MINNEAPOLIS: The Jungle Theater has announced its 2018 season, its 28th, comprising five work, plus two new-play initiatives.
“Our season is lively, funny, and poignant,” said Jungle artistic director Sarah Rasmussen in a statement. “It stretches across genres and generations. It includes timeless voices like Melville and Billie Holiday, along with new theatrical sensations like The Wolves and Hand to God. Each show will have the Jungle’s hallmarks of masterful design and a deep inquiry into the human heart.”
The season will open with Ishmael, an adaptation of Herman Melville’s Moby Dick by Leo Geter (Jan. 13-Feb. 4, 2018). The piece will feature Twin Cities-based actor and singer Jack Weston, who plays 12 characters. Three bluegrass musicians of the band Pert Near Sandstone will provide backing music. Geter will direct.
Next will be the Midwest premiere of My Mother Has 4 Noses, written and performed by singer/songwriter Jonatha Brooke (Feb. 10-March 4, 2018). In it, Brooke uses story and song to tell the story of caring for her mother in the last years of her life. Jeremy B. Cohen will direct.
After that the Jungle will present the Midwest premiere of Sarah DeLappe‘s The Wolves, a finalist for the 2017 Pulitzer Prize (March 31-April 29, 2018). The play is about a girls’ high school soccer team as they prepare for a match. Rasmussen will direct.
Next will be Lady Day at Emerson’s Bar and Grill by Lanie Robertson (May 26-June 24, 2018). The show is about one of Billie Holiday’s final performances, and features some of her songs. Marion McClinton will direct, and designer Joel Sass will transform the Jungle into a small, intimate bar in 1959. Thomasina Petrus will play Holiday.
The season will close with Hand to God by Robert Askins (July 21-Aug. 19, 2018). The play is about an awkward teenager and his sock puppet, who becomes possessed by the devil.
In addition, the Jungle has announced two new initiatives: JungleWriters, a free playwriting program for female high school students in Minneapolis, and the Jungle’s first-ever commission: an adaptation of Louisa May Alcott’s Little Women by Kate Hamill.
The Jungle Theater presents work in its 150-seat space.
