The Cradle Will Rock, Strindbergs in Rep & More Fill Out Classic Stage's 2018-2019 Season

Classic Stage Company, under the leadership of Tony-winning Artistic Director John Doyle, has announced its upcoming 2018-2019 season, the acclaimed theater's 51st. Highlights include a new production of Marc Blitzstein's folk opera The Cradle Will Rock and two classic works by August Strindberg performed in repertory. All productions appear at Classic Stage Company's downtown venue.

Kicking off the season in late October 2018 will be George Tabori's new translation of Bertolt Brecht's 1941 play The Resistible Rise of Arturo Ui. Set in 1930s Chicago, the work centers on mobster Arturo Ui, who will stop at nothing to control the cauliflower trade. Brecht’s skewering of Adolf Hitler and totalitarianism will be directed by Doyle.

Next up, in early January 2019, will be two 19th-century August Strindberg plays performed in repertory: Mies Julie and The Dance of Death. Mies Julie follows the title character, the lonely, imperious daughter of an aristocrat, who falls for her father’s charismatic footman; the scandal that ensues spirals out of control. The Dance of Death centers on retired military man Edgar and his wife, Alice, who have given up on any semblance of civility toward each other on the threshold of their 25th wedding anniversary. Due to their isolation, however, they are as codependent as they are hateful.

Beginning in late March 2019, Classic Stage will present a new staging of Marc Blitzstein's folk opera The Cradle Will Rock. Set in Steeltown, USA, The Cradle Will Rock centers on laborer Larry Foreman, who struggles to unionize fellow steelworkers against mounting attacks from a greedy industrialist and uses his power to influence nearly everyone else in town.

In the summer of 2019, Classic Stage will offer up a festival of 39 readings from Oregon Shakespeare Festival's Translation Project entitled Play On! CSC partnered with OSF for the commission of 36 playwrights—each paired with a dramaturg—to translate Shakespeare's canon into contemporary modern English.

Classic Stage is currently presenting a new mounting of Tennessee Williams' Summer and Smoke—a co-production with Transport Group—and will conclude its current season with the previously announced new staging of Oscar Hammerstein II and Georges Bizet's musical Carmen Jones, featuring Tony winner Anika Noni Jones.

Dates, additional creatives and casting for the 2018-2019 Classic Stage season will be announced at a later date.