Theatre on the Square 2015-2016 Season

Theatre on the Square Announces their 2015-16 season schedule.

Enter Love
September 11 – 27, 2015
On the Christel DeHaan Main Stage

Music and Lyrics by Lynn Lupold
Book – Kenny Shepard
Director: Lynn Lupold

A musical about the ever-changing nature of romantic relationships in the first decade of the 21st century. Set in an international airport located in a large city somewhere in the mid-west, this production is a series of encounters—with dialogue and music—that take place between an assortment of couples and individuals at various locations—arrival and departure concourses, waiting lounges, baggage check, observation deck, and the central location, a bar—in the airport.

 

SPECIAL CO-PRODUCTION – To be announced soon…or Nevermore…
October 3 – 31, 2015 – Christel DeHaan Main Stage
Director:  Ben Asaykwee

 

Miss Gulch Returns
October 23–November 8, 2015

Brent Marty revives his one-man/one-woman musical comedy written and originally performed by Fred Barton. It is a loose parody of the character of Almira Gulch from the 1939 MGM film The Wizard of Oz as portrayed by Margaret Hamilton. Blurring the line between fiction and reality, the show builds on the premise that Almira Gulch was an actress—rather than a character portrayed by an actress—who appeared in The Wizard of Oz (as herself). Songs include Born On A Bike, Pour Me A Man, and I Can Be An Icon, Too

 

Naughty and Nice for the Holidays

The NICE: A Christmas Story
November 27 – December 20, 2015
On the Christel DeHaan Main Stage

By Jean Shepherd, Bob Clark, Leigh Brown, Philip Grecian
Director:  Lori Raffel

Humorist Jean Shepherd’s beloved memoir of growing up in the Midwest in the 1940s.  The story follows 9-year-old Ralphie Parker in his quest to get a genuine Red Ryder BB gun under the tree for Christmas. All the elements from the beloved motion picture are here, including the family’s temperamental exploding furnace, the school bully, the boys’ experiment with a wet tongue on a cold lamppost,   Ralphie’s fantasy scenarios and more. A Christmas Story is destined to become a theatrical holiday favorite.

The NAUGHTY: 8 Reindeer Monologues
November 27, December 20, 2015
Theatre on the Square – Stage Two

By Jeff Goode
Director: Greg Howard

Eight reindeer dishing about the real Santa. All those rumors you’ve heard about him and the elves? About Rudolph’s little secret? About Vixen’s story that was leaked to the press? All true. Yes, the reindeer finally speak up and – believe us – they do not hold back!
Called “Refreshing, disturbing…and hilarious “ by The Naples Daily News.

 

Skylight
January 22—February 13, 2016
Christel DeHaan Main Stage

By David Hare
Director: Gari Williams

Actor Bill Simmons stars in this play about family, secrets and relationships gone bad. Kyra is surprised to see the son of her former lover at her apartment in a London slum. He hopes she will reconcile with his distraught, now widowed, father. Tom, a restless, self-made restaurant and hotel tycoon, arrives later that evening, unaware of his son’s visit. Kyra, who was his invaluable business associate and a close family friend until his wife discovered their affair, has since found a vocation teaching underprivileged children. Is the gap between them unbridgeable, or can they resurrect their relationship?

 

Killer Joe
February 19–March 5, 2016
Theatre on the Square – Stage Two

By Tracy Letts
Director: Lori Raffel

The first play by the author of August: Osage County, which premiered at Chicago’s Steppenwolf before going on to acclaimed productions in London and New York. Hired by the dissolute Smith family to murder the matriarch for insurance money, Killer Joe takes the daughter to bed as a retainer against his final payoff which sets in motion a bloody aftermath as the “hit man” meets his match.  Wes Craven called it “White-trash Gothic with a comic-book spin.”

 

Passion
March 11–26, 2016
Theatre on the Square – Christel DeHaan Main Stage

Music and lyrics by Stephen Sondheim – Book by James Lapine
Director:  Tim Spradlin

Set in 19th century Italy, this dramatic musical concerns a young soldier and the changes in him brought about by the obsessive love of Fosca, his Colonel’s homely, ailing cousin.  The New York Times said “Once in an extraordinary while, you sit in a theater and your body shivers with the sense and thrill of something so new, so unexpected, that it seems, for those fugitive moments, more like life than art. Passion is just plain wonderful.”

 

Porno Stars at Home
April 1–23, 2016
Theatre on the Square – Stage Two

By Leonard Melfi
Director: Bill Wilkison

All those people who live fantasy lives up there on the not so silver porno screen what might they be like at home, away from the tacky lighting and cheap interiors of their workaday world? What might they fantasize about? What might they really, really want? One wants to be discovered as a serious actress well, they all more or less want that ; one, a star of gay porno, is actually heterosexual and wants to be recognized as such; another wants a child.

 

Batboy: The Musical
April 29–May 28, 2016
Theatre on the Square – Christel DeHaan Main Stage

Story and book by Keythe Farley and Brian Flemming, music and lyrics by Laurence O’Keefe
Director:  Zack Neiditch (co-produced with Zach Rosing)

Inspired by a series of tabloid headlines published in 1992 by The Weekly World News, a group of spelunking West Virginian teenagers discover the creature and the sheriff brings him to the local veterinarian (Dr. Parker’s) home, where he begins to assimilate to human life and become a part of the Parker family while trying to keep his penchant for sucking human blood under control. When Edgar tries to ingratiate himself with the townfolk of Hope Falls, he is quickly rejected, and he and Dr. Parker’s daughter (who fall in love) run away together. After a single night of joyous freedom, tragedy strikes when Meredith finds them and reveals the dark secret of Bat Boy’s origin.

 

Time Stands Still
June 17–July 9, 2016

By Donald Margulies
Director:  Gari Williams

The play focuses on Sarah and James, a photojournalist and a foreign correspondent trying to find happiness in a world that seems to have gone crazy. Theirs is a partnership based on telling the toughest stories, and together, making a difference. But when their own story takes a sudden turn, the adventurous couple confronts the prospect of a more conventional life.

 

Rent
July 15–August 13, 2016

Book, Music, and Lyrics by Jonathan Larson
Director: Scott Robinson

20th anniversary of RENT on Broadway!  Set in the East Village of New York City, rent is about falling in love, finding your voice and living for today. Winner of the TONY Award for Best Musical and the Pulitzer Prize for Drama, rent has become a pop cultural phenomenon with songs that rock and a story that resonates with audiences of all ages. Based loosely on Puccini’s La Boheme.

Winner of the TONY Award for Best Musical and the Pulitzer Prize for Drama.