My Fair Lady, Barbara Cook, August Wilson Series Headed for Kennedy Center in '07-'08

The 2007-2008 theater season at the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts will feature the previously announced "August Wilson's 20th Century," the playwright's complete 10-play cycle performed as staged readings, a five-concert cabaret series curated by Barbara Cook and productions of My Fair Lady and Disney's The Lion King. The lineup and dates for the Washington, D.C. theater are as follows:

"Barbara Cook's Spotlight" features the legendary singer and actress and some of her favorite performers in a series five cabaret evenings at the Terrace Theater. Cook will perform on October 19, followed by performances by three-time Tony Award nominee Judy Kuhn on October 26, Tony winner Lillias White on November 16, Broadway regular Brent Barrett on December 28 and Alice Ripley and Emily Skinner on April 11, 2008.

A revival of Lerner & Loewe's My Fair Lady will play the Opera House from December 27 to January 20, 2008, directed by Trevor Nunn Cats, Les Miserables with choreography by Matthew Bourne Swan Lake, Mary Poppins. No casting has been announced.

"August Wilson's 20th Century," a series including the late playwright's entire 10-play cycle, will be presented as staged readings with costumes, lighting and scenery in the Terrace Theater from March 4 to March 29, 2008. Kenny Leon, director of the forthcoming Broadway production of Wilson's Radio Golf, will serve as the festival's artistic director and direct productions of Gem of the Ocean, Fences, The Piano Lesson and Radio Golf. Other directors for the series will include Lou Bellamy Ma Rainey's Black Bottom, Gordon Davidson Jitney, Todd Kreidler Joe Turner's Come and Gone and Derrick Sanders Seven Guitars, Two Trains Running and King Hedley II.

The company for "August Wilson's 20th Century" will consist of a group of about 25 actors who will each perform in at least three plays. The cast will include John Amos, Cherise Booth, Rocky Carroll, Anthony Chisholm, Rosalyn Coleman, Keith David, Viola Davis, Hassan El-Amin, Lynda Gravátt, Stephen McKinley Henderson, Billy Eugene Jones, Ron Cephas Jones, Eugene Lee, Anthony Mackie, Afemo Omilami, Phylicia Rashad, Roslyn Ruff, Keith Randolph Smith, Michole Briana White and James Williams. Additional actors will be announced in the coming months.

Disney's The Lion King, directed by Julie Taymor, makes its Washington, D.C. debut beginning June 26, 2008, at the Opera House. Julie Marie Myatt's Welcome Home, Jenny Sutter, a play about a wounded Marine sergeant home from Iraq, willl play the Terrace Theater from July 19 to July 27, 2008. A production of the Oregon Shakespeare Festival directed by Jessica Thebus, Jenny Sutter is part of the Kennedy Center Fund for New American Plays. Due to scheduled renovations, the Eisenhower Theater will be closed for the 2007-2008 season.