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Sher Will Stage Lucas' Prayer for Playwrights Horizons; Silver, Rebeck, Rapp Also Slated
By Kenneth Jones
13 Mar 2008
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Adam Rapp
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| photo by Aubrey Reuben | Plays by Craig Lucas, Adam Rapp, Theresa Rebeck and Nicky Silver will be seen in the 2008-09 season by Off-Broadway's Playwrights Horizons.
Artistic director Tim Sanford and managing director Leslie Marcus announced the first four productions — two world premieres and two New York City premieres — of its coming six-show season.
The world premiere of Three Changes by Nicky Silver (Fit to Be Tied at Playwrights Horizons, The Food Chain, Pterodactyls, Raised in Captivity), directed by Tony Award nominee Wilson Milam (The Lieutenant of Inishmore), will launch the season in August on the PH Mainstage.
Two additional productions as well as casting information will be announced in the coming months.
Pulitzer Prize finalist Rapp (Red Light Winter, Essential Self-Defense) will direct the world premiere of his new play, Kindness, in fall 2008 at PH's Peter Jay Sharp Theater.
Bartlett Sher will stage the New York City premiere of Prayer for My Enemy by Pulitzer Prize nominee Craig Lucas (Small Tragedy, Reckless, The Dying Gaul) on the PH Mainstage in fall 2008. The play had its world premiere in a co-production by by Intiman Theatre in Seattle and Long Wharf Theatre in New Haven, CT. Sher and Lucas worked together on The Light in the Piazza.
Our House, the new scathing comedy about the media and reality TV, by Pulitzer finalist Rebeck (The Butterfly Collection, Bad Dates, Mauritius and co-writer of Omnium Gatherum), will play the Mainstage winter/spring 2009.
Playwrights Horizons' two-venue home is located at 416 W. 42nd Street between Ninth and Tenth Avenues.
For Playwright Horizons subscription information visit www.playwrightshorizons.org.
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Here's how Playwrights Horizons characterizes the new plays for 2008-09:
In Nicky Silver's Three Changes, "Nate and Laurel are a comfortably married, Upper West Side couple — until Nate's wayward brother Hal arrives from Hollywood. What at first seems a casual visit, a chance to reconnect, is quickly revealed as something more ominous. Hal may have had success, but human connection is all that matters, and he intends to make connections — no matter who pays the price. [It's] a funny and darkly suspenseful look at the joy of family, and how far we'll go to get it."
In Adam Rapp's Kindness, "an ailing mother and her teenaged son flee Illinois and a crumbling marriage for the relative calm and safety of a midtown Manhattan hotel. Mom holds tickets to a popular musical about love and redemption. Her son, a gifted student currently enrolled at a prestigious military academy, isn't interested. So Mom takes the kindly cabdriver instead, while the boy entertains a visitor from down the hall, an enigmatic young woman seeking solace after a tumultuous, potentially dangerous evening. [It's] a play about the preciousness of life, the possibility for sympathy in a harsh world, and the meaning of mercy in the face of devastating circumstances."
In Craig Lucas' Prayer for My Enemy, "It's a hell of a night for the Noones — father Austin's watching his nature shows and trying to keep from falling off the wagon, mother Karen's keeping an eye on Austin, son Billy's just back from Iraq, and pregnant daughter Marianne's upset about the state of her marriage to Tad, Billy's childhood friend who may still harbor a crush on him. With the Red Sox battling the Yankees for the 2004 AL title, an American family's long-held secrets are dragged to the fore in what may be its final reckoning. [It's] a paean to our age, a keenly-layered drama about the preciousness of life and the grace to share common ground — even with those we love the least."
Theresa Rebeck's Our House asks, "What happens when news and entertainment are interchangeable? In a cautionary tale ripped from today's headlines, a power-hungry TV mogul faced with dwindling ratings installs America's favorite news anchor as host of a popular reality show. Meanwhile, in Middle America, a houseful of roommates bicker over high-stakes real-world conflicts: Merv doesn't clean the bathroom, someone ate Alice's yogurt, and the rent is long past due. When reality suddenly collides with reality TV, we find ourselves front and center in the thorniest hostage drama since Waco. [It's] a deliciously scathing new comedy that takes on a media-obsessed culture intent on turning even the most sobering crisis into sexy entertainment."
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