Public Theater Announces 2013-14 Season, Including Two New Musicals and a ‘Radical’ Antony & Cleopatra

The Public Theater has announced its 2013-14 season, which will include two new musicals, a ‘radical’ staging of Shakespeare’s Antony & Cleopatra and the final play in Richard Nelson’s Apple family series.

The season kicks off with the Wallace Shawn-Andre Gregory Project, which will mark a new collaboration between the playwright and director. The first, The Designated Mourner, will feature Shawn, Deborah Eisenberg and Larry Pine and will run from June 21 through August 25, 2013. The second, Grasses of a Thousand Colors, will feature Julie Hagerty, Emily McDonnell, Jennifer Tilly and Shawn and will run from October 8 through November 10.

Monologist Mike Daisey will bring his master storytelling to the Public with the world premiere of All The Faces of The Moon, created and performed by Daisey with direction by Jean-Michele Gregory. The series is told over the course of one lunar month, with a new monologue every night totaling 29 unique performances, each standing alone as a single story but working together as an epic theatrical narrative. It is billed as the “largest story ever attempted in the American theater.”

Arguendo, created and performed by Elevator Repair Service, will run from September 10 through October 6. Directed by John Collings, the show is a playful riff on the 1991 Supreme Court case Barnes v. Glen Theatre, which saw a group of dancers challenging a ban on public nudity. The play is co-commissioned by the Public, Woolly Mammoth Theatre Company and Wexner Center for the Arts at The Ohio State University.

Fun Home, a musical based on Alison Bechdel’s graphic novel with music by Jeanine Tesori, book and lyrics by Lisa Kron and direction by Sam Gold, will run from October 1 through November 3. Set in a funeral home, the show charts a girl’s quest to come to terms with her father’s unexpected death. The show made its world premiere with a Public Lab production in the fall of 2012.

The Foundry Theatre’s production of Bertolt Brecht’s Good Person of Szechwan will run from October 18 through November 24. The play features a translation by John Willett and direction by Lear deBessonet, with a cast that includes Taylor Mac, Kate Benson, Ephraim Birney, Vinie Burrows, Clifton Duncan, Jack Allen Greenfield, Annie Golden, Brooke Ishibashi, Paul Juhn, Mia Katigbak, Lisa Kron, David Turner and Darryl Winslow. The show features original live by music by Cesar Alvarez with The Lisps.

Tony winner Richard Nelson’s award-winning series of plays about the fictional Apple family will conclude with the fourth and final play Regular Singing, opening on November 22, 2013—the 50th anniversary of JFK’s assassination. Nelson’s previous plays about the Apple family will be performed in repertory in The Apple Family Plays: Scenes From Life in the Country from October 22 through December 15.

The Under the Radar Festival will celebrate its tenth anniversary with another 12-day international theater collective showcasing new works from around the world. The festival will run from January 8 through January 19, 2014.

Tarell Alvin McCraney’s new production of Shakespeare’s Antony & Cleopatra will follow with a New York premiere from February 18 through March 23. The play is set in the 18th century and is described as a “stripped down, radical new version” of the Bard’s play, presented in collaboration with the Royal Shakespeare Company, GableStage in Miami and Ohio State University.

Father Comes Home From The Wars (Parts 1, 2 & 3) will run from March 11 through March 30. Pulitzer Prize winner Suzan-Lori Parks’ drama about “the mess of war, the cost of freedom and the heartbreak of love” will be directed by Jo Bonney.

A Second Chance will get its New York premiere from March 18 through April 13. With music, lyrics and book by Ted Shen and direction by Jonathan Butterell, this new musical tells the story of a recent widower and a divorcee whose mid-life meeting leads them both to new experiences.

Finally, The Civilians’ The Great Immensity will get a New York premiere with a Public Lab production running from April 8 through April 27. Written and directed by Steven Cosson and featuring songs by Michael Friedman, the “thrilling and timely” production follows a woman who hops the globe while pursuing the tropical disappearance of someone close to her. On her journeys, she uncovers a mysterious plot surrounding the upcoming international climate summit in Auckland.