The Purple Lights of Joppa Illinois, Starring Susan Heyward, Extends Off-Broadway

Pulitzer Prize finalist Adam Rapp's The Purple Lights of Joppa Illinois has extended off-Broadway. The production will now play through June 26; it had been set to shutter on June 19 at Atlantic's Stage 2. As previously reported, the New York premiere closes out Atlantic Theater Company's 2015-2016 season. The show features Susan Heyward, William Apps, Connor Barrett and Katherine Reis.

Ellis Shook lives alone in a small duplex apartment in Paducah, Kentucky. He works nights buffing floors, keeps to himself—and always remembers to take his medication. But when two teenage girls arrive at his doorstep one autumn afternoon, their visit will force him to confront a tragic past while also offering him a glimpse at hope.

Rapp makes his Atlantic Theater Company return with this play; he staged the world premiere of Dreams of Flying Dreams of Falling in 2011. His plays include Finer Noble Gases, Nocturne, Faster, Blackbird, Essential Self-Defense, American Sligo and Red Light Winter, for which he received an Obie Award and was a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize for Drama. The world premiere production of his latest play Wolf in the River recently played off-Broadway at The Flea Theater.