Pamela Gien's The Syringa Tree began at Seattle's ACT Theatre (where it returns later in the year) before playing a long run Off-Broadway. The South African solo drama deals with issues of apartheid and identity.

Trinity Repertory Theatre artistic director Oskar Eustis is helming the world premiere of Paula Vogel's The Long Christmas Ride Home for his Rhode Island stage this month. The director will also stage the new work—about a family whose car spins out of control on an icy road following a Christmas dinner gone awry—for the Long Wharf.

Following a workshop Fran's Bed with Mia Farrow and Molly Ringwald earlier this year, the theatre will give a full production to the James Lapine play. Lapine will direct the family drama in which a sick woman show, on her death bed, reveals the many secrets of her life to her two grown daughters.

Legendary Swedish director Ingmar Bergman adapted Ibsen's classic A Doll's House in 1981 into Nora. Long Wharf artistic director Gordon Edelstein will direct the work, which follows the same story of the doll-like wife of lawyer Torvald Helmer who is suddenly faced with the discovery of a long-kept secret.

Director Mladen Kiselov will take on William Shakespeare's classic Hamlet, the tale of a young man who grapples with the death of his father and his mother's sudden remarriage. Long Wharf will also co-produce The Story with the New York Shakespeare Festival. Written by Tracey Scott Wilson, the drama delves into racial politics, as a young African-American journalist gets the scoop on a murder.

Other shows that may appear in the season include The Second Man by S.N. Behrman, The Playmaker by Dan Decker or a new musical in the works from Charles Randolph Wright (Blue) about the life of Eartha Kitt.

For more information, visit the Long Wharf Theatre on the web at www.longwharf.org.