Odds & Ends: Taylor Mac's New Play Will Seat Audiences in a Ball Pit & More

Here's a quick roundup of stories you might have missed today.

Taylor Mac's New Play Will Seat Audiences in a Ball Pit
We're going to have a ball! Taylor Mac, the Tony-nominated playwright who stirred audiences last year with Gary: A Sequel to Titus Andronicus, will debut The Fre at off-Broadway's Flea Theater next month. The Flea's Artistic Director Niegel Smith will helm the production, which is set in a giant ball pit from which audiences will watch the play. Based on Aristophanes' The Frogs, The Fre tells the story of an intellectual aesthete who is trapped inside a mud put in the middle of a swamp by the swamp's fatuous inhabitants who call themselves the "Fre." Using a combination of potty-mouthed prose versus heightened verse, the play will take audiences literally and figuratively into a mud pit to hash out the current political divide. Performances will run from February 28 through April 12.

GLAAD Media Awards Will Revive Category Recognizing Outstanding Broadway Productions
The media advocacy organization GLAAD has announced the return of the Outstanding Broadway Production category as part of its 31st Annual GLAAD Media Awards. The category will shine a spotlight on LGBTQ-inclusive content on Broadway. Past productions that have been recognized include Rent, Angels in America, Falsettos, I Am My Own Wife, The Normal Heart, Wig Out!, The Pride, The Goat or Who Is Sylvia?, A Boy and His Soul, The Intelligent Homosexual's Guide to Capitalism and Socialism with a Key to the Scriptures, 25 Questions for a Jewish Mother and The Little Dog Laughed. This year's nominees will be announced later this month.

The Wrong Man to Make London Debut as Solo Show
The new musical The Wrong Man, which recently made its world premiere with off-Broadway's MCC Theater with a cast of eleven, will make its way across the pond next month in a new format. Writer-composer-lyricist Ross Golan, who created the musical from his concept album, will perform the show solo at The Other Palace's Studio space. The Wrong Man is set in Reno, Nevada, where Duran, a man just scraping by, is accused of a murder he says he didn't commit. The off-Broadway production was headlined by three-time Tony nominee Joshua Henry as Duran alongside Ryan Vasquez and Ciara Renée, as well as an ensemble of eight. Performances will begin on February 20.

LaMama Announces New York Premiere of The Beautiful Lady Musical by Elizabeth Swados
Off-Broadway's La MaMa ETC has scheduled the New York-debut staging of The Beautiful Lady, a musical featuring music by the late Elizabeth Swados and a book by Paul Schmidt. Anne Bogart will direct the production, scheduled to play the Ellen Stewart Theatre from April 30 through May 17. Set in an artists’ café during the Russian Revolution, The Beautiful Lady tells the stories of radical poets of the time. As the revolution turns and begins to persecute its own, the poets advocate for a free and just society, seeking meaning and purpose in their resistance.