Courage in Concert will reunite Streep with her fellow cast members from the 2006 Shakespeare in the Park production of Mother Courage, including Tony and Academy Award winner Kevin Kline, Jenifer Lewis, Austin Pendleton and Frederick Weller. Also announced to perform are cast members from the Tony-winning revival of Hair.
Tony and Pulitzer Prize-winning Playwright Tony Kushner translated Bertolt Brecht's anti-war drama. The production, which featured a score by Kushner's Tony-nominated Caroline, or Change collaborator, composer Jeanine Tesori was directed by former Public Theater artistic director George C. Wolfe.
The evening of song will benefit the American Jewish World Service and Partners In Health, both of which aim to improve the well-being of people in impoverished communities around the world.
“When you work on or watch or read the plays of Bertolt Brecht you’re compelled to ask yourself questions about the relationship between art and the troubled world outside. These questions are complicated, have no easy answers,” Tony Kushner said in a statement. “Three summers ago, we presented Mother Courage and Her Children directed by George C. Wolfe and I think I can speak for everyone involved that the experience was thrilling, moving, and left many of us wanting to extend our encounter with this immense play and its provocations. Jeanine Tesori, Meryl Streep and I have been discussing putting together a concert version of the score as a benefit. Together we chose two groups whose work we admire enormously: American Jewish World Services and Partners In Health. Both AJWS and PIH insistently call attention not only to the needs of the poor but to the underlying causes of their poverty. The connection they forge between understanding and action is the connection at the heart of Brecht’s play.”
The 8 PM event will take place at the Public Theater. Tickets for Courage in Concert will go on sale Sept. 17. Tickets range from $250-$2,500. For tickets phone (212) 967-7555 or visit PublicTheater. The Public Theater is located at 425 Lafayette Street in Manhattan.
