Spirit, Bach at Leipzig & Seven Set for NYTW Season

New York Theatre Workshop has firmed up plans for its 2005-2006 season. Following the season's first entry, the currently running Oedipus at Palm Springs, NYTW will present the theatrical piece Spirit, Itamar Moses' Bach at Lepizig and the hip-hop musical Seven by Will Power NYTW's Flow.

Spirit was created by the Improbable Theatre and is directed by Julian Crouch best known for Shockheaded Peter and Arlene Audergon. It begins and ends with three performers onstage, half in and half out of a steeply raked platform with no scripted lines to say and no story to act out. Spirit is about the three performers struggling to tell the story of the three brothers. The eldest of the brothers is sent his call-up papers to fight in his country's war, but dreaming of heroism; the youngest brother intercepts the letter and goes to war in his sibling's place. The piece features headless puppets, bread rolls as puppets, a corpse as a puppet, strange dancing, deeply personal reminiscences and lots of improvisation. The show will begin previews on September 13 and open off-Broadway on September 15. Guy Dartnell, Phelim McDermott and Lee Simpson star.

Jeffrey Carlson, Richard Easton, Michael Emerson, Reg Rogers and David Schramm are set to star in Bach at Lepizig, beginning performances on October 28. Inspired by actual events, the play is set in Leipzig, Germany in1722. It centers on seven rival musicians who jump at the chance to fill the most sought-after musical post in Europe: organmaster at Leipzig. Pam MacKinnon directs.

The Seven is a musical adaptation of Aeschylus's Seven Against Thebes, the story of brotherly war between Oedipus's sons. Jo Bonney will direct the NYTW staging of the tuner, which is scheduled to begin performances on January 17, 2006.

Oedipus at Palm Springs ends its run at NYTW on August 28.