BETHESDA, MD.: Round House Theatre (RHT) has announced its 2017-18 season, featuring six productions.
“For our 40th anniversary, we’ve invited some of the world’s leading theatre artists to create new plays with the incredible community of local artists we have here in the D.C. area,” says artistic director Ryan Rilette in a statement.
The season will start with In the Heights (Sept. 6-Oct. 8), with music and lyrics by Lin-Manuel Miranda and book by Quiara Alegría Hudes. Coproduced with Olney Theatre Center, the musical follows the lively inhabitants of Washington Heights. Marcos Santana will choreograph and direct.
Next up will be the world premiere of Sarah Gancher’s I’ll Get You Back Again (Oct. 4-29), about a struggling stand-up comedian who sits in for her dead father as the bassist for his seminal psychedelic rock band. Rachel Chavkin will direct.
Following will be The Book of Will (Nov. 29-Dec. 24), by Lauren Gunderson, about two actors who compile the first Folio to preserve the works of their deceased friend, William Shakespeare. Rilette will direct.
The season will continue with the American premiere of Moira Buffini’s Handbagged (Jan. 31-Feb. 25, 2018), a comedy that imagines what Margaret Thatcher and Queen Elizabeth II talk about behind closed doors. The show will be presented as part of the 2018 Women’s New Voices Theater Festival, in arrangement with Tricycle Theatre and Eleanor Lloyd Productions. Indhu Rubasingham will direct.
Next up will be “Master Harold”…And the Boys (April 11-May 6, 2018), by Athol Fugard, about two black men and a white boy who joke and dance together in a small South African tea shop in 1950 to diffuse the reality of the apartheid. Rilette will direct.
The season will close with The Legend of Georgia McBride (June 6-July 1, 2018), by Matthew Lopez, about an Elvis impersonator who loses his gig and performs as a drag queen to support his growing family. Tom Story will direct.
In addition to the season lineup, Round House will present Happenstance Theater’s Bon Voyage (July 14-30), a devised piece about a collection of 19th-century dreamers who meet on the way to Paris.
RHT will also present Sloppy Firsts, by Megan McCafferty, about a sixteen-year-old high school student who suffers a major blow when her best friend suddenly moves away. The show will be performed by the Round House Teen Performance Company.
Round House Theater, founded in 1978, presents modern classics and musicals at its 400-seat theatre.
