BROOKLYN: St. Ann’s Warehouse has announced its 2016-17 season, which will feature the world premiere of Taylor Mac’s A 24-Decade History of Popular Music as well as a new play from Daniel Kitson and the Donmar Warehouse production of The Tempest. The season will be the second in the theatre’s new home on the Brooklyn Bridge waterfront.
“We fully expect this wild array of brilliant artists, starting with the shimmering Taylor Mac, to set and reset the stage for another season of spectacular transformations in the new St. Ann’s Warehouse,” said artistic director and founder Susan Feldman in a statement.
The season will launch with Taylor Mac’s A 24-Decade History of Popular Music (Sept. 15-Oct. 8). The marathon follows music history from 1776 to the present day, and the production will feature a 24-piece orchestra and a vast group of special guests. Mac will perform the show in two ways: as a series of concerts covering three decades each, and in a one-time-only, non-stop, 24-hour marathon performance. Matt Ray will be the arranger and music director. Machine Dazzle and Mimi Lien will design the sets. Josh Torres will design the lights. Jocelyn Clarke will be the dramaturg, and Niegel Smith will codirect.
Next up will be the American premiere of Daniel Kitson’s Mouse: The Persistence of an Unlikely Thought (Nov. 8-27). The monologuist’s show is about “friendship and loneliness, doubt and hope, a mouse, a phone call, and the unfathomable repercussions of everything we ever do,” according to a statement.
The London Artists Projects production of Penny Arcade’s Longing Lasts Longer (Dec. 1-11) will have its American premiere next. Conceived, written, and performed by Arcade, the show uses the performer’s combination of standup comedy and memoir and a live/mixed soundtrack of popular music from the past five decades to critique the suburbanization of New York City. Arcade will collaborate with designer and co-director Steve Zehentner and creative producer Jeremy Goldstein.
The new year will launch with the Donmar Warehouse’s production of The Tempest (Jan. 13-Feb. 12, 2017), featuring an all-female cast led by Harriet Walter. Lloyd previously brought all-female productions of Julius Caesar and Henry IV, headlined by Walter, to St. Ann’s Warehouse.
The final show of the season will be Kneehigh’s production of 946: The Amazing Story of Adolphus Tips (March 16-April 9, 2017), adapted by Michael Morpurgo and Emma Rice from Morpurgo’s book. The coming-of-age story follows a young girl named Lily, who lives with her family and her cat, Adolphus, in the seaside village of Slapton when American soldiers arrive in preparation for the D-Day invasion. Rice will direct.
St. Ann’s Warehouse, founded in 1980, is a presenting house committed to bringing international companies and artists to New York audiences.
