 and securities trader Jane Snake has landed a lucrative job on Wall Street, where her ancestors, the Lenape, were violently removed 400 years before, when the Dutch “purchased” the island of Manahatta. Past and present intertwine as Jane is caught in the center of a looming mortgage crisis that threatens financial ruin for millions of families — including her own. “A Raisin in the Sun”
March 13 — April 4 On the South Side of 1950s Chicago, Lena Younger dreams of using her deceased husband’s insurance money to move her family out of their cramped apartment to a better neighborhood. Her son, Walter Lee Jr., wants to use it instead to set himself up in business; while her daughter, Beneatha, dreams of medical school. In Lorraine Hansberry’s defiantly hopeful drama, an African American family’s dreams and conflicts are amplified by external tensions and prejudice in a country on the cusp of change. “Testmatch”
East Coast Premiere By Kate Attwell April 24 — May 16 London, today: A raindelayed women’s cricket match between India and England leaves tensions bare. Pent up in the locker room all day, neither side can play nice anymore. Calcutta, near the turn of the 19th century: Two British imperialists debate the rules of engagement, the problem of women and the trouble with mosquitoes as
famine ravages East India. An allfemale cast takes the stage for this energetic, sharpwitted tale of sport, gender politics and colonialism, interrogating the present by rethinking the past. HARTFORD STAGE “Quixote Nuevo” Through Oct. 13 By Octavio Solis A reimagining of Don Quixote by Miguel de Cervantes. “Cry It Out”
Oct. 24 — Nov. 17 By Molly Smith Metzler An ode to modernday motherhood, “Cry it Out” peers into the lives of four new parents with nothing in common except sleep deprivation, unreliable child care and the notion of “having it all.” The darkly funny comedy takes a smart and honest look at the power of female friendship, the dilemma of going back to work after being home with a newborn and the effect social class has on parenthood in America. “A Christmas Carol — A Ghost Story of Christmas” Nov 29 — Dec 28 By Charles Dickens Originally Adapted and Directed by Michael Wilson “Pike St.”
Jan. 9 — Feb. 2 Written and Performed by Nilaja Sun
In “Pike St.,” Sun vividly brings to life three generations of a Puerto Rican family on New York’s Lower East Side. Evelyn, a mother struggling to hold her life together with both grace and humor as she cares for her immobilized daughter and supports her womanizing father, relies on money from her brother, who is serving abroad in Afghanistan. When he comes home, suffering from PTSD, Evelyn fights for her family’s healing, redemption and survival in the face of a threatening storm — both natural and manmade. “ “Jane Eyre”
Feb. 13 — March 15 By Charlotte Bronte “The King’s Speech”
March 19 — April 19 Written by David Seidler “Ah, Wilderness!”
May 7 — 31
By Eugene O’Neill “Ah, Wilderness!” takes place in a picturesque Connecticut town at the turn of the 20th century and paints a nostalgic portrait of smalltown values, teenage growing pains and young love.