PROVIDENCE, R.I.: The Wilbury Theatre Group has announced their 2018-19 season, which will feature six plays that places revivals of classic plays alongside experimental new works.
“Next season is about learning to leave the past behind and looking to the future,” said Wilbury founder and artistic director Josh Short in a statement. “The writers of each of this season’s plays are telling stories of wit, style, and substance that will resonate with audiences on an emotional level. More importantly though, they tell the stories that encourage us to be the change, to seize the day, and to make the future the way we want it to be.”
Opening the season will be Paula Vogel’s Pulitzer Prize-winning How I Learned to Drive (Sept.-Oct.), a play about survival as seen through the lens of a troubling relationship between a young girl and an older man.
Following will be Hype Man: A Break-Beat Play (Oct.-Nov.) by Idris Goodwin, a play about Pinnacle and his hype man Verb who are on the verge of making it big before a police shooting of an unarmed black teen forces their group to navigate issues of friendship, race, and privilege.
Next up will be Futurity (Nov.-Dec.), with lyrics and book by César Alvarez and music by Alvarez and the Lisps. This avant-Americana musical tells of a Civil War soldier and a mathematical genius thousands of miles away who, together, imagine their way out of impossible circumstances by inventing a machine.
The season continues with The Crucible (Jan.-Feb. 2019), Arthur Miller’s classic play portraying the Salem Witch Trials written as an allegory for the rise of McCarthyism in the late 1940s.
Next is Constellations (March-April 2019) by Nick Payne, a play that explores a myriad of possible lifetimes that could play out after Roland and Marianne meat at a party.
Closing out the season is Fun Home (May-June 2019), based on the graphic novel by Alison Bechdel, with book by Lisa Kron and music by Jeanine Tesori. The musical follows Alison, whose father dies unexpectedly, as she dives into her past to tell the story of the one-of-a-kind man whose temperament and secrets defined her family and her life.
The programming will also include three additional workshop and full-scale productions from the company’s new works and experimental arm, Studio W. This year includes a new adaptation of A Servant of Two Masters by Brien Lang, new works by Darcie Dennigan and Matt Requintina, and the National New Play Network rolling premiere of Red Bike by Caridad Svich.
Founded in 2010, the Wilbury Theatre Group is a collaboration of artists that present contemporary and experimental theatre.
