Williamstown Theatre Festival's Nikos Stage
Something Old Something New
By: Charles Giuliano - Mar 07, 2011
For the first season of Artistic Director Jenny Gersten the programming resembles the acrobatics of uneven parallel bars.
When the schedule was announced recently for the Main Stage critics were surprised and somewhat disappointed that just three plays were planned. Down from four last summer. They include You Can't Take It With You, which is headed to Broadway, She Stoops to Conquer directed by former WTF artistic director, Nicholas Martin, and the American Premiere of John Doyle's new musical Ten Cents a Dance assembled from the music of Rogers and Hart.
If the Main Stage season is reduced it appears that the programming for the Nikos Stage has been expanded. Where we anticipated four productions there will be five.
Berkshire theatre audiences will be pleased to experience a full and diverse season that will be launched on June 22 on the Nikos Stage, with a perennial favorite, A Streetcar Named Desire, and close on the Main Stage, August 28, with Ten Cents a Dance.
Gersten has scheduled a full house of eight productions with a clear emphasis on the more intimate, edgy and less expensive productions of the Nikos Stage. Because WTF tends not to scrimp on the pit band the most costly presentation will likely be the season’s only musical Ten Cents a Dance.
With five productions on the Nikos Stage Gersten will try a new approach. Traditionally the Nikos has focused on new but mainstream plays. There has been little or no interest in the avant-garde in the Berkshires. Other than the iconic productions of Beckett at Berkshire Theatre Festival. Under Nicholas Martin several Nikos plays- The Understudy, Broke-Ology, The Atheist, After the Revolution, moved to Off Broadway in New York.
Notably, Gersten’s first Main Stage production You Can't Take It With You is Broadway bound. This is an accomplishment WTF has not managed in some time.
It remains to be seen whether any of the five Nikos plays will be headed for New York.
Where Nikos has presented new works Gersten is exploring a different strategy with two revivals A Streetcar Named Desire, by Tennessee Williams, and Henrik Ibsen’s proto-feminist trope A Doll’s House.
The Streetcar casting of Jessica Hecht as Blanche DuBois is truly inspiring. She is widely regarded as one of the finest theatrical actresses of her generation. A WTF regular she was a Tony nominee a couple of seasons ago for her role in Arthur Miller’s A View from the Bridge. She was less visible last summer in the ensemble cast of Our Town. Currently in New York she has been appearing in a sold out production of Three Sisters. Sam Rockwell will evoke the raw red meat of Stanley Kowalski. In a small theatre Streetcar will prove to be one of the hot tickets of the Berkshire Season.
The choice of A Doll’s House is curious. This season Theresa Rebeck has received enthusiastic response for her reworking of the play, moved to Connecticut, in DollHouse. A Boston Globe article states that “The 2001 Hartford production of ‘DollHouse’ was harshly reviewed — Rebeck won’t talk about that — and the play has not received a full staging since.” If done well it is a compelling play. I often showed a video of a Jane Fonda production to my Humanities classes during a segment on feminist issues.
Of the new Nikos plays One Slight Hitch, starring the hilarious Lewis Black, promises to bring some levity to the season. Lord knows we can all use a few laughs. What follows is the Williamstown Theatre Festival’s press release.
Artistic Director Jenny Gersten is pleased to announce the Nikos Stage line-up for the 2011 Williamstown Theatre Festival (WTF), the company's 57th season. The Nikos Stage season includes revivals of Tennessee Williams' A Streetcar Named Desire and Henrik Ibsen's A Doll's House, along with three new works: Lewis Black's One Slight Hitch, the East Coast Premiere of Bess Wohl's Touch(ed), and The Civilians' production of You Better Sit Down: tales from my parents' divorce.
"These selections represent an ambitious experiment for the 173-seat Nikos Stage," says Gersten. "While new plays continue to be the focus of this venue, the inclusion of innovative revivals of classics gives our audience a fresh, and more intimate relationship with these works. Simultaneously, artists will have the opportunity to explore more nuanced, introspective interpretations of these great plays."
The Nikos Stage season includes:
A STREETCAR NAMED DESIRE June 22 - July 3
The Nikos Stage season opens with a revival of Tennessee Williams' incendiary drama, directed by David Cromer (Our Town). The cast will feature Jessica Hecht (A View From the Bridge; Our Town at WTF) as Blanche DuBois and Sam Rockwell (A Behanding in Spokane; The Hot L Baltimore at WTF) as Stanley Kowalski.
With 28 productions of his plays in our history, Tennessee Williams and the Williamstown Theatre Festival have had a long and impressive relationship. To honor his 100th birthday, there's no better gift than an intimate new production of his masterwork by one of today's most inventive directors. In the close quarters of the Nikos Stage, the audience will take up temporary residence in the stifling Kowalski apartment to witness Williams' turbulent tale of longing and delusion.
ONE SLIGHT HITCH July 6 - 17
Comedian and playwright Lewis Black comes home to WTF with a modern day farce that mocks the all-too-human desire to shape our own destiny. It's Courtney's wedding day, and her mom, Delia, is making sure that everything is perfect. The groom is perfect, the dress is perfect, and the decorations (assuming they arrive) will be perfect. Then, like in any good farce the doorbell rings. And all hell breaks loose. So much for perfect.
Joe Grifasi (Once in a Lifetime at WTF) directs a cast that includes Paige Howard (Adventureland) as Melanie and Mark Linn-Baker (As You Like It at WTF) as Doc Coleman.
A DOLL'S HOUSE July 20 - 31
Nora Helmer has everything an affluent housewife could want: beautiful children, an adoring husband, a bright future. When a carelessly buried secret rises to the surface, her well-calibrated, though artificial, domestic ideal begins to crumble. Terrified by this new reality, Nora must choose between outward perfection and inner truth. Still bracingly relevant, Ibsen's masterpiece, in a striking contemporary translation, offers no safer conclusions today than when it stormed stages of 19th-century Europe.
Sam Gold (Circle Mirror Transformation) directs a cast that includes Oscar Isaac (Shakespeare in the Park's Romeo and Juliet) as Krogstad, Hamish Linklater (Shakespeare in the Park's The Merchant of Venice; "The New Adventures of Old Christine") as Torvald, Matthew Maher (Gone Baby Gone) as Doctor Rank, Lily Rabe (The Merchant of Venice; WTF's Crimes of the Heart) as Nora, and Lili Taylor ("Six Feet Under"; Aunt Dan and Lemon, WTF's The Landscape of the Body) as Kristine.
TOUCH(ED) August 3 - 14
Kay loves her older sister Emma. Or is it Christina? Christine? Matilda? After spending eight years institutionalized and medicated, Emma has changed more than just her name. Determined to get back the brilliant sister she remembers, Kay rents a cabin in the woods and she and her boyfriend Billy hide the sharp objects, from butcher knife to cheese grater. Perhaps quality time with loved ones, some home-cooked meals and games of Scrabble will succeed in restoring Emma to health where her psychiatrists have failed. Directed by Trip Cullman (Bachelorette) in its East Coast Premiere, Bess Wohl's lively, bittersweet comedy explores the scope, limits, and sometimes dangerous side effects of familial love.
YOU BETTER SIT DOWN: tales from my parents' divorce August 16 - 21
Directed by Anne Kauffman (WTF's Six Degrees of Separation; This Wide Night) and crafted from interviews between the cast and their own parents, You Better Sit Down is an alternately heartbreaking and hilarious look at the stories behind the statistics of one of the most prominent social phenomena of our time. Shockingly candid, these delicate parent-child conversations, with the actors playing their own parents, yield unique insights into falling in love, falling out of love, and rebuilding a life after the complex experience of dividing a family.
The Civilians, a New York-based theater company, creates original work derived from investigations into the world beyond the theater.
These shows join the previously announced Main Stage productions, which include the Broadway-bound revival of You Can't Take It With You, the riotous Restoration comedy She Stoops to Conquer, and the American Premiere of John Doyle's dazzling new musical Ten Cents a Dance. The Main Stage Season begins July 1, 2011 and runs through August 28, 2011.
Announcements regarding additional cast and creative team information for both Nikos Stage and Main Stage productions, as well as additional Festival events, are forthcoming.
TICKETS AND SCHEDULE
Special Main Stage and Nikos Stage Season Packages are available for purchase until March 18, 2011 at www.wtfestival.org
Single tickets for the 2011 Williamstown Theatre Festival season will go on sale June 1, 2011 and can be purchased online at www.wtfestival.org, by phone at (413) 597-3400 or in person at the '62 Center for Theatre and Dance, 1000 Main St. (Route 2), Williamstown, MA 02167. New curtain times for all Main Stage and Nikos Stage shows are as follows: Tuesday - Saturday at 7:30 p.m., Thursday, Saturday & Sunday at 2:00 p.m.