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NEW YORK CITY CENTER ANNOUNCES 2014 ENCORES! SEASON
Released May 21, 2013 |
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The 2014 season of New York City Center’s Tony Award–winning Encores! series will open with Little Me directed by John Rando and starring Christian Borle (“Smash,” Peter and the Starcatcher) on February 5, 2014. The season will continue with The Most Happy Fella, directed and choreographed by Casey Nicholaw and starring Shuler Hensley (Oklahoma!, The Whale), followed by Irma La Douce, directed by John Doyle. Encores! Music Director Rob Berman will helm all shows.
Little Me, Neil Simon’s first musical, is the story of the glamorous Belle Poitrine, a self-invented celebrity who has spent her life in pursuit of wealth, culture and social position. Her seven oddball lovers are played by one actor: seven plum roles, from an innocent college boy to an octogenarian lecher to the dying king of a tiny European country that doesn’t seem to exist. The Encores! production will star Christian Borle.
Based on the novel Little Me: The Intimate Memoirs of that Great Star of Stage, Screen and Television/Belle Poitrine, by Patrick Dennis, Little Me has a book by Neil Simon, music by Cy Coleman and lyrics by Carolyn Leigh. The original production starred Sid Caesar as Belle’s seven love interests. It opened at the Lunt-Fontanne Theatre on November 17, 1962 and ran for 257 performances. Songs include “I've Got Your Number,” “Real Live Girl”and “The Other Side of the Tracks.” Little Me will run February 5 – 9.
The Most Happy Fella, Frank Loesser’s most ambitious and romantic musical, tells the heart-stopping story of a love triangle between an aging Napa Valley farmer, a young waitress and a handsome, restless ranch hand. The Most Happy Fella will star Shuler Hensley.
The Most Happy Fella is based on the play They Knew What They Wanted by Sidney Howard. Ithas a book, music and lyrics by Frank Loesser. Loesser’s score displays an astonishing range –ardent operatic numbers stand side by side with Broadway show-stoppers – and includes “Somebody Somewhere,” “My Heart Is So Full of You,” “Big D” and “Standing on the Corner.” It opened at the Imperial Theatre on May 3, 1956 and ran for 676 performances. The Most Happy Fella will run April 2 – 6.
(HISTORICAL NOTE: The Most Happy Fella was revived by the New York City Center Light Opera at City Center for a limited run of 16 performances from February 10 through February 22, 1959.)
Encores! breaks the mold with its first musical not written on American soil with Irma La Douce, the tale of a Parisian lady of the evening and the law student who falls in love with her. It has music by Marguerite Monnot and English book and lyrics by Julian More, David Heneker and Monty Norman.
After a three-year run in Paris, an English-language version of Irma La Douce, directed by Peter Brook, enjoyed tremendous success first in London and then on Broadway. Itopened at the Plymouth Theatre on September 29, 1960 and ran for 524 performances. The score produced one standard, “Our Language of Love,” and also features “The Valse Millieu” and “Dis Donc.” Irma La Douce will run May 7 – 11.
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Encores! subscriptions can be purchased starting August 5, 2013 through CityTix® at 212-581-1212 or online at www.NYCityCenter.org.
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NEW YORK CITY CENTER CELEBRATES THE 10TH ANNIVERSARY SEASON OF THE FALL FOR DANCE FESTIVAL
Released May 9, 2013 |
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New York City Center is celebrating the 10th Anniversary of the Fall for Dance Festival with a very special season, beginning with two FREE evenings of dance at the Delacorte Theater in Central Park, hosted by The Public Theater, on September 16 and 17 (Rain date, September 18). The Festival will continue at City Center from September 25 – October 5 with performances by 20 acclaimed dance companies and artists from around the world, including three new works from today’s most exciting young choreographers, commissioned by City Center, in celebration of the tenth anniversary, all for the low ticket price of $15. The Festival’s many free pre-show events will include dance lessons and panels by choreographers, artists and dance educators. Tickets will go on sale Sunday, September 8 at 11 a.m.
The FREE performances at The Public’s Delacorte Theater will feature works by four Festival alumni: New York City Ballet, Paul Taylor Dance Company, Ronald K. Brown/Evidence and STREB Extreme Action Company. (The same program will be performed on both nights.) Free tickets will be distributed, two per person, at The Public’s Delacorte Theater on the day of the show and through a virtual ticketing lottery.
The two-week Festival at City Center will consist of five unique programs and will include performances by Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater, American Ballet Theatre, Ballet Hispanico, BODYTRAFFIC, Colin Dunne, Dance Theatre of Harlem, doug elkins choreography, etc., Les Ballets Trockadero de Monte Carlo, Richard Alston Dance Company, Sara Mearns, Sidi Larbi Cherkaoui and The Royal Ballet. Additional companies and complete scheduling information TBA.
To celebrate the Festival’s 10th season, City Center has commissioned three new works: Annabelle Lopez Ochoa will create a new piece for Ballet Hispanico; Justin Peck will choreograph a new ballet for Sara Mearns, Principal Dancer, New York City Ballet, and a partner TBA; and The Royal Ballet’s Artist-in-Residence Liam Scarlett will create a new pas de deux for the company. Each commissioned work will receive its world premiere at the Festival and will be performed twice.
The Fall for Dance Festival has received international acclaim for its quality, innovation and success in introducing new and younger audiences to the world of dance. Newcomers and dance enthusiasts alike look forward to the Festival as both an introduction to new artists and a welcome return to familiar and beloved companies.
“We launched Fall for Dance nine years ago with the goal of introducing new audiences to dance and providing a highly visible showcase for artists, and it has succeeded beyond our wildest dreams,” said New York City Center President & CEO Arlene Shuler. “Since its inception, the Festival has presented 177 diverse companies and introduced more than 220,000 newcomers and dance enthusiasts to an eclectic mix of choreographers and performers. We are thrilled that our 10th Anniversary celebration will open with two free programs at the Delacorte Theater. It is particularly meaningful because the New York Dance Festival, which was held at the Delacorte in the 1960s, ’70s and ’80s, provided a model and inspiration for our Festival.”
“We are delighted to partner with City Center and bring dance back to the Delacorte, where it has such a beautiful and distinguished history,” said Public Theater Artistic Director Oskar Eustis. “Fall for Dance was formed on the same democratic principles as The Public Theater; indeed City Center and The Public are both democratic artistic institutions intent on making art for the people. It’s a match made in heaven, or New York, which is the same thing.”
Stanford Makishi serves as Artistic Producer and Ilter Ibrahimof serves as Artistic Advisor to the Festival.
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The 2013 Fall for Dance Festival runs September 25 – October 5 at New York City Center (West 55th Street between 6th and 7th avenues). All tickets are $15 and go on sale on Sunday, September 8 at 11 a.m. Tickets can be purchased online, by calling CityTix at 212.581.1212, or at the City Center Box Office. |
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STEPHEN SONDHEIM/WYNTON MARSALIS COLLABORATION
Released Apr 18, 2013 |
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Stephen Sondheim and Wynton Marsalis will collaborate on A BED AND A CHAIR: A New York Love Story, a new musical event featuring Sondheim’s music arranged and performed by the Jazz at Lincoln Center Orchestra with Wynton Marsalis, announced Arlene Shuler, President & CEO of New York City Center. This Encores! Special Event, directed by frequent Sondheim collaborator John Doyle, and conceived by Peter Gethers, Jack Viertel and John Doyle, will run for seven performances, November 13 – 17 at City Center. City Center’s annual Gala Benefit will take place on Thursday, November 14 and will include a post-performance dinner at the Plaza Hotel.
A BED AND A CHAIR: A New York Love Story, presented by the combined forces of City Center’s Encores! program and Jazz at Lincoln Center, celebrates love in New York and love of New York. Native Manhattanite Sondheim and adopted citizen Marsalis (originally from New Orleans) will compare musical notes on their shared passion for our city.
The program will feature more than two dozen Sondheim compositions, each piece newly re-imagined by the unique musical sensibility of Marsalis and performed by the Jazz at Lincoln Center Orchestra. Singers will be drawn from both the jazz and Broadway worlds. Casting will be announced at a later date.
A BED AND A CHAIR: A New York Love Story is the second production of the City Center and Jazz at Lincoln Center producing partnership that began in 2011 with the acclaimed Cotton Club Parade, a celebration of Duke Ellington’s years at the famed Harlem nightclub. The show returned to City Center for a limited run in 2012; a Broadway production is scheduled to open during the 2013-14 season.
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A BED AND A CHAIR: A New York Love Story will run for seven performances, Nov 13 – 17, 2013. Tickets go on sale Sep 3. Further information is available at NYCityCenter.org and jalc.org.
For the November 14 Gala tickets and information, please call 212.763.1205 or visit NYCityCenter.org/gala. |
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ON YOUR TOES CASTING ANNOUNCED
Released Apr 15, 2013 |
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Christine Baranski, Kelli Barrett, Walter Bobbie, Jeremy Cohen, Dalton Harrod, Randy Skinner, Shonn Wiley, Karen Ziemba, New York City Ballet Principal dancer Joaquin De Luz and American Ballet Theatre principal dancer Irina Dvorovenko will star in Rodgers and Hart’s On Your Toes, the final Encores! presentation of the 2012-13 New York City Center season. Directed and choreographed by Warren Carlyle, On Your Toes will have guest music direction by Encores! founding music director Rob Fisher and will play seven performances, from May 8 – 12 at New York City Center, W. 55th Street (between 6th and 7th Avenues). The “Slaughter on Tenth Avenue” ballet, originally choreographed by George Balanchine, will be staged by Susan Pilarre, who served as a Ballet Mistress of the show’s 1983 Broadway Revival.
The complete cast of On Your Toes includes: Christine Baranski, Kelli Barrett, Walter Bobbie, Jeremy Cohen, Joaquin De Luz, Irina Dvorovenko, Dalton Harrod, Randy Skinner, Shonn Wiley and Karen Ziemba, with Adam Bashian, Brandon Bieber, Justin Bowen, Abby Church, Rachel Coloff, Steve Czarnecki, Christine DiGiallonardo, Deanna Doyle, Ashlee Dupre, Sara Edwards, Jason Michael Evans, Kurt Froman, Luke Hawkins, Jessy Hendrickson, Beth Johnson-Nicely, Drew King, Mark Mackillop, Sean McGibbon, Mara Newberry, David Scott Purdy, Ariel Shepley, Nicholas Sipes, Kathy Voytko and Alex Wong.
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Tickets for On Your Toes start at $25 and can be purchased online, by calling CityTix at 212.581.1212, or at the City Center Box Office (West 55th Street between 6th and 7th Avenues). |
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NEW YORK CITY CENTER GOES OFF-BROADWAY WITH ENCORES! OFF-CENTER
Released Apr 4, 2013 |
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A New Musical Theater Series
Jeanine Tesori, Artistic Director
Featuring
The Cradle Will Rock
directed by Sam Gold, choreographed by Chase Brock
July 10 – 13
Violet
Starring Sutton Foster
directed by Leigh Silverman
July 17 – one night only!
I’m Getting My Act Together and Taking It on the Road
directed and choreographed by Kathleen Marshall
July 24 – 27
New York City Center goes Off-Broadway this summer with the launch of Encores! Off-Center, a new series featuring seminal Off-Broadway musicals filtered through the lens of today’s most innovative artists. In keeping with City Center’s founding mission to make the arts accessible to all, the majority of tickets will be $25.
The series, under the artistic direction of Jeanine Tesori, will open on July 10 with The Cradle Will Rock, Marc Blitzstein’s historic 1937 allegory of corruption and corporate greed, directed by Sam Gold and choreographed by Chase Brock. Cradle will be followed by a one-night-only performance of Jeanine Tesori and Brian Crawley’s Violet, starring Sutton Foster and directed by Leigh Silverman, with music direction by Michael Rafter on Wednesday, July 17. The series will conclude with Gretchen Cryer and Nancy Ford’s I’m Getting My Act Together and Taking It on the Road, directed and choreographed by Kathleen Marshall , July 24 – 27. Chris Fenwick will music direct Cradle and Getting My Act Together. Tickets will go on sale April 15.
OFF-CENTER: THE PAST MEETS THE FUTURE
“The goal of Encores! Off-Center is to connect the innovators of today to the shows that expanded creative boundaries in the past,” said Jeanine Tesori. “We want to find out what happens when contemporary artists meet this material. How will today’s directors, musicians, actors and audiences relate to these stories?”
Like the wildly popular Fall for Dance Festival, launched by City Center in 2004, Off-Center aims to attract new and younger audiences by offering affordable tickets.
“I strongly believe that we need to build a new generation of musical theater lovers,” said New York City Center President & CEO Arlene Shuler. “That’s why the $25 ticket for Off-Center is so important. We want young people and people who have never been to a musical theater performance to fall in love with it and discover something in this art form that speaks to them.”
In the Encores! tradition, there will be a great emphasis on the scores, with the orchestra performing onstage, and each show will receive a brief rehearsal period followed by five performances. The series also will feature free, pre-curtain conversations with a range of special guests including artists, scholars and musicians. These events, while informative, will also be entertaining in their own right, featuring genres ranging from visual art to spoken-word poetry and beyond. The events will place the musical in the context of its legacy and provide insightful explorations of the work the audience is about to experience.
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Tickets for all Encores! Off-Center productions start at $25 and will be available starting April 15. Tickets can be purchased online, by calling CityTix at 212.581.1212, or at the City Center Box Office (West 55th Street between 6th and 7th Avenues). |
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LIN-MANUEL MIRANDA JOINS CELIA KEENAN-BOLGER, COLIN DONNELL, BETSY WOLFE AND ELIZABETH STANLEY IN STEPHEN SONDHEIM’S MERRILY WE ROLL ALONG
Released Oct 31, 2011 |
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Lin-Manuel Miranda will join previously announced Celia Keenan-Bolger, Colin Donnell, Betsy Wolfe and Elizabeth Stanley in Stephen Sondheim’s Merrily We Roll Along, the first New York City Center Encores! production of the season. Merrily We Roll Along,with music and lyrics by Stephen Sondheim and book by George Furth, will be directed by James Lapine with music direction by Rob Berman and musical staging by Dan Knechtges. Merrily has been extended for a two-week run, and willplay for 15 performances, February 8–19, 2012, at New York City Center, 55th Street between 6th and 7th Avenues.
Merrily We Roll Along,with music and lyrics by Stephen Sondheim and book by George Furth, is a musical about friendship and the compromise of youthful ideals, based on the 1934 play of the same name by George S. Kaufman and Moss Hart. The show moves backwards in time from 1980 to 1955 and examines the lives of three people whose friendship is tested by time, events, ambition and fate. It charts the rise of a songwriting team during the years of Sondheim’s own early career and includes some of his most brilliant and bruising songs, such as “Not a Day Goes By,” “Old Friends,” “Our Time” and “Opening Doors.” Although unsuccessful in its original 1981 Broadway production (which ran 16 performances at the Alvin Theatre), Merrily has gained in stature and reputation over the ensuing years, beginning with a reconfigured version at the La Jolla Playhouse in California in 1985, directed by James Lapine. Merrily We Roll Along will run February 8 – 19, 2012.
Colin Donnell plays Franklin Shepard, an idealistic young Broadway composer turned Hollywood mogul; Lin-Manuel Miranda plays Charley Kringas, Shepard’s partner and best friend; and Celia Keenan-Bolger plays Mary Flynn, their loyal but disillusioned friend. Betsy Wolfe plays Shepard’s wife Beth and Elizabeth Stanley plays Gussie Carnegie, the star of their first Broadway hit.
Lin-Manuel Miranda is the Tony-winning composer-lyricist of Broadway’s In the Heights, which received four 2008 Tony Awards (including Best Orchestrations, Best Choreography and Best Musical), with Lin-Manuel receiving a Tony Award for Best Score as well as a nomination for Best Leading Actor in a Musical. Lin-Manuel is the recipient of the 2009 Grammy Award for In The Heights Original Broadway Cast Album and was named a finalist for the 2009 Pulitzer Prize for Drama. Following In The Heights, Miranda contributed new songs to the revival of Stephen Schwartz’s Working, collaborated with Arthur Laurents and Stephen Sondheim on Spanish translations for the 2009 Broadway Revival of West Side Story, and most recently, partnered with Jeff Whitty, Tom Kitt and Amanda Green for the highly-anticipated new show Bring It On: The Musical, now embarking on a national tour. Lin-Manuel’s TV and film credits include “The Electric Company”, “Sesame Street”, “The Sopranos”, “House”, “Modern Family”, “The Sex and the City Movie” and the upcoming “The Odd Life of Timothy Green” and “200 Cartas.”
Colin Donnell (Franklin Shepard) is currently starring on Broadway as Billy Crocker in in Anything Goes. His credits include the Broadway production of Jersey Boys and the off-Broadway productions of Meet Me in St. Louis and Almost Heaven: The Songs of John Denver. Colin played as Young Ben in the Encores! production of Follies.
Celia Keenan-Bolger (Mary Flynn) was nominated for a Tony Award for her performance in The 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee and played Eponine in the Broadway revival of Les Miserables. She has appeared off-Broadway in Little Fishes at Second Stage, Kindertransport at Manhattan Theatre Cluband Summer of ’42 at Goodspeed Opera House. Celia was last seen at City Center in the Encores! production of Juno.
Elizabeth Stanley (Gussie Carnegie) played April in John Doyle’s revival of Company and starred in the Broadway productions of Million Dollar Quartet and Cry-Baby.
Betsy Wolfe (Beth) played Mary Ann Singleton in the world premiere of Tales of the City, based on Armistead Maupin’s novels, with music by the Scissor Sisters. She was seen on Broadway in Everyday Rapture and 110 in the Shade at Studio 54, The 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee and A Wonderful Life.
James Lapine (Director) wrote the books for and directed Sondheim’s Sunday in the Park with George, Into the Woods, Passion and the recent multi-media revue Sondheim on Sondheim. He collaborated with William Finn on March of the Falsettos and Falsettoland, later presented on Broadway as Falsettos, as well as A New Brain, Muscle and the soon-to-be-produced Little Miss Sunshine. His directing credits include Merrily We Roll Along at the La Jolla Playhouse in California in 1985, and the Broadway productions of Golden Child, The Diary of Anne Frank, Dirty Blonde, Amour and The 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee.
Rob Berman (Music Director) is entering his fifth season as music director of Encores!, where he has conducted Where’s Charley?, Lost in the Stars, Bells Are Ringing, Anyone Can Whistle, Fanny, Finian's Rainbow, Music in the Air, Damn Yankees, Applause and Stairway to Paradise, as well as several gala concerts. Broadway conducting credits include Finian's Rainbow, Irving Berlin’s White Christmas, The Pajama Game, The Apple Tree, Wonderful Town and Promises, Promises, among others. He is a three-time Emmy nominee for his work as music director of the Kennedy Center Honors and a winner of the Helen Hayes Award for Best Musical Direction for his work on the Kennedy Center’s production of Sunday in the Park with George. He was also music director for A Broadway Celebration: In Performance at the White House.
Dan Knechtges (Musical Staging) directed and choreographed the acclaimed off Broadway production of Lysistrata Jones, which is opening on Broadway in December. His previous Broadway credits include Xanadu (Tony nomination, Best Choreography), Sondheim on Sondheim, 110 in The Shade and The 25th Annual Putnum County Spelling Bee. He has directed and choreographed for numerous theaters across the country and internationally on shows ranging from Gilbert and Sullivan to Rodgers and Hammerstein to Brecht.
The 2012 Encores! season is made possible, in part, by Stacey and Eric Mindich and by the Stephanie and Fred Shuman Fund for Encores!
Newman’s Own Foundation is a proud sponsor of Encores! The Newman’s Own Foundation is an independent, private foundation that derives its grant-making income from royalty payments received in conjunction with the sale of Newman’s Own food products. Since the inception of Newman’s Own in the early 1980s, more than $280 million has been donated to thousands of charities around the world.
Merrily We Roll Along is generously supported by Douglas S. Cramer and Hugh Bush, Perry and Marty Granoff, and Mary Jo and Ted Shen.
New York City Center (Arlene Shuler, President & CEO) has played a defining role in the cultural life of the city for more than 60 years. It was Manhattan’s first performing arts center, dedicated by Mayor Fiorello LaGuardia in 1943 with a mission to make the best in music, theater and dance accessible to all audiences. Today, City Center is home to many distinguished companies, including Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater and Manhattan Theatre Club; a roster of renowned national and international visiting artists; and its own critically acclaimed and popular programs. The Tony-honored Encores! musical theater series has been hailed as “one of the very best reasons to be alive in New York.” Dance has been integral to the theater’s mission from the start, and dance programs, including the annual Fall for Dance Festival and a partnership with London’s Sadler’s Wells Theatre, remain central to City Center’s identity. City Center is dedicated to providing educational opportunities to New York City students and teachers with programs such as Encores! In Schools and the Young People’s Dance Series. Special workshops cater to families, seniors and other groups, while events such as the Fall for Dance DanceTalk series offer learning opportunities to the general public. City Center recently completed an extensive renovation project to revitalize and modernize its historic theater.
City Center is located on 55th Street, between 6th and 7th Avenues. Merrily We Roll Along will run for 15 performances according to the following schedule: Tuesday at 7 pm, Wednesday at 7:30 pm, Thursday and Friday at 8 pm, Saturday at 2 pm and 8 pm, and Sunday at 2 pm and 7 pm (exception: Wed. 2/15 at 7 pm). Tickets start at $25 and are available at the New York City Center Box Office (West 55th Street between 6th and 7th Avenues), through CityTix® at 212-581-1212, or online at www.NYCityCenter.org. |
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NEW YORK CITY CENTER & JAZZ AT LINCOLN CENTER PRESENT DUKE ELLINGTON’S COTTON CLUB PARADE
Released Oct 27, 2011 |
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Carla Cook, Brandon Victor Dixon, Jared Grimes and Adriane Lenox have been cast in Duke Ellington’s Cotton Club Parade, opening November 18 at New York City Center. Cotton Club Parade is a celebration of Ellington’s years at the famed Harlem nightclub in the 1920s and early ‘30s, when the joint was jumping with revues featuring big bands, swing and blues, dancers, singers and novelty acts. Cotton Club Parade, conceived by Jack Viertel, with selected texts by Langston Hughes,will be directed by Warren Carlyle and will feature the renowned Jazz at Lincoln Center Orchestra with Wynton Marsalis, who also serves as music director. It is the inaugural production of a new producing partnership between City Center and Jazz at Lincoln Center that combines the organizations’ specialties: musical theater and jazz. Cotton Club Parade will play for six performances, November 18–22, 2011. City Center is located on 55th Street between 6th and 7th Avenues.
With Ellington’s music as the centerpiece, Cotton Club Parade reimagines one of the composer’s Cotton Club floor shows. Ellington and his orchestra began a four-year residency at the Club in 1927 and continued making guest appearances throughout the 1930s. Legendary performers such as the Nicholas Brothers, Bessie Smith, Ethel Waters, Snake Hips Tucker, Peg Leg Bates and a 16-year old Lena Horne all performed at the Club.
As in the original revues, Cotton Club Parade will feature singers, dancers and variety acts, and songs by the greatest jazz composers of the time, including Jimmy McHugh and Dorothy Fields (“I Can’t Give You Anything But Love” and “Digga Digga Doo”), a young Harold Arlen (“Stormy Weather,” “I’ve Got the World on a String,” “Between the Devil and the Deep Blue Sea,”), and of course, Duke Ellington (“Rockin’ in Rhythm,” “Cotton Club Stomp,” Black and Tan Fantasy,” and “Creole Love Call”).
The cast includes Alexandria “Brinae Ali” Bradley, Everett Bradley, Andrew “Dr.Ew” Carter, Carla Cook, Nicolette DePass, Brandon Victor Dixon, DeWitt Fleming Jr., Carmen Ruby Floyd, Jared Grimes, Jeremiah “Showtyme” Haynes, Rosena Hill, Rachael Hollingsworth, Kendrick Jones, Monroe Kent, Adriane Lenox and T. Oliver Reid, with Shani “Virgo” Alston, Jason E. Bernard, Tanya Birl, Braxton Brooks, Christopher Broughton, Chanon Judson, Karine Plantadit, Monique Smith, Daniel J. Watts, Joseph Monroe Webb, Christian Dante White and J.L. Williams.
Duke Ellington influenced millions of people around the world and at home. During the course of his 50-year career, he composed more than 3,000 songs and played more than 20,000 performances in Europe, Latin America, the Middle East and Asia. He gave American music its own sound for the first time with popular hits such as “It Don't Mean a Thing if It Ain't Got That Swing,” “Sophisticated Lady,” “Mood Indigo,” “Solitude,” “In a Mellotone,” and “Satin Doll.” Ellington was awarded the Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award in 1966 and later earned several other prizes, including the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 1969 and the Legion of Honor by France in 1973.
The Jazz at Lincoln Center Orchestra, composed of 15 of the finest jazz soloists and ensemble players today, has been the Jazz at Lincoln Center resident orchestra since 1988. Under Music Director Wynton Marsalis, the Jazz at Lincoln Center Orchestra spends half of its season on tour and performs a vast repertoire, from rare historic compositions to Jazz at Lincoln Center-commissioned works by guest artists and Jazz at Lincoln Center Orchestra members.
Carla Cook is a Grammy nominated singer/songwriter whose eclectic repertoire includes jazz, R&B, European classical, Motown, blues and rock. Her 2000 debut album, It’s All About Love, received a Grammy nomination in the Best Jazz Vocal Performance category and was awarded the AFIM Indie Award for Best Jazz Vocal. In 2000 Cook recorded her second album, Dem Bones and in 2002, she recorded Simply Natural, both for MAXJAZZ.
Brandon Victor Dixon was nominated for a Tony Award for his performance as Harpo in The Color Purple and has appeared off Broadway as Haywood in The Scottsboro Boys (Lucille Lortel, Drama Desk, Drama League, Outer Critics Circle nominations)and on national tour as Adult Simba in The Lion King. Brandon was last seen at City Center in the Encores! production of House of Flowers.
Jared Grimes is making his mark in tap and hip-hop/street jazz. He has danced alongside legends such as Gregory Hines, Ben Vereen, Jerry Lewis and Fayard Nicholas and toured with Mariah Carey. Jared’s stage credits include Babes in Arms at the Goodspeed Opera House; Sammy, directed by Debbie Allen; Scottsboro Boys, directed by Susan Stroman; Pure Country, directed by Peter Masterson; and Vaudeville, directed by Christopher d'Amboise. Jared performed with Wynton Marsalis at the Kennedy Center on the occasion of the inauguration of President Barack Obama.
Adriane Lenox’s many Broadway credits include Doubt (Tony Award) Chicago, Caroline or Change, Kiss Me Kate, Ain't Misbehavin', Dreamgirls and How to Succeed in Business Without Really Trying. Off-Broadway, she was seen in Still Life and Dinah Was... (Obie, Audelco Awards). Adriane appeared with Sandra Bullock in the film The Blind Side and will appear opposite Robert DeNiro in Red Lights.
Warren Carlyle directed and choreographed Hugh Jackman: Back on Broadway, opening November 10,andthe Encores! production of Finian’s Rainbow and its subsequent Tony nominated Broadway production. He choreographed the Encores! productions of Girl Crazy, On the Town, Juno and Stairway to Paradise. NY credits include: Follies (Choreographer, Marriot Marquis Theater), A Tale of Two Cities (Director and Choreographer, Al Hirschfield Theater) and 101 Dalmatians (Choreographer, Madison Square Garden and US Tour). His regional credits include Camelot (Stratford Shakespeare Festival), Randy Newman’s Harps & Angels (Mark Taper Forum),Limelight: The Story of Charlie Chaplin (La Jolla Playhouse), Buddy’s Tavern (The O’Neill), Lucky Guy (Goodspeed), Mame (Kennedy Center), The Pirates of Penzance (Paper Mill Playhouse, Goodspeed), The Baker’s Wife (Goodspeed). UK: Me and My Girl (UK Tour), Pageant (Vaudeville Theater) and Sondheim’s Moving On (Bridewell Theater).
Wynton Marsalis is the Artistic Director of Jazz at Lincoln Center. He is an internationally acclaimed musician, composer, bandleader, educator and a leading advocate of American culture. Born in New Orleans, Louisiana, he made his recording debut as a leader in 1982, and has recorded more than 30 jazz and classical recordings, which have won him nine GRAMMY® awards. Wynton became the first jazz artist to be awarded the prestigious Pulitzer Prize in music, for his oratorio Blood on the Fields, which was commissioned by Jazz at Lincoln Center. By creating and performing an expansive range of brilliant new music for quartets to big bands, chamber music ensembles to symphony orchestras, tap dance to ballet, Wynton has expanded the vocabulary for jazz and created a vital body of work that places him among the world’s finest musicians and composers. He helped lead the effort to construct Jazz at Lincoln Center’s home – Frederick P. Rose Hall – the first education, performance, and broadcast facility devoted to jazz, which opened in October 2004.
Jack Viertel is Artistic Director of Encores! and also serves as Senior Vice President of Jujamcyn Theaters, which owns and operates five Broadway Theaters, currently presenting The Book of Mormon, How to Succeed… Jersey Boys, On A Clear Day… and Lysistrata Jones. At Encores! he has overseen 33 productions, and conceived the Encores! revue Stairway to Paradise. Two of them - Gypsy, and Finian’s Rainbow – later moved to Broadway. He spent two years as Dramaturg of the Mark Taper Forum in Los Angeles, and from 1980 to 1985 was the drama critic and arts editor of the Los Angeles Herald Examiner. He was the original conceiver and co-producer of Smokey Joe’s Cafe, and helped shepherd six of August Wilson’s plays to Broadway, as well as Tony Kushner’s Angels in America, among many others.
New York City Center (Arlene Shuler, President & CEO) has played a defining role in the cultural life of the city for more than 60 years. It was Manhattan’s first performing arts center, dedicated by Mayor Fiorello LaGuardia in 1943 with a mission to make the best in music, theater and dance accessible to all audiences. Today, City Center is home to many distinguished companies, including Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater and Manhattan Theatre Club; a roster of renowned national and international visiting artists; and its own critically acclaimed and popular programs. The Tony-honored Encores! musical theater series has been hailed as “one of the very best reasons to be alive in New York.” Dance has been integral to the theater’s mission from the start, and dance programs, including the annual Fall for Dance Festival and a partnership with London’s Sadler’s Wells Theatre, remain central to City Center’s identity. City Center is dedicated to providing educational opportunities to New York City students and teachers with programs such as Encores! In Schools and the Young People’s Dance Series. Special workshops cater to families, seniors and other groups, while events such as the fall for Dance DanceTalk series offer learning opportunities to the general public. City Center recently completed an extensive renovation project to revitalize and modernize its historic theater.
Jazz at Lincoln Center is dedicated to inspiring and growing audiences for jazz. With the world-renowned Jazz at Lincoln Center Orchestra and a comprehensive array of guest artists, Jazz at Lincoln Center advances a unique vision for the continued development of the art of jazz by producing a year-round schedule of performance, education and broadcast events for audiences of all ages. These productions include concerts, national and international tours, residencies, a jazz hall of fame, weekly national radio programs, recordings, publications, an annual high school jazz band competition and festival, a band director academy, jazz appreciation curriculum for students, music publishing, children’s concerts, lectures, adult education courses, student and educator workshops and interactive websites. Under the leadership of Artistic Director Wynton Marsalis, Chairman Lisa Schiff, and Executive Director Adrian Ellis, Jazz at Lincoln Center produces thousands of events each season in its home in New York City, Frederick P. Rose Hall, and around the world. For more information, visit jalc.org
Cotton Club Parade will run for six performances, November 18–22, 2011, according to the following schedule: Friday at 8pm, Saturday at 2 and 8pm, Sunday at 6:30pm, Monday and Tuesday at 7pm. Tickets start at $25 and are available at the New York City Center Box Office (West 55th Street between 6th and 7th avenues), through CityTix® at 212-581-1212, or online at NYCityCenter.org. Further information is available at NYCityCenter.org and jalc.org. |
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NYCC TO SHOWCASE VIDEO ART
Released Oct 11, 2011 |
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A video display wall will be among the highlights of the newly restored and revitalized New York City Center when it reopens this October, adding a modern element to the theater’s transformed orchestra lobby. The video wall will showcase an evolving roster of video content and create new synergy between the visual and performing arts and their audiences. The New Museum, located on the Bowery in Lower Manhattan, will curate three installations in the inaugural year, beginning with a series of video works by New York–based artist Rashaad Newsome.
The video wall will feature six 36” x 80” high-definition plasma monitors that will be visible to pedestrians on 55th Street through new glass doorways, making the art accessible to thousands of people each day.
“With the addition of the video display wall, theatergoers’ artistic experience will begin the moment they walk through the door,” said Arlene Shuler, City Center President & CEO. “We are thrilled to be collaborating with the New Museum on this exciting project. The exhibits will bring a fresh new element to City Center’s programming and introduce our audiences to visual artists they might not otherwise have discovered.”
New Museum Director Lisa Phillips said, “We are very excited to be partnering with New York City Center and expand our program of institutional collaboration, allowing us to bring contemporary art to a wider audience in NYC.”
The inaugural video installation will include a series of video works by New York–based artist Rashaad Newsome (b. 1979 in New Orleans, La). Newsome’s powerful video and performance works explore the dynamics of culturally specific material from a diverse range of sources. Long fascinated with the dance form known as vogue, which originated in New York City’s gay ballroom scene in the 1960s and ’70s, the artist invited contemporary vogue dancers to be recorded performing. The resulting video works, which will debut at City Center, isolate and abstract the dancers’ movements in the absence of a soundtrack, as Newsome remixes and reframes footage to choreograph a new dance.
New Museum
The New Museum is the only museum in New York City exclusively devoted to contemporary art. Founded in 1977, the New Museum was conceived as a center for exhibitions, information and documentation about living artists from around the world. From its beginnings as a one-room office on Hudson Street to the inauguration of its first freestanding, dedicated building on the Bowery designed by SANAA in 2007, the New Museum continues to be a place of ongoing experimentation and a hub of new art and new ideas. The New Museum is located at 235 Bowery at Prince Street. Visit newmuseum.org for more information.
New York City Center
New York City Center has played a defining role in the cultural life of the city for nearly 70 years. It was Manhattan’s first performing arts center, dedicated by Mayor Fiorello LaGuardia in 1943 with a mission to make the best in music, theater and dance accessible to all audiences. Today, City Center is home to many distinguished companies, including Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater and Manhattan Theatre Club; a roster of renowned national and international visiting artists; and its own critically acclaimed and popular programs. The Tony-honored Encores! musical theater series, now in its 19th season, has been hailed as “one of the very best reasons to be alive in New York.” Dance has been integral to the theater’s mission from the start, and dance programs, including the annual Fall for Dance Festival and a partnership with London’s Sadler’s Wells Theatre, remain central to City Center’s identity. City Center is dedicated to providing educational opportunities to New York City students, teachers and the general public. City Center is currently undergoing an extensive renovation and restoration to revitalize and modernize its historic theater. A gala re-opening is scheduled for Tuesday, October 25, 2011.
For more information about New York City Center’s historic renovation and restoration, and its video art installations and exhibits, please visit www.NYCityCenter.org. |
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NYCC TO PROVIDE CREATIVE HOME TO THREE OUTSTANDING CHOREOGRAPHERS
Released Oct 11, 2011 |
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Three choreographers have been chosen to take part in New York City Center’s inaugural Choreography Fellowship Program, a new initiative being launched in conjunction with the theater’s reopening season. The Fellowship will provide three choreographers at critical stages of their careers with a creative home at City Center for one year. The recipients are: Emery LeCrone, an emerging ballet choreographer; Andrea Miller, Artistic Director of Gallim Dance; and Shen Wei, Artistic Director of Shen Wei Dance Arts.
During each yearlong fellowship, the choreographers will receive a generous stipend in addition to rehearsal space in the City Center studios and a performance opportunity at City Center. They will also have full access to City Center’s administrative expertise in fundraising, finance, technology and marketing.
“City Center has a long history of nurturing choreographers, from George Balanchine to Christopher Wheeldon, and we are proud to continue the tradition with this new initiative,” said Arlene Shuler, President & CEO of New York City Center. “We chose choreographers at various stages in their careers, from emerging to established, because dance makers continue to need support even after they’ve achieved a certain degree of success. Our staff is ready to support these choreographers in every aspect of the creative process as well as provide technical assistance for the companies.”
New York City Center gratefully acknowledges the generous leadership support of Frederic and Robin Seegal. Mr. Seegal, a member of the New York City Center Board of Directors, was instrumental in conceiving and encouraging the development of the Choreography Fellowship Program. Additional support has been provided by the Doris Duke Charitable Foundation.
At the age of 24, Emery LeCrone has already created several prominent works, competed in numerous choreography competitions, and received substantial grants and new commissions for her choreography. Directors of prominent dance companies, dance institutions and foundations across the country, as well as major critics, have recognized her work. In the 2010-11 season alone, LeCrone premiered new ballets for Minnesota Dance Theater, North Carolina Dance Theater, Miro Magloire’s New Chamber Ballet, The Columbia Ballet Collaborative, Hartt University of Dance, Greensboro Ballet, and Colorado Ballet as part of The Vail International Dance Festival. She also created new works for the Guggenheim Museum’s acclaimed Works & Process performing arts series and participated in the renowned New York Choreographic Institute. In addition, she serves full time as choreographer-in-residence for New York dance companies the New Chamber Ballet and the Columbia Ballet Collaborative. LeCrone also teaches dance regularly.
Andrea Miller, a native of Salt Lake City, Utah, graduated from the Juilliard School with a BFA in Dance before joining Ohad Naharin’s Ensemble Batsheva in Israel. In 2006 Miller returned to New York City to establish Gallim Dance, a contemporary dance company that supports the creation and performance of her choreography. A sought-after choreographer, Miller has been noteworthy for her use of extreme physicality and the ability to create an experience where the dancers appear to be at the edge of their limits. She was awarded the 2009 Princess Grace Foundation Fellowship in Choreography and was selected for Dance Magazine’s 2009 “25 to Watch.” Her work has been presented throughout the U.S., Canada and Europe. In addition, Miller is associate choreographer with Noord Nederlandse Dans.
Shen Wei is widely recognized for his defining vision of an intercultural, interdisciplinary, original mode of movement-based performance. Born in a rural village in Hunan, he danced with the Hunan State Xian Opera Company and was a founding member of the Guangdong Modern Dance Company, the first such company in China. He moved to New York City in 1995 upon receiving a scholarship from the Nikolais/Louis Dance Lab, and in July 2000 he formed Shen Wei Dance Arts, which tours extensively on five continents. Shen Wei’s works have been performed throughout the world, including in the Opening Ceremonies of the 2008 Beijing Olympics. He is the recipient of a 2007 MacArthur “Genius” Award and a United States Artists Fellow, and he has received a John Simon Guggenheim Fellowship, a New York Foundation for the Arts Fellowship, and the American Dance Festival’s Ben Sommer Fellowship, among others. His newest work will have its world premiere at the Park Avenue Armory in November.
New York City Center (Arlene Shuler, President & CEO) has played a defining role in the cultural life of the city for more than 60 years. It was Manhattan’s first performing arts center, dedicated by Mayor Fiorello LaGuardia in 1943 with a mission to make the best in music, theater and dance accessible to all audiences. Today, City Center is home to many distinguished companies, including Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater and Manhattan Theatre Club; a roster of renowned national and international visiting artists; and its own critically acclaimed and popular programs. The Tony-honored Encores! musical theater series has been hailed as “one of the very best reasons to be alive in New York.” Dance has been integral to the theater’s mission from the start, and dance programs, including the annual Fall for Dance Festival and a partnership with London’s Sadler’s Wells Theatre, remain central to City Center’s identity. City Center is dedicated to providing educational opportunities to New York City students and teachers with programs such as Encores! In Schools and the Young People’s Dance Series. Special workshops cater to families, seniors and other groups, while events such as the Fall for Dance DanceTalk series offer learning opportunities to the general public. City Center recently completed an extensive renovation project to revitalize and modernize its historic theater. |
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NYCC ANNOUNCES 2011-12 SEASON
Released Sep 8, 2011 |
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New York City Center will reopen following a historic renovation and modernizationwith a star-studded gala on October 25. The event will kick off a celebratory season of new and expanded programming, festivals, exhibits, a special commission, and performances by world-class dance and theater companies. The renovation, designed by Ennead Architects, LLP (formerly Polshek Partnership), has transformed the landmark building into a contemporary cultural center complete with modern amenities and enhanced historic details, from the mezzanine lobby’s painted ceiling and murals to the auditorium’s arabesque dome. City Center is located on 55th Street between 6th and 7th Avenues.
Following the October 25 gala, the season continues with the eighth annual Fall for Dance Festival, featuring 20 companies in 10 nights of dance for only $10 per ticket. The season also features world premieres and new productions by American Ballet Theatre, Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater, Corella Ballet Castilla Y León,prima ballerina Diana Vishneva, Eifman Balletof St. Petersburg, and the 11th annualFlamenco Festival. The acclaimed Kings of the Dance returns with an all-new program featuring international ballet stars Guillaume Cotê, Marcelo Gomes, David Hallberg, Denis Matvienkoand Ivan Vasiliev.
New this season is a producing partnership between New York City Center and Jazz at Lincoln Center that will combine the organizations’ specialties: musical theater and jazz. The collaborative venture will begin this fall with Cotton Club Parade, a celebration of Duke Ellington’s years at the famedHarlem nightclub, opening November 18, 2011.
The 19th season of City Center’s Encores!serieswill begin February 8, 2012, withStephen Sondheim’s Merrily We Roll Along, followed by Rodgers and Hammerstein’sPipe Dream and JuleStyne and Leo Robin’s Gentlemen Prefer Blondes. Manhattan Theatre Club will present world premieres by Zoe Kazan, Molly Smith Metzler and Matt Charman, and The Pearl Theatre Company will present a season of four plays including Ionesco’s The Bald Soprano, Shakespeare’s Richard II, Bernard Shaw’s The Philandererand O’Neill’s A Moon for the Misbegotten.
Click here to download complete press release (PDF) |
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2011 FALL FOR DANCE FESTIVAL WILL FEATURE 20 DANCE COMPANIES FROM AROUND THE WORLD
Released Aug 24, 2011 |
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New York City Center will reopen following a historic restoration and modernization of its landmarked building with its eighth annual Fall for Dance Festival, running October 27 – November 6, 2011. In keeping with its commitment to make dance accessible to everyone, all tickets will be $10, as they have been each year since the Festival’s beginning. The two-week Festival will showcase 20 national and international companies and choreographers and will include company debuts and premieres in five programs (each program will be repeated once). Tickets will go on sale Sunday, October 2 at 11 a.m.
AN INTERNATIONAL FESTIVAL
The Fall for Dance Festival is a celebration of the diversity and vitality of dance, in New York City, throughout the United States and around the globe. Steven McRae, Principal Dancer of The Royal Ballet, London, and Pontus Lidberg Dance, based in Sweden and New York, will make their U.S. debuts; other international companies and artists include:The Australian Balletfrom Australia, CCN de Créteil et du Val-de-Marne / Compagnie Käfigfrom France, Lizt Alfonso Dance Cuba from Cuba, Richard Alston Dance Company from the U.K., Royal Ballet of Flanders from Belgium, TAO Dance Theater from China, and Vertigo Dance Company from Israel.
American companies and performers will include: Maurice Chestnut from New Jersey,Lil Buck from California, Hubbard Street Dance Chicago from Illinois, The Joffrey Ballet from Illinois, and from New York: Alvin Ailey American DanceTheater, Drew Jacoby, Jessica Lang Dance, Liz Gerring Dance Company, Mark Morris Dance Group,New York City Ballet and Trisha Brown Dance Company.
TheFall for Dance Festival has received national and international recognition for its quality, innovation and success in introducing new and younger audiences to the world of dance. Since its inception, the Festival has presented 145 different dance companies to more than 150,000dance enthusiasts for just $10 per ticket. Newcomers and dance enthusiasts alike look forward to the Festival as both an introduction to new artists and a welcome return to familiar and beloved companies.
“We are thrilled to present the eighth annual Fall for Dance Festival in our revitalized home,” said New York City Center President & CEO Arlene Shuler. “City Center has been transformed, and Festival audiences are going to be wowed by its new look and energy. We are grateful to our sponsors for their support and commitment to the arts, which enables us to keep ticket prices at $10. In this way, we can continue our mission to provide an accessible means for new audiences to discover the joy of dance, while giving dance lovers an opportunity to experience new artists and genres.”
New York City Center gratefully acknowledges Fall for Dance Leadership Sponsor, Bloomberg, and its Principal Sponsor, MetLife Foundation. Fall for Dance is also made possible through the generosity of its Lead Presenting Partners Barbara and David Zalaznick, Jody and John Arnhold, Perry and Marty Granoff, and Caroline Howard Hyman.
“Bloomberg is firmly committed to supporting a diverse range of artists around the world,” said EranaStennett, “and we are thrilled to sponsor New York City Center’s Fall for Dance Festival to help bring a variety of the world’s best dance to New York.”
“MetLife Foundation is dedicated to fostering access to the arts for people of all ages and backgrounds,” said Dennis White, president and CEO of MetLife Foundation. “We are proud to continue our support for this groundbreaking festival that creates opportunities for diverse audiences to experience world-class dance.”
New York City Center also recognizes the extraordinary leadership support of The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation, which inaugurated a $10 million endowment campaign to ensure the future stability of the annual Fall for Dance Festival. Additional generous funding for the Fall for Dance Festival endowment has been received from The Peter Jay Sharp Foundation, The Ford Foundation, The Rockefeller Brothers Fund, The Fan Fox and Leslie R. Samuels Foundation and an anonymous donor. More than $6 million in commitments have been received to date.
TEN NIGHTS, FIVE UNIQUE PROGRAMS
Program One: Thursday, October 27 and Friday, October 28
The Festival’s opening program features works from four acclaimed American dance companies and choreographers. Mark Morris Dance Group opens the evening with All Fours(2003), a piece for 12 dancers set to Bartók’sString Quartet No. 4, performed by live musicians.Lil Buck brings his brilliant Memphis jookin’ to the stage in The Swan (2007). Trisha Brown Dance Company returns to the Festival with a new work, Rogues (2011), by Trisha Brown. The evening concludes with The Joffrey Ballet’s Woven Dreams (2011), a new work for 18 dancers choreographed by Edwaard Liang.
Program Two: Saturday, October 29 and Sunday, October 30
Vertigo Dance Company from Israel makes its Festival debut with Mana(2009),a hypnotic work foreightdancers choreographed by Noa Wertheim and adapted for Fall for Dance. Next, contemporary ballet dancer Drew Jacoby performs the world premiere of a new work, TBA (2011) by Gallim Dance Artistic DirectorAndrea Miller, and Jessica Lang Dance presents the New York premiere of Among the Stars (2010), inspired by the Japanese star festivalTanabata. The evening ends with the U.S. premiere of Richard Alston’s Roughcut(1990),performed byRichard Alston Dance Company of the U.K. to live music by Steve Reich.
Program Three: Tuesday, November 1 and Wednesday, November 2
The Australian Ballet, celebrating its 50th Anniversary season, opens the program with Glen Tetley’s Gemini (1973), set to music by Hans Werner Henze. The evening continues with three Festival debuts: Steven McRae, Principal Dancer of The Royal Ballet, London, makes his U.S. debut with Something Different (2009),a joyous solo tap piece. Pontus Lidberg Dance makes its U.S. debut with Faune(2010),choreographed by Pontus Lidberg and inspired by Debussy’s Prelude to the Afternoon of a Faun. Hubbard Street Dance Chicagocloses the evening with the New York premiere of OhadNaharin’s THREE TO MAX (2011), a new work created especially for HSDC.
Program Four: Thursday, November 3 and Friday, November 4
This international program opens with the Festival debut of TAO Dance Theater of China, presenting the U.S. premiere of Weight x 3 (2009),choreographed by Tao Ye and adapted for Fall for Dance. French choreographer MouradMerzouki’sAgwa(2008),a unique blend of samba, hip-hop, capoeira, bossa nova and electronic music, will be performed by 11 dancers fromCCN de Créteil et du Val-de-Marne / CompagnieKäfig. The Royal Ballet of Flanders,Belgium’s only classical ballet company,follows with The Return of Ulysses (2006),a New York premiere by Christian Spuck, adapted for Fall for Dance. The Festival debut of Lizt Alfonso Dance Cuba ends the evening with Lizt Alfonso’s passionate Pa’ Cuba me voy (2001), performed by 17 female dancers and seven musicians in a sensual combination of flamenco, ballet, Afro-Cuban and Cuban rhythms.
Program Five: Saturday, November 5 and Sunday, November 6 (matinee)
The final program opens with the Festival debut of Maurice Chestnut’s Floating (2010), a high-energy tap piece with live music performed by The Above Ground Project. Christopher Wheeldon’s stirring Polyphonia(2001), performed to live music byNew York City Ballet, will be followed by the Festival debut of Liz Gerring Dance Company, which will perform Gerring’sLichtung/Clearing (2010), adapted for Fall for Dance.The Festival comes to a rousing finish with Mauro Bigonzetti’sFestaBarocca (2008), performed by 30 dancers from Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater.
Stanford Makishi serves as Artistic Advisor to the Festival.
EDUCATION
The Fall for Dance Festival will offer DanceTalk, a series of pre-performance discussions and demonstrations that explore Festival programming. On Friday, October 28, City Center and Barnard College Department of Dance will co-present The Diaspora of Israeli Dance, moderated by Dance Magazine editor Wendy Perron. On Wednesday, November 2, City Center and Hunter College Department of Dance will co-present Ballet: Is It or Isn’t It? Rethinking an Evolving Art Form, moderated by dance historian Maura Keefe. Panels will take place in City Center’s Studio 5 from 6:30–7:30pm. Each event is free and open to the public. Educational groups can make advance reservations by contacting Chelsea Koenig at New York City Center’s Education Department: ckoenig@nycitycenter.org.
New York City Center and the NYC Department of Education will co-present a Fall for Dance Festival Lab for dance educators on Saturday, October 1. In Where is the Story? Dance in Abstraction, dance educators will take master classes focusing on two pieces of repertoire performed by Liz Gerring Dance Company and Mark Morris Dance Group. City Center teaching artists will facilitate a follow-up workshop centered on applications to classroom practice. The Lab will take place in City Center’s studios from
9 a.m. – 3:30 p.m.
FESTIVAL LOUNGE
For each Fall for Dance performance, the public atrium between 55th and 56th Streets (immediately west of the theater’s main entrance) is transformed into Lounge FFD, a vibrant gathering place for audience members and artists. Featuring music by a rotating roster of NYC DJs, Lounge FFD offers Festival attendees, performers and neighborhood friends a place to relax and mingle, share a cocktail and have a snack before and after the show – as well as during intermission – while video monitors throughout the lounge follow the action onstage. Lounge FFD is open to the general public as well as to Festival artists and attendees. No tickets are required and everyone is welcome.
NEW YORK CITY CENTER
(Arlene Shuler, President & CEO) has played a defining role in the cultural life of the city for nearly 70 years. It was Manhattan’s first performing arts center, dedicated by Mayor Fiorello LaGuardia in 1943 with a mission to make the best in music, theater and dance accessible to all audiences. Today, City Center is home to many distinguished companies, including Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater, American Ballet Theatre and Manhattan Theatre Club; a roster of renowned national and international visiting artists; and its own critically acclaimed and popular programs. The Tony-honored Encores!musical theater series has been hailed as “one of the very best reasons to be alive in New York” and has expanded to include a new partnership with Jazz at Lincoln Center. Dance has been integral to the theater’s mission from the start, and dance programs, including the annual Fall for Dance Festival and a partnership with London’s Sadler’s Wells Theatre, remain central to City Center’s identity. City Center is dedicated to providing educational opportunities to New York City students and teachers with programs such as Encores! In Schools and the Young People’s Dance Series. Special workshops cater to families, seniors and other groups, while events such as the Fall for DanceDanceTalk series offer learning opportunities to the general public. City Center is currently undergoing an extensive renovation and restoration to revitalize and modernize its historic theater. Designed by Ennead Architects LLP (formerly Polshek Partnership), the renovation will preserve and restore the landmark 1923 building’s historic features while modernizing and upgrading the facility to create a world-class cultural center. A gala re-opening is scheduled for Tuesday, October 25, 2011.
The 2011 Fall for Dance Festival runs Thursday, October 27 – Sunday, November 6 at New York City Center (West55th Street between6th and7th Avenues). All performances are at 8 p.m., except for the Sunday, November 6 performance, which is a 3 p.m. matinee. All tickets are $10 and go on sale Sunday, October 2 at 11 a.m. Tickets can be purchased online, by calling CityTix at 212.581.1212, or at the City Center Box Office. |
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NYCC REOPENS FOLLOWING HISTORIC RENOVATION & RESTORATION
Released Aug 2, 2011 |
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New York City Center will reopen following a historic renovation and modernization with a star-studded gala on October 25. The event will kick off a celebratory season of new and expanded programming, festivals, exhibits, a special commission, and performances by world-class dance and theater companies. The renovation, designed by Ennead Architects, LLP (formerly Polshek Partnership), has transformed the landmark building into a contemporary cultural center complete with modern amenities and enhanced historic details, from the mezzanine lobby’s painted ceiling and murals to the auditorium’s arabesque dome.
New York City Center was constructed in 1923 as a meeting hall for the Ancient Order of the Nobles of the Mystic Shrine (the Shriners), and Mayor Fiorello LaGuardia dedicated it as Manhattan’s first major performing arts center in 1943. The City-owned building, which includes a 2,255-seat mainstage auditorium, two smaller theaters, four rehearsal studios and a 12-story office tower, is one of the city’s most beloved performing arts centers. It is home to world-class theater and dance, including the acclaimed Fall for Dance Festival and the Tony Award–winning Encores! series.
The revitalized building will feature a lighted and heated street-level marquee that will welcome audiences into a reconfigured box office lobby outfitted with a new ticket window and concessions bar, a video display wall, and a modernized patrons’ lounge. The restored auditorium will include plush new seating with expanded legroom and improved sightlines, as well as a dramatic, newly painted interior awash in vibrant color. Performers will welcome the state-of-the-art sprung stage floor, renovated dressing rooms, new lighting and updated backstage amenities.
The renovation, made possible through a $75 million capital campaign, is the most extensive project of its kind in the building’s nearly 70-year history. Stepping Forward: The Campaign for City Center, has been raising funds to renovate the landmark building and to ensure the growth of City Center’s current and future programs. The City of New York committed $35.6 million for the renovation.
“City Center has been one of the city’s preeminent performing arts centers for nearly 70 years,” said Arlene Shuler, City Center’s President & CEO. “This long-awaited renovation has revitalized our historic building and ensures that City Center will remain a vital part of the city’s cultural fabric for many years to come. We are grateful to Mayor Bloomberg and Commissioner Levin for their extraordinary commitment to City Center, as well as to Speaker Christine Quinn, the City Council, and Manhattan Borough President Scott M. Stringer for their leadership support.”
Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg stated, “City Center occupies a special place in the lives of New Yorkers as the diverse and accessible ‘People’s Theater’ founded by Mayor LaGuardia. Generations of New Yorkers flocked to City Center to see performances by many of the world’s greatest artists and companies. The City of New York is proud to help City Center remain a vibrant cultural attraction for generations to come.”
According to Duncan Hazard, Partner in Charge, Ennead Architects, “City Center’s glowing new bronze and glass marquee and dramatically lit façade will draw audiences into a redesigned lobby and beautifully restored auditorium that honor this theater’s rich past while providing modern and comfortable amenities for the audiences and performers of today.”
REOPENING HIGHLIGHTS
GALA REOPENING, OCTOBER 25, 2011
The October 25 Gala will begin with a ribbon-cutting ceremony. Then, as a nod to the building’s 1943 dedication ceremony when Mayor LaGuardia conducted the New York Philharmonic, Mayor Bloomberg will take the stage to conduct the Encores! Orchestra. The show, directed by Tony Award winner and former Encores! Artistic Director Kathleen Marshall, will celebrate New York City Center with performances, reminiscences and tributes by stars of dance and theater. With music direction by Encores! Music Director Rob Berman.
CITY CENTER ENCORES! AND JAZZ AT LINCOLN CENTER COLLABORATION
This new producing partnership will combine the organizations’ specialties: musical theater and jazz. The collaborative venture will begin this fall at City Center with Cotton Club Parade, a celebration of Duke Ellington’s years at the famed Harlem nightclub. Cotton Club Parade will be directed by Warren Carlyle and will feature the renowned Jazz at Lincoln Center Orchestra with Wynton Marsalis, who also serves as Music Director. It will play for six performances, November 18–22, 2011.
SPECIAL DANCE COMMISSION
City Center has commissioned a new work by resident company American Ballet Theatre in celebration of the theater’s reopening. A new ballet by Demis Volpi, winner of the Erik Bruhn Prize for Best Choreography in 2011, will have its New York City premiere during ABT’s City Center season in November. The work is a co-commission with American Ballet Theatre.
NEW YORK CITY CENTER CHOREOGRAPHY FELLOWSHIP PROGRAM
Three choreographers at critical stages of their careers will be given a creative home at City Center for one year through the New York City Center Choreography Fellowship Program. City Center has a long history of nurturing choreographers, from George Balanchine to Christopher Wheeldon, and we are proud to continue the tradition with this new initiative. The three artists, to be announced soon, will receive a $10,000 stipend in addition to rehearsal space, technical support and a performance opportunity at City Center. They will also have full access to City Center’s institutional resources and administrative expertise in programming, fundraising, finance and marketing.
EXPANDED ENCORES! SERIES
City Center’s Tony Award–winning Encores! series is expanding to seven performances with the addition of Wednesday evening and Sunday matinee performances.
RENOVATION HIGHLIGHTS
VIDEO DISPLAY WALL / PARTNERSHIP WITH THE NEW MUSEUM
At the heart of the theater’s reconfigured orchestra lobby, patrons will be greeted by a video display wall composed of high-definition plasma monitors overlaid with a neo-Moorish latticework design. The New Museum is partnering with City Center to curate three video installations for the 2011-12 season. The state-of-the art video wall, visible to both patrons of the theater and passersby on 55th Street, consists of six video panels and will showcase an evolving roster of video content, adding a dynamic new artistic element and broadening the range of programming presented by City Center.
SEATING
The renovated, 2,255-seat theater will feature improved sightlines and wider seats with more legroom. The width of the seats has increased by an average of two inches and space between rows has been expanded from 32 inches to between 33 and 48 inches, depending on their location.
AMENITIES
A lighted and heated street-level marquee, a reconfigured and expanded orchestra lobby, a second elevator, increased and expanded restroom facilities, and a new patrons’ lounge will create a welcoming environment.
DÉCOR
The auditorium’s walls and dome ceiling have been painted in rich colors that highlight the theater’s original decorative detail. Other aesthetic improvements include a restored box office lobby with refurbished glazed terra cotta tiles and ceiling, and a renovated mezzanine lobby with a fully restored stenciled ceiling and decorative wall murals.
LEED (Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design)
City Center’s renovation included a series of energy-saving measures designed to achieve a Silver LEED rating. Environmentally friendly updates include water-saving toilets in all restrooms; energy-efficient lighting, heating and air conditioning; enhanced recycling of building waste; and a “green housekeeping” program that will include nontoxic cleaning products.
DESIGN DETAILS
Ennead Architects’ renovation respects and enhances the original theater’s unique and much-loved neo-Moorish design, featuring elaborate arabesque motifs and intricate plasterwork. In addition to the careful restoration work throughout the building, new design elements have been based on a careful study of the underlying geometric motifs of Islamic architecture, reinterpreted to be complementary to but not imitative of the existing fabric. The architects’ goal has been to create a vibrant new venue, with all of the conveniences and amenities that contemporary patrons expect, but one that is still “City Center,” beloved by generations of New York City theatergoers.
A large, glowing bronze and glass marquee with new exterior lighting and signage will dramatically define the building within its urban context. Inside, the auditorium’s walls, long covered over with white paint, have once again been painted in rich colors that highlight the theater’s original decorative detail. The original box office and mezzanine lobbies have been restored, and several dramatic new spaces will be introduced, including an expanded and redesigned orchestra-level lobby, a new patrons’ lounge, new bars, and redesigned and increased restroom facilities. A new elevator has been installed and the existing elevator has been upgraded. The 2,255-seat auditorium is being reconfigured to improve sightlines, and new, wider seats with expanded legroom will make the theater experience more comfortable and accessible.
Back-of-house improvements include a new sprung stage floor suitable for dance, all new theatrical support systems, a completely refurbished dressing room tower, and ADA accessible restrooms for the performers.
HISTORY OF THE BUILDING
Built in 1923 as a meeting hall for the Ancient Order of the Nobles of the Mystic Shrine, or Shriners, the former temple officially became City Center on December 11, 1943, with Mayor LaGuardia himself conducting the New York Philharmonic in the national anthem.
Throughout the 1940s and 50s, City Center flourished as a popular, affordable alternative to Broadway, the Metropolitan Opera House and Carnegie Hall. City Center was so successful in fostering the performing arts that New York City Opera, New York City Ballet and New York City Symphony were founded under its dome. A very young Leonard Bernstein conducted the New York City Symphony in low-cost, after-work concerts. Luminaries of the theater, including Paul Robeson, Orson Welles and Tallulah Bankhead, played the classics on City Center’s stage. Still-rising stars such as Bob Fosse, Barbara Cook and Walter Matthau appeared in popular revivals of Broadway musicals.
After the opening of Lincoln Center and the departure of New York City Opera and New York City Ballet, the building became under-utilized and was threatened with demolition. It was saved in the 1970s when, under the leadership of then-chairman Howard M. Squadron, the theater was dedicated as New York’s premier home for dance and given landmark status, and the City Center 55th Street Theater Foundation was formed to manage the complex and ensure its survival as a performing arts center. By this point, however, much of the vintage architectural detail had faded or been covered up, and the functional shortcomings of a former Shriners’ hall had never been adequately addressed in converting the building into a home for the performing arts. The grand reopening of the modernized and restored theater will usher in a new era for the building and for New York City Center.
NEW YORK CITY CENTER TODAY
New York City Center is home to many distinguished companies, including Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater, American Ballet Theatre and Manhattan Theatre Club; a roster of renowned national and international visiting artists; and its own critically acclaimed and popular programs. The Tony-honored Encores! musical theater series, now in its 19th season, has been hailed as “one of the very best reasons to be alive in New York.” Dance has been integral to the theater’s mission from the start, and dance programs, including the annual Fall for Dance Festival and a partnership with London’s Sadler’s Wells Theatre, remain central to City Center’s identity. City Center is dedicated to providing educational opportunities to New York City students and teachers with programs such as Encores! In Schools and the Young People’s Dance Series. Special workshops cater to families, seniors and other groups, while events such as the Fall for Dance DanceTalk series offer learning opportunities to the general public.
ENNEAD ARCHITECTS
Ennead Architects is an internationally acclaimed architectural firm whose work includes new building design, planning, renovation and adaptive re-use projects, largely for not-for-profit educational, cultural, scientific and governmental institutions. Among the firm’s award-winning projects are: The Standard New York, Rose Center for Earth and Space at the American Museum of Natural History, William J. Clinton Presidential Center, Carnegie Hall renovation and expansion, Yale University Art Gallery renovation and expansion, Brooklyn Museum renovation and expansion, Holland Performing Arts Center, and the Weill Cornell Medical College Weill Greenberg Center. Current Projects include Stanford University Bing Concert Hall, Tisch School of the Arts, The Public Theater renovation, Utah Museum of Natural History, Vietnam Veterans Memorial Education Center, Weill Cornell Medical Research Building and New York City Center. Ennead Architects is the recipient of the AIA Firm Award, the President’s Medal of the AIA/New York Chapter, and the Smithsonian Institution’s Cooper-Hewitt National Design Award.
SUPPORTERS
New York City Center is a City-owned facility and is supported by funds from the New York City Department of Cultural Affairs, New York City Council, National Endowment for the Arts and New York State Council on the Arts. |
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NYCC ANNOUNCES 19TH ENCORES! SEASON
Released May 23, 2011 |
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New York City Center’s 19th Encores! season will open in City Center’s newly restored and renovated theater on February 8, 2012 with Stephen Sondheim’s Merrily We Roll Along, and will continue with Rodgers and Hammerstein’s rarely seen Pipe Dream on March 28¸ followed by Gentlemen Prefer Blondes on May 9. For the first time, each musical will play for seven performances.
Merrily We Roll Along,with music and lyrics by Stephen Sondheim and book by George Furth, is a musical about friendship and the compromise of youthful ideals, based on the 1934 play of the same name by George S. Kaufman and Moss Hart. Merrily We Roll Along begins in 1980 and moves backward in time, from 1980 – 1955, telling the story of three friends whose friendship is tested by time, events, ambition and fate. It charts the rise of a songwriting team during the years of Sondheim’s own early career, and includes some of his most brilliant and bruising songs, including “Not a Day Goes By,” “Old Friends,” “Our Time” and “Opening Doors.” Although unsuccessful in its original 1981 Broadway production (which ran 16 performances at the Alvin Theatre), Merrily has gained stature and reputation over the ensuing years, beginning with a reconfigured version at the La Jolla Playhouse in California in 1985, directed by frequent Sondheim collaborator James Lapine. Mr. Lapine will return to the project as director of the Encores! production. Merrily We Roll Along will run February 8 – 12, 2012.
Outcasts yearning for a better life populate the bordellos and flophouses of a 1950s California seaside town in Rodgers and Hammerstein’s Pipe Dream, based on John Steinbeck's novel Sweet Thursday. Pipe Dream opened at the Shubert Theatre on November 30, 1955 and ran for 246 performances. It was nominated for nine Tony Awards, including Best Musical. Pipe Dream has not been seen on the American stage in more than two decades, owing to a technicality involving the underlying rights. This Rodgers and Hammerstein rarity includes “All at Once You Love Her,” “The Next Time It Happens” and the wistful ballad “Everybody’s Got a Home but Me.” Pipe Dream will run March 28 – April 1, 2012.
Gentlemen Prefer Blondes, adapted from the novel by Anita Loos, has a book by Anita Loos and Joseph Fields, music by Jule Styne and lyrics by Leo Robin. Set in the Roaring Twenties, Gentlemen Prefer Blondes follows the madcap adventures of the original “dumb blonde,” Lorelei Lee, as she sets sail for Europe with her best friend Dorothy Shaw. Gentlemen Prefer Blondes made a star of Carol Channing on Broadway and later cemented Marilyn Monroe’s status as an American film icon and sex symbol in the 1953 screen version. “Diamonds Are a Girl’s Best Friend” is the crown jewel in a score that sparkles with songs like “Bye, Bye, Baby,” “A Little Girl from Little Rock” and “I Love What I’m Doing (When I’m Doing it for Love).” The original production, directed by John C. Wilson and choreographed by Agnes de Mille, opened at the Ziegfeld Theatre on December 8, 1949, and played a total of 740 performances. The show was revived by Tony Randall’s National Actors Theater in 1995 and ran for 24 performances. Gentlemen Prefer Blondes will run May 9 – 13, 2012.
The 2012 Encores! season is made possible, in part, by Stacey and Eric Mindich and by the Stephanie and Fred Shuman Fund for Encores!
The Newman’s Own Foundation is a proud sponsor of Encores! The Newman’s Own Foundation is an independent, private foundation that derives its grant-making income from royalty payments received in conjunction with the sale of Newman’s Own food products. Since the inception of Newman’s Own in the early 1980s, more than $280 million has been donated to thousands of charities around the world.
Gentlemen Prefer Blondes is generously supported by The Joseph S. and Diane H. Steinberg Charitable Trust and Roz and Jerry Meyer.
James Lapine (Director, Merrily We Roll Along) wrote the book and directed Stephen Sondheim’s Sunday in the Park with George, Into the Woods, Passion and the recent multi-media revue Sondheim on Sondheim. He collaborated with William Finn on March of the Falsettos and Falsettoland, later presented on Broadway as Falsettos, as well as A New Brain, Muscle and the soon-to-be-produced Little Miss Sunshine. His directing credits include Merrily We Roll Along at the La Jolla Playhouse in California in 1985, and the Broadway productions of Golden Child, The Diary of Anne Frank, Amour and The 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee.
Rob Berman (Music Director) is entering his fifth season as music director of Encores!, where he has conducted Where’s Charley?, Lost in the Stars, Bells Are Ringing, Anyone Can Whistle, Fanny, Finian's Rainbow, Music in the Air, Damn Yankees, Applause and Stairway to Paradise, as well as several gala concerts. Broadway conducting credits include Finian's Rainbow, Irving Berlin’s White Christmas, The Pajama Game, The Apple Tree, Wonderful Town and Promises, Promises, among others. He is a two-time Emmy nominee for his work as music director of the Kennedy Center Honors and won a Helen Hayes Award for Best Musical Direction for his work on the Kennedy Center’s production of Sunday in the Park with George. He was also music director for A Broadway Celebration: In Performance at the White House.
NEW YORK CITY CENTER (Arlene Shuler, President & CEO) has played a defining role in the cultural life of the city for nearly 70 years. It was Manhattan’s first performing arts center, dedicated by Mayor Fiorello LaGuardia in 1943 with a mission to make the best in music, theater and dance accessible to all audiences. Today, City Center is home to many distinguished companies, including Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater, American Ballet Theater, Paul Taylor Dance Company and Manhattan Theatre Club; a roster of renowned national and international visiting artists; and its own critically acclaimed and popular programs. The Tony-honored Encores! musical theater series has been hailed as “one of the very best reasons to be alive in New York.” Dance has been integral to the theater’s mission from the start, and dance programs, including the annual Fall for Dance Festival and a partnership with London’s Sadler’s Wells Theatre, remain central to City Center’s identity. City Center is dedicated to providing educational opportunities to New York City students and teachers with programs such as Encores! In Schools and the Young People’s Dance Series. Special workshops cater to families, seniors and other groups, while events such as the Fall for Dance DanceTalk series offer learning opportunities to the general public. City Center is currently undergoing an extensive renovation and restoration to revitalize and modernize its historic theater. Designed by Ennead Architects LLP, (formerly known as Polshek Partnership Architects), the renovation will preserve and restore the landmark 1923 building’s historic features while modernizing and upgrading the facility to create a world-class cultural center. A gala re-opening is scheduled for Tuesday, October 25, 2011.
All Encores! productions will run for seven performances according to the following schedule: Wednesday at 7:30 p.m., Thursday and Friday at 8 p.m., Saturday at 2 p.m. and 8 p.m., and Sunday at 2 p.m. and 6:30 pm. New Encores! subscriptions will be available for the first time in three years and can be purchased starting August 1st at the New York City Center Box Office (West 55th Street between 6th and 7th avenues), through CityTix® at 212-581-1212, or online at www.NYCityCenter.org. Single tickets for Encores! 2012 go on sale October 10, 2011. Tickets start at $25. |
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NYCC & JAZZ AT LINCOLN CENTER COLLABORATION
Released April 28, 2011 |
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Today, on the 112th anniversary of Duke Ellington’s birth, New York City Center and Jazz at Lincoln Center are pleased to announce a new producing partnership that will combine the organizations’ specialties: musical theater and jazz. The collaborative venture will begin this fall at City Center with Cotton Club Parade, a celebration of Ellington’s years at the famed Harlem nightclub. Presented under the auspices of City Center’s acclaimed Encores! series and Jazz at Lincoln Center, Cotton Club Parade will be directed by Warren Carlyle and will feature the renowned Jazz at Lincoln Center Orchestra with Wynton Marsalis, who also serves as music director. It will play for six performances, November 18–22, 2011. Tickets will go on sale Monday, August 15 at City Center.
Harlem’s famed Cotton Club presented annual revues that featured big band swing and blues, dancers, singers, comedians and novelty acts throughout the 1920s and 1930s. Duke Ellington and his orchestra began a four-year residency in 1927 and continued making guest appearances throughout the 1930s. As in the original revues, the Cotton Club Parade will feature singers, dancers and variety acts (to be announced).
Future productions will be presented biannually at each other’s venues. The next production is scheduled for the 2013-14 season at Jazz at Lincoln Center’s Rose Theater.
“We are thrilled to be collaborating with Jazz at Lincoln Center to develop new projects involving artists from both the jazz and theater worlds,” said City Center President & CEO Arlene Shuler. “It’s especially exciting that City Center will be presenting Cotton Club Parade as the first Encores! event in our beautiful, newly renovated theater.”
Laura Johnson, Executive Producer, Jazz at Lincoln Center, said, “We are delighted to work with City Center to celebrate these two uniquely American musical idioms – jazz and musical theater. From the early 20th century theatrical jazz of Ellington’s Cotton Club floor shows to Tin Pan Alley to the jazz-drenched scores of mid-century book musicals, jazz and musical theater have succeeded in entertaining audiences with some of the most enduring and sophisticated music ever produced by American composers and lyricists.”
Duke Ellington influenced millions of people around the world and at home. During the course of his 50-year career, he composed more than 3,000 songs and played more than 20,000 performances in Europe, Latin America, the Middle East and Asia. He gave American music its own sound for the first time with popular hits such as “It Don't Mean a Thing if It Ain't Got That Swing,” “Sophisticated Lady,” “Mood Indigo,” “Solitude,” “In a Mellotone,” and “Satin Doll.” Ellington was awarded the Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award in 1966 and later earned several other prizes, including the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 1969 and the Legion of Honor by France in 1973.
The Jazz at Lincoln Center Orchestra, composed of 15 of the finest jazz soloists and ensemble players today, has been the Jazz at Lincoln Center resident orchestra since 1987. Featured in all aspects of the organization’s programming, the remarkably versatile Jazz at Lincoln Center Orchestra performs and leads concert and educational events in New York, across the U.S. and around the world and with many of the world’s leading symphony orchestras, ballet troupes, local students and an ever-expanding roster of guest artists. Education is a major part of Jazz at Lincoln Center’s mission and its educational activities are coordinated with concert and Jazz at Lincoln Center Orchestra tour programming.
Under Music Director Wynton Marsalis, the Jazz at Lincoln Center Orchestra spends over half of the year on tour and performs a vast repertoire, from rare historic compositions to Jazz at Lincoln Center-commissioned works by guest artists and Jazz at Lincoln Center Orchestra members.
To date, 14 recordings featuring the orchestra, under the former name of the Lincoln Center Jazz Orchestra with Wynton Marsalis, have been released and internationally distributed: Vitoria Suite (2010), Portrait in Seven Shades (2010), Congo Square (2007), Don’t Be Afraid…The Music of Charles Mingus (2005), A Love Supreme (2005), All Rise (2002), Big Train (1999), Sweet Release & Ghost Story (1999), Live in Swing City (1999), Jump Start and Jazz (1997), Blood on the Fields (1997), They Came to Swing (1994), The Fire of the Fundamentals (1993), and Portraits by Ellington (1992).
Jazz at Lincoln Center Orchestra is: Music Director and Trumpet: Wynton Marsalis; Trumpets: Ryan Kisor, Marcus Printup, Kenny Rampton; Trombones: Chris Crenshaw, Vincent Gardner, Elliot Mason; Reeds: Walter Blanding, Victor Goines, Sherman Irby, Ted Nash, Joe Temperley; Piano: Dan Nimmer; Bass: Carlos Henriquez; Drums: Ali Jackson.
Warren Carlyle directed and choreographed the Encores! production of Finian’s Rainbow and its subsequent Broadway production. He choreographed the Encores! productions of On the Town, Juno and Stairway to Paradise, and directed and choreographed the Broadway production of A Tale of Two Cities and the world premiere ofLimelight: The Story of Charlie Chaplin at the La Jolla Playhouse.
New York City Center (Arlene Shuler, President & CEO) has played a defining role in the cultural life of the city for more than 60 years. It was Manhattan’s first performing arts center, dedicated by Mayor Fiorello LaGuardia in 1943 with a mission to make the best in music, theater and dance accessible to all audiences. Today, City Center is home to many distinguished companies, including Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater, Paul Taylor Dance Company and Manhattan Theatre Club; a roster of renowned national and international visiting artists; and its own critically acclaimed and popular programs. The Tony-honored Encores! musical theater series has been hailed as “one of the very best reasons to be alive in New York.” Dance has been integral to the theater’s mission from the start, and dance programs, including the annual Fall for Dance Festival and a partnership with London’s Sadler’s Wells Theatre, remain central to City Center’s identity. City Center is dedicated to providing educational opportunities to New York City students and teachers with programs such as Encores! In Schools and the Young People’s Dance Series. Special workshops cater to families, seniors and other groups, while events such as the Fall for Dance DanceTalk series offer learning opportunities to the general public. City Center is currently undergoing an extensive renovation project to revitalize and modernize its historic theater. A grand reopening gala is scheduled for October 25.
Cotton Club Parade will run for six performances, November 18–22, 2011, according to the following schedule: Fri 8pm, Sat 2 & 8pm, Sun 6:30pm, Mon 8pm, Tue 8pm. Tickets start at $25 and go on sale Monday, August 15. Further information is available at NYCityCenter.org and jalc.org. |
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NYCC RENOVATION SECOND PHASE BEGINS TODAY
Released March 23, 2011 |
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New York City Center, dedicated by Mayor LaGuardia in 1943 as Manhattan’s first performing arts center, today begins the final phase of its historic renovation and restoration. Designed by Ennead Architects LLP, (formerly known as Polshek Partnership Architects), the renovation will preserve and restore the landmark 1923 building’s historic features while modernizing and upgrading the facility to create a world-class cultural center. A gala re-opening is scheduled for Tuesday, October 25, 2011.
The renovation was designed in two phases to limit the interruption of performances. Phase I, from April to September 2010, included behind-the-scenes improvements such as the installation of a new, state-of-the-art sprung stage floor, new elevator shaft, modernized dressing rooms and backstage areas.
Renovation Highlights
City Center’s interior features elaborate arabesque ceilings and detailed plasterwork, reflecting its original purpose as a meeting hall for the Ancient Order of the Nobles of the Mystic Shrine. Ennead Architects’ design preserves its essential character while restoring and dramatically enhancing the building with modern patron amenities. An illuminated marquee on 55th Street will welcome audiences. The auditorium’s walls, long covered over with white paint, will once again be painted in rich colors that highlight the theater’s original decorative detail. The original box office and mezzanine lobbies will be restored and several dramatic new spaces will be introduced, including an expanded and redesigned street level lobby, a new patrons’ lounge, new bars and increased and revamped restrooms. A new elevator will be installed and the existing elevator will be upgraded. The auditorium will be reconfigured to improve sightlines, and new, wider seats with expanded legroom will make it more comfortable and accessible. The total number of seats will be reduced to 2,235 (from the current 2,753).
The $75 million Campaign for City Center: Preserving the Past, Securing the Future will both realize the renovation of the landmark building and support City Center’s current and future programs, such as the acclaimed Encores! Great American Musicals in Concert series and the immensely popular Fall for Dance Festival.
In recognition of the civic importance of City Center’s artistic contributions to the cultural life of
New York, its educational outreach throughout the five boroughs and its vital place in the
architectural fabric of midtown Manhattan, the City of New York has committed more than
$36.8 million to the capital campaign to renovate the city-owned property, with funds coming
from the Office of the Mayor through the Department of Cultural Affairs, the New York City Council and the Office of the Manhattan Borough President.
History of the Building
Built in 1923 as a meeting hall for the Ancient Order of the Nobles of the Mystic Shrine, or Shriners, the former temple officially became City Center on December 11, 1943, with Mayor LaGuardia himself conducting the New York Philharmonic in the national anthem.
Throughout the 1940s and ’50s, City Center flourished as a popular, affordable alternative to the Broadway theater, the Metropolitan Opera House and Carnegie Hall. City Center was so successful in fostering the performing arts that New York City Opera, New York City Ballet and New York City Symphony were founded under its dome. A very young Leonard Bernstein conducted the New York City Symphony in low-cost, after-work concerts. Luminaries of the theater, including Paul Robeson, Orson Welles and Tallulah Bankhead, played the classics on City Center’s stage. Still-rising stars such as Bob Fosse, Barbara Cook and Walter Matthau appeared in popular revivals of Broadway musicals.
After the opening of Lincoln Center and the departure of New York City Opera and New York City Ballet, the building became under-utilized and was threatened with demolition. It was saved in the 1970s when, under the leadership of then-chairman Howard M. Squadron, the theater was dedicated as New York’s premier home for dance and given landmark status, and New York City Center was formed to manage the complex and ensure its survival as a performing arts center. By this point, however, much of the vintage architectural detail had faded or been covered up, and the functional shortcomings of a former Shriners’ hall had never been adequately addressed in converting the building into a home for dance and musical theater. The grand re-opening, in October 2011, of the modernized and restored theater will give way to a new era for the building and for New York City Center.
Today, City Center is home to many distinguished companies, including Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater, American Ballet Theatre, Paul Taylor Dance Company and Manhattan Theatre Club; a roster of renowned national and international visiting artists; and its own critically acclaimed and popular programs. The Tony-honored Encores! musical theater series, now in its 18th season, has been hailed as “one of the very best reasons to be alive in New York.” Dance has been integral to the theater’s mission from the start, and dance programs, including the annual Fall for Dance Festival and a partnership with London’s Sadler’s Wells Theatre, remain central to City Center’s identity. City Center is dedicated to providing educational opportunities to New York City students and teachers with programs such as Encores! In Schools and the Young People’s Dance Series. Special workshops cater to families, seniors and other groups, while events such as the Fall for Dance DanceTalk series offer learning opportunities to the general public.
For further information and updates on the renovation, visit www.NYCityCenter.org |
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ENCORES! LOST IN THE STARS CASTING ANNOUNCED
Released January 10, 2011 |
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Chuck Cooper, Daniel Breaker, Patina Miller,Sharon Washington, Daniel Gerroll, John Douglas Thompson and Sherry Boone have been cast inLost in the Stars, the second Encores! production of the New York City Center season, running February 3–6 at City Center. Lost in the Stars has music by Kurt Weill and book and lyrics by Maxwell Anderson. It will be directed by Gary Griffin andchoreographed by Chase Brock, withmusic direction by Rob Berman.
Lost in the Stars,the second and final collaboration between Kurt Weill and Maxwell Anderson, was billed as a “musical tragedy” when it opened on Broadway in 1949. Based on Alan Paton’s novel Cry, the Beloved Country, the show provides an uncompromising social indictment of apartheid South Africa through the story of two aging men, one black, one white, brought together by a shared grief. The score, one of Weill’s most polystylistic, contains operatic arias, chorales, blues, folk music, and pop tunes, and makes abundant use of the chorus (representing the blacks and whites of Johannesburg) to comment upon the action and propel the story forward. It includes “Stay Well”, “Trouble Man,” and the haunting title song.
Lost in the Stars is the last work Weill completed before his death in 1950. It opened at the Music Box Theater on October 30, 1949, and played 281 performances. A Broadway revival in 1972 ran for 39 performances. This is the second production of Lost in the Stars to be staged at City Center: A 1958 City Opera production featured Shirley Verrett and Louis Gossett, Jr.
Weill and Anderson’s collaborations are being celebrated in New York City this winter.In addition to the City Center production of Lost in the Stars,their 1938 musical comedy Knickerbocker Holiday, which introduced the famous “September Song,” will be given a semi-staged production by Collegiate Chorale at Alice Tully Hall on January 25 and 26.
A symposium entitled “Kurt Weill + Maxwell Anderson: Collaboration in Musical Theatre” will be held on February 4, 2011, at 5 pm at the Martin E. Segal Theatre Center, 365 Fifth Avenue (at 34th Street), presented by CUNY Graduate Center in association with the Kurt Weill Foundation for Music. Stephen Hinton, Elmar Juchem and Kim H. Kowalke will serve as panelists; David Savran will moderate. Admission is free and open to the public.
The cast of Lost in the Stars features: Sherry Boone, Daniel Breaker, Kieran Campion,Chuck Cooper, Quentin Earl Darrington, Clifton Duncan, Mark Eland, Daniel Gerroll, Jeremy Gumbs, Chike Johnson, Stephen Kunken, Patina Miller, James Rebhorn, Ted Sutherland, John Douglas Thompson and Sharon Washington,with Adam Alexander, Andre Garner, Rosena Hill, Mary Illes, Amy Justman, Joy Lynn Matthews, Andrew McRae, Patricia Phillips, Devin Richards, Lindsay Roberts, Nathaniel Stampley, Eric Van Hoven, Kevin Vortmann, J.D. Webster and Jorell Williams.
Sherry Boone (Irena) has appeared on Broadway in Marie Christine, Ragtime,Master Class and Jelly’s Last Jam and off-Broadway and nationally in Phantom of the Opera, as Carrie Pipperidge in Carousel and as Eliza Doolittlein My Fair Lady. She has been a guest soloist with the National Symphony Orchestra, Philadelphia Orchestra, Toronto Symphony, Nashville Symphony Orchestra, Hartford Symphony and at Lincoln Center's Mostly Mozart Festival.
Daniel Breaker (Absalom Kumalo) has appeared on Broadway in Shrek: The Musical, Passing Strange (Tony Award nomination), Cymbeline and Well. His off-Broadway credits include Passing Strange, Fabulation and Pericles. He has been seen in the films The Dark Fieldsand Passing Strange (directed by Spike Lee).
Chuck Cooper (Stephen Kumalo) is a veteran of 10 Broadway plays and musicals and numerous television guest leads and film appearances. He won the 1996 Tony Award for Best Featured Actor for his portrayal of Memphis in The Life. Other Broadway credits include: Finian's Rainbow; Lennon; Caroline, or Change;Chicago; Passion; Someone to Watch Over Me; Rumors;Amen Corner and Getting Away with Murder. His off-Broadway credits include: Caroline, or Change,Thunder Knocking on the Door, Marco Polo Sings a Solo and Avenue X.
Daniel Gerroll (James Jarvis) has just completed playing Scrooge in the Guthrie Theater’s new adaptation of A Christmas Carol. On Broadway he has appeared in Plenty, High Society and Enchanted April. He has been seen off-Broadway at Manhattan Theatre Club, Roundabout, Second Stage and many others. His film and television credits include The Namesake, Big Business, “The Good Wife,” “Ugly Betty,” “The Starter Wife” and “Law and Order: Criminal Intent.”
Patina Miller (Linda) was nominated for an Olivier Award for her performance as Deloris Van Cartier in the London production of Sister Act, a role she will reprise on Broadway this spring. She was last seen in New York as Dionne in the Public Theater's production of Hair in Central Park.
John Douglas Thompson (John Kumalo)appeared on Broadway inCyrano de Bergerac and Julius Caesar. He won a 2009 Obie Award for his performance in the title role of Othello at Theater for a New Audience and was nominated for a Drama Desk Award for his performance in the Irish Repertory Theater’s production of The Emperor Jones. His other credits include Classic Stage Company's production of The Forest.
Sharon Washington (Grace Kumalo) was most recently seen on Broadway in The Scottsboro Boys. Her many off-Broadway credits include The Overwhelming, House and Garden, The Radical Mystique, Stuff Happens, Richard III and String of Pearls.
The 2010-11 Encores! season is made possible, in part, by the Stephanie and Fred Shuman Fund for Encores!
New York City Center gratefully acknowledges lead support from American Express, Stacey and Eric Mindich and the Newman’s Own Foundation.
Lost in the Stars is funded, in part, by the Kurt Weill Foundation for Music, Inc., New York, NY.
Gary Griffin (Director) directed the Encores! productions of The New Moon, Pardon MyEnglish, A Tree Grows in Brooklyn, The Apple Tree and Music in the Air. He directed The Color Purple and The Apple Tree on Broadway, Pacific Overtures in London (Olivier Award, Outstanding Musical Production, Olivier Nomination, Best Director), and West Side Story and Evita at Stratford Festival of Canada. Mr. Griffin is associate artistic director of Chicago Shakespeare Theater, where he directed Private Lives, Amadeus and A Little Night Music. Regionally, he has directed at The Alliance Theatre, The Old Globe, McCarter Theatre, Signature Theatre and Kansas City Repertory Theatre.
Chase Brock (Choreographer)is artistic director of The Chase Brock Experience, the Brooklyn-based contemporary dance company for which he has created 25 dances and commissioned six original scores. In addition, he is the choreographer of the bestselling Nintendo Wii video game Dance on Broadway, Mark Lamos's A Little Night Music, Jeff Calhoun's Shenandoah, Bartlett Sher's production of the opera Roméo et Juliette (Salzburg Festival), the film Clear Blue Tuesday and Broadway Under the Stars (CBS).
Rob Berman (Music Director) is in his fourth season as music director of the series, where he has conducted Bells Are Ringing, Anyone Can Whistle, Fanny, Finian's Rainbow, Music in the Air, Damn Yankees, Applause and Stairway to Paradise, as well as last season's gala concert celebrating Stephen Sondheim. Broadway conducting credits includeFinian's Rainbow, Irving Berlin’s White Christmas, The Pajama Game, The Apple Tree, Wonderful Town and Promises, Promises, among others. Mr. Berman is a two-time Emmy nominee for his work as music director of the Kennedy Center Honors and he won a Helen Hayes Award for Best Musical Direction for his work on the Kennedy Center’s production of Sunday in the Park with George. Recently, he was music director for A Broadway Celebration: In Performance at the White House.
New York City Center Encores! (Jack Viertel, Artistic Director; Rob Berman, Music Director) has, since 1994, celebrated the rarely heard works of America’s most important composers and lyricists. Conceived as concert performances, Encores! gives these scores the chance to be heard as originally intended by their creators. Over the years, Encores! has presented the works of the Gershwins, Rodgers and Hart, Rodgers and Hammerstein, Cole Porter, Irving Berlin, Kurt Weill, Bock and Harnick, Stephen Sondheim, Burt Bacharach, Kander and Ebb, Comden and Green, and many others. The program is the recipient of a special 2000 Tony Honor for Excellence in the Theatre, as well as an Outer Critics Circle Award, Lucille Lortel Award and Jujamcyn Theaters Award.
NEW YORK CITY CENTER (Arlene Shuler, President & CEO) has played a defining role in the cultural life of the city for more than 60 years. It was Manhattan’s first performing arts center, dedicated by Mayor Fiorello LaGuardia in 1943 with a mission to make the best in music, theater and dance accessible to all audiences. Today, City Center is home to many distinguished companies, including Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater, Paul Taylor Dance Company and Manhattan Theatre Club; a roster of renowned national and international visiting artists; and its own critically acclaimed and popular programs. The Tony-honored Encores! musical theater series, now in its 18th season, has been hailed as “one of the very best reasons to be alive in New York.” Dance has been integral to the theater’s mission from the start, and dance programs, including the annual Fall for Dance Festival and a partnership with London’s Sadler’s Wells Theatre, remain central to City Center’s identity. City Center is dedicated to providing educational opportunities to New York City students and teachers with programs such as Encores! In Schools and the Young People’s Dance Series. Special workshops cater to families, seniors and other groups, while events such as the Fall for Dance DanceTalk series offer learning opportunities to the general public.
Tickets for Lost in the Stars are available at the New York City Center Box Office (West 55th Street between 6th and 7th avenues), through CityTix® at 212-581-1212, or online. Tickets for the Orchestra, Grand Tier and Mid-Mezzanine are $100; tickets for the Rear Mezzanine and Front Gallery are $50; tickets for the Rear Gallery are $25. |
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NYCC ANNOUNCES STUDIO FIVE DANCE SERIES
CURATED AND HOSTED BY DAMIAN WOETZEL
Released November 2, 2010 |
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Studio 5 at City Center will present its first dance program of the 2010-2011 season on Tuesday, November 9. Hosted and curated by renowned dancer-turned-director Damian Woetzel, this season’s three-part dance series will highlight choreographers and companies that have played an important role in City Center’s history. It begins with a celebration of the 50th Anniversary ofthree Balanchine ballets that premiered at City Center in 1960. Stars of the New York City Ballet – Tiler Peck, Jenifer Ringer, Jared Angle and Joaquin De Luz – will dance excerpts from the three highlighted ballets.
Joining Woetzel in examining and coaching the ballets will be acclaimed ballerina Violette Verdy, an original cast member of two of the works. In addition to handing down her knowledge and insights to the dancers who perform her roles today, Verdy will share her memories of performing and working with Balanchine on the creation of these magnificent ballets in the very theater where they were first unveiled 50 years ago.
Studio 5 provides an intimate forum for informal conversations with some of today’s most compelling figures in theater and dance. Interactive discussions and performances by guest artists offer audiences a glimpse beyond the proscenium into the creative worlds of theater and dance.
The newest addition to Studio 5 at City Center, “Musical Theater from the Page to the Stage,” debuted on October 18 with a theater program curated and hosted by Tony Award-winning actress Victoria Clark.
All programs are held at City Center at 6:30 p.m.
The schedule is as follows:
November 9, 2010 - Balanchine at City Center: 1960
New York City Ballet dancers will join Mr. Woetzel for a celebration of three Balanchine ballets that premiered at City Center 50 years ago: Tschaikovsky Pas de Deux (March 29, 1960), Donizetti Variations (November 16, 1960) and Liebeslieder Walzer (November 22, 1960). With special guest Violette Verdy.
February 7, 2011 - Paul Taylor Dance Company
Paul Taylor at 80 continues to win acclaim for the vibrancy and relevance of his current work as well as his classics. Mr. Woetzel welcomes dancers from the world-renowned Paul Taylor Dance Company for an exclusive preview of its upcoming City Center season, which includes time-honored masterworks and New York premieres.
April 11, 2011 - Dance Theatre of Harlem
Founded by Arthur Mitchell and Karel Shook in the midst of the Civil Rights turmoil of the 1960s, Dance Theatre of Harlem made history as an internationally acclaimed African-American classical ballet company. Artistic Director Virginia Johnson and members of the DTH Ensemble join Mr. Woetzel as they delve into the company’s past and look ahead to its future.
Damian Woetzel, former Principal Dancer with New York City Ballet, is the Artistic Director of the Vail International Dance Festival; the founding Director of the Jerome Robbins Foundation's New Essential Works (NEW) Program, and cultural producer for the World Science Festival. Woetzel also works with Yo-Yo Ma and his Silk Road Connect Program in the New York City Public Schools. He is active as a director and producer of dance and music performances, and recently directed a performance at the White House celebrating Judith Jamison and dance in America. Woetzel holds a Master in Public Administration Degree from Harvard’s Kennedy School of Government, and he is currently co-teaching a course on Performing Arts and the Law at Harvard Law School. In November of 2009, President Obama appointed Woetzel to the President’s Committee on the Arts and Humanities. Woetzel serves on the Board of New York City Center.
Studio 5 at City Center is generously supported by Barbara Brandt, Margee and John Falk, and Barbara and David Zalaznick.
NEW YORK CITY CENTER (Arlene Shuler, President & CEO) has played a defining role in the cultural life of the city for more than 60 years. It was Manhattan’s first performing arts center, dedicated by Mayor Fiorello LaGuardia in 1943 with a mission to make the best in music, theater and dance accessible to all audiences. Today, City Center is home to many distinguished companies, including Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater, Paul Taylor Dance Company and Manhattan Theatre Club; a roster of renowned national and international visiting artists; and its own critically acclaimed and popular programs. The Tony-honored Encores! musical theater series, now in its 18th season, has been hailed as “one of the very best reasons to be alive in New York.” Dance has been integral to the theater’s mission from the start, and dance programs, including the annual Fall for Dance Festival and a partnership with London’s Sadler’s Wells Theatre, remain central to City Center’s identity. City Center is dedicated to providing educational opportunities to New York City students and teachers with programs such as Encores! In Schools and the Young People’s Dance Series. Special workshops cater to families, seniors and other groups, while events such as the Fall for Dance DanceTalk series offer learning opportunities to the general public.
Studio 5 events take place in City Center Studio 5, 130 W. 56th Street, 5th floor. Tickets are $20 and must be purchased in advance via CityTix® at 212-581-1212, online at www.NYCityCenter.org or at the City Center Box Office (West 55th Street between 6th and 7th avenues). All events are at 6:30 p.m. |
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ENCORES! BELLS ARE RINGING CASTING ANNOUNCED
KELLI O'HARA JOINS ENCORES! CAST
Released September 20, 2010 |
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Kelli O’Hara and Will Chasewill star in Bells Are Ringing, the first Encores! production of the New York City Center season, running November 18–21 at City Center. The cast also features Dylan Baker, Bobby Cannavale, Judy Kaye, Brad Oscar and David Pittu. Bells Are Ringing, directed and choreographed by Kathleen Marshall with music direction by Rob Berman, has music by Jule Styne and book and lyrics by Betty Comden and Adolph Green.
In Bells Are Ringing, a lonely young woman can’t help getting involved in the lives of her answering service clients. When she falls for a man she has met only by voice, classic 1950s mayhem ensues. The score, by turns brassy, sweet and romantic, includes “Just in Time,” “The Party’s Over,” “I Met a Girl,” “Long Before I Knew You” and a fistful of other great tunes from one of Broadway's greatest tunesmiths. The original production opened at the Shubert Theater on November 29, 1956, and played a total of 924 performances. The entire original production was directed by Jerome Robbins; dance and musical numbers of the original production were staged by Jerome Robbins and Bob Fosse. The show won Tony awards for its stars Judy Holliday and Sydney Chaplin.
The cast of Bells Are Ringing includes Dylan Baker, Bobby Cannavale, Will Chase, Judy Kaye, Kelli O’Hara, Brad Oscar, David Pittu, Danny Rutigliano, Jeffrey Schecter and John C. Vennema.
Kelli O’Hara (Ella Peterson) received her third Tony nomination for her portrayal of Nellie Forbush in South Pacific at Lincoln Center Theater. Ms. O’Hara’s previous Broadway credits include The Pajama Game (Tony nomination) with Harry Connick, Jr., The Light in the Piazza (Tony nomination), Follies, Sweet Smell of Success, Jekyll & Hyde and Dracula. She has appeared as Eliza Doolittle in the New York Philharmonic production of My Fair Lady, with the New York Pops at Carnegie Hall, and at a sold-out run at Café Carlyle.
Will Chase (Jeffrey Moss) can currently be seen on Broadway in Billy Elliot. His previous Broadway credits include The Story of My Life, High Fidelity, Lennon, The Full Monty, Aida, Miss Saigon, and as Roger in the final cast and filmed stage version of Rent. He was nominated for a Helen Hayes Award for his performance in the Signature Theatre’s Kiss of the Spider Woman and has been nominated three times for Chicago’s Jeff Award.
Dylan Baker (Inspector Barnes) has appeared on Broadway in God of Carnage, the original production of La Bête (Tony nomination), November, Mauritius and Eastern Standard. His many Off-Broadway credits include Not About Heroes (Obie Award), Sea of Tranquility, Homebody/Kabul, The Common Pursuit and Tartuffe. His film credits include Secretariat, Road to Perdition, Happiness, Revolutionary Road, Spider-Man 2, Spider-Man 3, and Planes, Trains and Automobiles.
Bobby Cannavale (Blake Barton) was nominated for a Tony Award for his role in Mauritius and has been seen in New York in Trust, Hurly Burly, The Gingerbread House and others. He has appeared in the films Night Falls on Manhattan, Snakes on Plane, The Bone Collector, The Guru,, Shall We Dance? and Romance & Cigarettes. He has had recurring television roles on “Will & Grace” (Emmy Award), “Third Watch,” “100 Centre Street” and “Ally McBeal.”
Judy Kaye (Sue Summers) won the Tony Award for her performance as Carlotta in The Phantom of the Opera and was nominated for her roles in Mamma Mia! and Souvenir. She also appeared on Broadway in Ragtime, On the Twentieth Century, Sweeney Todd and Grease! Ms. Kaye has appeared in theaters and opera houses across the country as Mama Rose in Gypsy, Pistache in Can-Can, Aldonza in Man of La Mancha, Mrs. Lovett in Sweeney Todd, Annie in Annie Get Your Gun, Lucy Lockit in The Beggar’s Opera and Sally in Follies. She last appeared at City Center in the Encores! production of Face the Music.
Brad Oscar (Dr. Kitchell) was nominated for the Tony Award for his role as Nazi playwright Franz Liebkind in The Producers and subsequently took over the lead role of Max Bialystock on Broadway and in Los Angeles. His other Broadway credits include Spamalot, Jekyll & Hyde and Aspects of Love. He has appeared at the Arena Stage as the Devil in Damn Yankees and as the M.C. in Cabaret, and at the Asolo Repertory Theatre in the title role of Barnum. Mr. Oscar was last seen at City Center in the Encores! production of Do Re Mi.
David Pittu (Sandor Prantz) has been nominated for Tony awards for his performances in LoveMusik and Is He Dead?. In 2008, he wrote, co-directed, and starred in What's That Smell: The Music of Jacob Sterling, which received an Outer Critics Circle nomination for Best Off-Broadway Musical. He has also been seen in The Coast of Utopia, TheTenth Man, Twelfth Night and Equivocation. David was last seen at City Center in the Encores! production of Of Thee I Sing.
Danny Rutigliano (Francis) was recently seen in New York in Cirque du Soleil's Banana Shpeel. He originated the role of Timon in the L.A. production of The Lion King, for which he received the Ovation Award, and performed the role in the Broadway production. His television credits include “Without a Trace,” “Law & Order” and “The Brothers Garcia.” His film credits include Goodfellas, The Producers and the voice of Timothy Mouse in Dumbo 2.
Jeffrey Schecter (Carl) appeared on Broadway in A Chorus Line¸ The Pajama Game, Wonderful Town, Guys and Dolls and Beauty and the Beast, and at the Old Globe in San Diego in the world premiere of Robin and the Seven Hoods.He was seen asOzzie inOn the Town at thePaper Mill Playhouse.
John C. Vennema (Larry Hastings) appeared on Broadway in The Cripple Of Inishman, Arthur Miller’s The Ride Down Mt. Morgan, The Elephant Man, The Royal Family, Otherwise Engaged and Racing Demon. His many Off-Broadway credits include Prisoner of the Crown, The Skin Game, Right Kind Of People and House and Garden.
Kathleen Marshall (Director and Choreographer) returns to Encores!, where she has directed and choreographed Applause, Carnival, Hair and Babes In Arms, among others, and served as artistic director for four seasons. Her Broadway credits include The Pajama Game; Wonderful Town; Grease; Boeing, Boeing; Little Shop of Horrors; Follies; Seussical; Kiss Me, Kate; Ring Round the Moon; 1776 and Swinging on a Star. For ABC/Disney, she directed and choreographed “Once Upon a Mattress” and choreographed “The Music Man” (Emmy nomination). She has received two Tony awards, two Drama Desk awards and two Outer Critics Circle awards.
Rob Berman (Music Director) is in his fourth season as music director of Encores!, where he has conducted Anyone Can Whistle, Fanny, Finian's Rainbow, Music in the Air, Damn Yankees, Applause and Stairway to Paradise, as well as last season's gala concert celebrating Stephen Sondheim. Broadway conducting credits include Finian's Rainbow, Irving Berlin’s White Christmas, The Pajama Game, The Apple Tree and Wonderful Town, among others. Mr. Berman is a two-time Emmy nominee for his work as music director of the Kennedy Center Honors, and he won a Helen Hayes Award for Best Musical Direction for his work on The Kennedy Center’s production of Sunday in the Park With George. Recently, he was music director for A Broadway Celebration: In Performance at the White House.
Bells Are Ringing has been generously supported by The Joseph S. and Diane H. Steinberg Charitable Trust and Roz and Jerry Meyer.
The 2010-11 Encores! season is made possible, in part, by the Stephanie and Fred Shuman Fund for Encores!
City Center gratefully acknowledges lead support from American Express, Stacey and Eric Mindich and the Newman’s Own Foundation.
New York City Center Encores! (Jack Viertel, Artistic Director; Rob Berman, Music Director) has, since 1994, celebrated the rarely heard works of America’s most important composers and lyricists. Conceived as
concert versions, each Encores! season gives three scores the chance to be heard as originally intended by their creators. Over the years, Encores! has presented the works of the Gershwins, Rodgers and Hart,
Rodgers and Hammerstein, Cole Porter, Irving Berlin, Kurt Weill, Bock and Harnick, Stephen Sondheim, Burt Bacharach, Kander and Ebb, Comden and Green, and many others. The program is the recipient of a special 2000 Tony Honor for Excellence in the Theatre, as well as an Outer Critics Circle Award, Lucille Lortel Award and Jujamcyn Theaters Award.
NEW YORK CITY CENTER (Arlene Shuler, President & CEO) has played a defining role in the cultural life of the city for more than 60 years. It was Manhattan’s first performing arts center, dedicated by Mayor Fiorello LaGuardia in 1943 with a mission to make the best in music, theater and dance accessible to all audiences. Today, City Center is home to many distinguished companies, including Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater, Paul Taylor Dance Company and Manhattan Theatre Club; a roster of renowned national and international visiting artists; and its own critically acclaimed and popular programs. The Tony-honored Encores! musical theater series, now in its 18th season, has been hailed as “one of the very best reasons to be alive in New York.” Dance has been integral to the theater’s mission from the start, and dance programs, including the annual Fall for Dance Festival and a partnership with London’s Sadler’s Wells Theatre, remain central to City Center’s identity. City Center is dedicated to providing educational opportunities to New York City students and teachers with programs such as Encores! In Schools and the Young People’s Dance Series. Special workshops cater to families, seniors and other groups, while events such as the Fall for Dance DanceTalk series offer learning opportunities to the general public.
Bells Are Ringing plays Thursday, November 18 and Friday, November 19 at 8 p.m., Saturday, November 20 at 2 p.m. and 8 p.m., and Sunday, November 21 at 6:30 p.m. Tickets for Encores! 2010-11 are available at the New York City Center Box Office (West 55th Street between 6th and 7th avenues), through CityTix® at 212-581-1212, or online. Tickets for the Orchestra, Grand Tier and Mid-Mezzanine are $100; tickets for the Rear Mezzanine and Front Gallery are $50; tickets for the Rear Gallery are $25. |
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NYCC ANNOUNCES 2010-11 ENCORES! DIRECTORS
Released September 20, 2010 |
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Jack Viertel, Artistic Director of New York City Center’s Encores! series, today announced directors for the 2010-11 Encores! season: Kathleen Marshall will direct and choreograph the season opener, Bells Are Ringing, with music by Jule Styne and book and lyrics by Betty Comden and Adolph Green, opening on November 18, 2010. Gary Griffin will direct Lost in the Stars, with music by Kurt Weill and book and lyrics by Maxwell Anderson, opening on February 3, 2011. John Doyle will direct Where’s Charley, based on Brandon Thomas’ Charley's Aunt, with book by George Abbott and music and lyrics by Frank Loesser, opening on March 17, 2011. Music Director Rob Berman will conduct all three musicals.
In Bells Are Ringing, a lonely young woman who runs an answering service falls for a client she has met only by voice, and classic 1950s mayhem ensues. The score, by turns brassy, sweet and romantic, includes “Just in Time,” “The Party’s Over,” “I Met a Girl,” “Long Before I Knew You” and a fistful of other great tunes from one of Broadway's greatest tunesmiths. The original production opened at the Shubert Theater on November 29, 1956, and played a total of 924 performances. Directed by Jerome Robbins and choreographed by Robbins and Bob Fosse, it won Tony awards for its stars Judy Holliday and Sydney Chaplin. Bells Are Ringing will run November 18–21, 2010.
Lost in the Stars, based on Alan Paton's novel Cry, the Beloved Country, with music by Kurt Weill and book and lyrics by Maxwell Anderson. This story of life in South Africa under apartheid stirred generations to action and was the basis for a beautiful, brooding, dramatic musical that produced not only the immortal title song, but an entire score that pulses with the life of a people. It opened at the Music Box Theater on October 30, 1949, and played 281 performances. Lost in the Stars will run February 3–6, 2011.
Where’s Charley?, Frank Loesser's first Broadway score, immediately demonstrated the master's easy command of wit and romance, sophistication and high jinks. George Abbott's adaptation of Brandon Thomas’ classic college farce Charley's Aunt delivered “Once in Love With Amy,” “My Darling, My Darling” and “The New Ashmolean Marching Society” to the hit parade, and launched Loesser into the songwriting stratosphere. The musical opened at the St. James Theater on October 11, 1948, and played 792 performances. It was directed by George Abbott, choreographed by George Balanchine and starred Ray Bolger, who won a Tony Award for his performance. Where’s Charley? will run March 17–20, 2011.
The 2010-11 Encores! season is made possible, in part, by the Stephanie and Fred Shuman Fund for Encores!
City Center gratefully acknowledges lead support from American Express, Stacey and Eric Mindich and the Newman’s Own Foundation.
Bells Are Ringing has been generously supported by The Joseph S. and Diane H. Steinberg Charitable Trust and Roz and Jerry Meyer.
Kathleen Marshall (Director and Choreographer, Bells are Ringing)) returns to Encores!, where she has directed and choreographed Applause, Carnival, Hair and Babes In Arms, among others, and served as artistic director for four seasons. Her Broadway credits include The Pajama Game; Wonderful Town; Grease; Boeing, Boeing; Little Shop of Horrors; Follies; Seussical; Kiss Me, Kate; Ring Round the Moon; 1776 and Swinging on a Star. For ABC/Disney, she directed and choreographed “Once Upon a Mattress” and choreographed “The Music Man” (Emmy nomination). She has received two Tony awards, two Drama Desk awards and two Outer Critics Circle awards.
Gary Griffin (Director, Lost In The Stars) directed the Encores! productions of The New Moon, Pardon My English, A Tree Grows In Brooklyn, The Apple Tree and Music In The Air. He directed The Color Purple and The Apple Tree on Broadway, Pacific Overtures in London (Olivier Award, Outstanding Musical Production, Olivier Nomination, Best Director), and West Side Story and Evita at Stratford Festival of Canada. Mr. Griffin is associate artistic director of Chicago Shakespeare Theater, where he directed Private Lives, Amadeus and A Little Night Music. Regionally, he has directed at The Alliance Theatre, The Old Globe, McCarter Theatre, Signature Theatre and Kansas City Repertory Theatre.
John Doyle (Director, Where’s Charley?) most recently directed Wings at Second Stage Theatre. His Broadway credits include Sweeney Todd (Tony, Drama Desk and Outer Critics Circle awards, Best Director of a Musical); Company (Tony Award, Best Revival) and A Catered Affair, and his off-Broadway credits include Road Show (The Public). In London, he has directed Gondoliers, Sweeney Todd and Mack and Mabel. Mr. Doyle’sopera credits include Peter Grimes, (Metropolitan Opera), Lucia di Lammermoor (Marinsky Theatre/ Scottish Opera), The Rise and Fall of the City of Mahagonny (LA Opera), and Madama Butterfly (Grange Park Opera).
Rob Berman (Music Director) will conduct all three Encores! musicals this season. He is in his fourth season as music director of the series, where he has conducted Anyone Can Whistle, Fanny, Finian's Rainbow, Music in the Air, Damn Yankees, Applause and Stairway to Paradise, as well as last season's gala concert celebrating Stephen Sondheim. Broadway conducting credits include Finian's Rainbow, Irving Berlin’s White Christmas, The Pajama Game, The Apple Tree and Wonderful Town, among others. Mr. Berman is a two-time Emmy nominee for his work as music director of the Kennedy Center Honors, and he won a Helen Hayes Award for Best Musical Direction for his work on The Kennedy Center’s production of Sunday in the Park With George. Recently, he was music director for A Broadway Celebration: In Performance at the White House.
New York City Center Encores! (Jack Viertel, Artistic Director; Rob Berman, Music Director) has, since 1994, celebrated the rarely heard works of America’s most important composers and lyricists. Conceived as concert versions, each Encores! season gives three scores the chance to be heard as originally intended by their creators. Over the years, Encores! has presented the works of the Gershwins, Rodgers and Hart, Rodgers and Hammerstein, Cole Porter, Irving Berlin, Kurt Weill, Bock and Harnick, Stephen Sondheim, Burt Bacharach, Kander and Ebb, Comden and Green, and many others. The program is the recipient of a special 2000 Tony Honor for Excellence in the Theatre, as well as an Outer Critics Circle Award, Lucille Lortel Award and Jujamcyn Theaters Award.
NEW YORK CITY CENTER (Arlene Shuler, President & CEO) has played a defining role in the cultural life of the city for more than 60 years. It was Manhattan’s first performing arts center, dedicated by Mayor Fiorello LaGuardia in 1943 with a mission to make the best in music, theater and dance accessible to all audiences. Today, City Center is home to many distinguished companies, including Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater, Paul Taylor Dance Company and Manhattan Theatre Club; a roster of renowned national and international visiting artists; and its own critically acclaimed and popular programs. The Tony-honored Encores! musical theater series, now in its 18th season, has been hailed as “one of the very best reasons to be alive in New York.” Dance has been integral to the theater’s mission from the start, and dance programs, including the annual Fall for Dance Festival and a partnership with London’s Sadler’s Wells Theatre, remain central to City Center’s identity. City Center is dedicated to providing educational opportunities to New York City students and teachers with programs such as Encores! In Schools and the Young People’s Dance Series. Special workshops cater to families, seniors and other groups, while events such as the Fall for Dance DanceTalk series offer learning opportunities to the general public.
Tickets for Encores! 2010-11 are available at the New York City Center Box Office (West 55th Street between 6th and 7th avenues), through CityTix® at 212-581-1212, or online. Tickets for the Orchestra, Grand Tier and Mid-Mezzanine are $100; tickets for the Rear Mezzanine and Front Gallery are $50; tickets for the Rear Gallery are $25. |
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NYCC ANNOUNCES 2010-11 SEASON
Released August 17, 2010 |
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New York City Center’s 2010-11 season begins on September 28 with the seventh annual Fall for Dance Festival, featuring 20 companies in 10 nights of dance for only $10 per ticket. More world-class dance follows when the acclaimed production of Matthew Bourne’s Swan Lake, winner of three Tony awards, returns to New York for a limited engagement at City Center beginning October 13. The season also features world premieres and new productions by resident companies Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater and the Paul Taylor Dance Company. Flamenco Hoy by Carlos Saura, one of Spain’s most acclaimed flamenco shows, will play 6 performances, February 16 – 20, 2011.
The eighteenth season of City Center’s Encores!series will open onNovember 18 with Bells Are Ringing, followed by Lost in the Stars in February and Where’s Charley? in March. Manhattan Theatre Club will present world premieres by Alfred Uhry as well as Beau Willimon as well as a New York premiere by Matthew Lopez,and The Pearl Theatre Company will present a season of four classic plays on City Center Stage II.
New York City Center is currently undergoing a historic renovation to create a sparkling 21st century facility for audiences and performers, while at the same time restoring the landmarked, neo-Moorish building to its elaborately decorative glory. Designed by Ennead Architects (formerly Polshek Partnership), the two-phase renovation will upgrade the building from the canopies in front to the backstage and performance areas, with new lighting, improved seating and sightlines, gracious new amenities and more. Phase I will be completed in September 2010; phase II will begin in late March 2011 and continue through a gala re-opening week in October 2011.
New York City Center gratefully acknowledges 2010-11 Dance Season Sponsors Frederic and Robin Seegal and the New York City Center Dance Council.
The 2010-11 Encores! season is sponsored by the Newman’s Own Foundation, the Stephanie and Fred Shuman Fund for Encores! and Stacey and Eric Mindich.
New York City Center is a City-owned facility and is supported by funds from the New York City Department of Cultural Affairs, National Endowment for the Arts and New York State Council on the Arts.
The complete schedule of the 2010-11 season is as follows:
FALL FOR DANCE FESTIVAL
September 28 – October 9, 2010
Tickets on Sale Sept 12
The seventh annual Fall for Dance Festival will showcase 20 national and international companies and choreographers. With ticket prices remaining at $10 for all seats, the festival will include world and U.S. premieres, and will feature several companies making their first U.S. appearances. A wide range of dance styles and traditions, ranging from contemporary dance and classical ballet to Odissi, tap and hip hop, will be represented in five programs. (Each program will be repeated once.)
Highlights of the festival include world premieres from Madhavi Mudgal and Jason Samuels Smith and his collaborator Mr. Wiggles; the U.S. premiere of Emanuel Gat’s My Favorite Things ;and Shu-Yi Chou award-winning [1875] Ravel and Bolero, as well as Tero Saarinen performing the U.S. premiere of Carolyn Carlson’s Man in a Room. The Merce Cunningham Dance Company will present the New York premiere of XOVER, presented as part of its two-year Legacy Tour. In addition, Miami City Ballet will present Twyla Tharp’s exhilarating The Golden Section.
Ten companies will make their festival debuts: Companhia Urbana de Dança (Brazil), Company Rafaela Carrasco (Spain), Corella Ballet Castilla y León (Spain), Dresden Semperoper Ballett (Germany), Emanuel Gat Dance (France), Gallim Dance (New York), Miami City Ballet (Florida), Russell Maliphant Company (England), Shu-Yi & (Dancers) Company (Taiwan) and Tero Saarinen Company (Finland).
The festival welcomes back: American Ballet Theatre, Bill T. Jones / Arnie Zane Dance Company, Jason Samuels Smith & Friends, KEIGWIN + COMPANY with Juilliard Dance, Madhavi Mudgal, Merce Cunningham Dance Company, New York City Ballet, Paul Taylor Dance Company, Ronald K. Brown / Evidence, A Dance Company and San Francisco Ballet. www.NYCityCenter.org
New York City Center gratefully acknowledges its new Leadership Sponsor, Bloomberg, and its new Principal Sponsor, MetLife Foundation. City Center is also delighted to announce the new support of Lead Presenting Partners Jody and John Arnhold, and Barbara and David Zalaznick.
Fall for Dance is also made possible by major support from The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation, The Peter Jay Sharp Foundation and the Ford Foundation.
Tickets: $10
Press: Helene Davis, (212) 354-7436, helene@helenedavispr.com
MATTHEW BOURNE'S SWAN LAKE
October 13 - November 7, 2010
Tickets on Sale Now
Matthew Bourne's Swan Lake turned tradition upside down and took both the theater and dance worlds by storm when it arrived on Broadway in 1998 and went on to win three Tony Awards. Acclaimed as a landmark achievement on the international stage, it has become the longest running ballet in London’s West End and on Broadway, enjoyed four hugely successful tours in the UK, and thrilled audiences all over the world. Now Matthew Bourne's Swan Lake returns to New York for four weeks only. With a blend of dance, humor and spectacle, Bourne has created a provocative and powerful Swan Lake for our times. www.NYCityCenter.org
Tickets: $25, $50, $85, $110
Press: Joe Perrotta, (212) 575-3030, ext 215, jperrotta@bbbway.com
Rolex presents
CAREER TRANSITION FOR DANCERS
25th Anniversary Silver Jubilee - A Star-Studded Retrospective
Monday, November 8, 2010
Tickets on Sale Now
Presented by Rolex and hosted by Angela Lansbury, five- time Tony Award-winning musical actress and legendary star of film and television, this evening will highlight magical moments from past glittering galas. Prominent artists from America’s greatest dance companies, including Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater, American Ballet Theatre, The Joffrey Ballet, MOMIX, National Dance Institute and Parsons Dance will perform. Tony Award winners Bebe Neuwirth, Ann Reinking, Chita Rivera, Marvin Hamlisch, Tommy Tune and Karen Ziemba will appear along with Lisa Niemi Swayze and many others to be announced.www.careertransition.org
Tickets: $45, $55, $75, $130 (Show Only)
Press: Kevin P. McAnarny (212) 581-3836, KPMAssociates@aol.com
ENCORES! - BELLS ARE RINGING
November 18 - 21, 2010
Tickets on Sale Sept. 7
In Bells Are Ringing, with music by Jule Styne and book and lyrics by Betty Comden and Adolph Green, a lonely girl who runs an answering service falls for a client she has met only by voice, and typical 1950s mayhem ensues. The score, by turns brassy, sweet and romantic, includes “Just in Time,” “The Party’s Over,” “I Met a Girl,” “Long Before I Knew You” and a fistful of other great tunes from one of Broadway's greatest tunesmiths. The original production opened at the Shubert Theater on November 29, 1956, and played a total of 924 performances. Directed by Jerome Robbins and choreographed by Robbins and Bob Fosse, it won Tony awards for its stars Judy Holliday and Sydney Chaplin. www.NYCityCenter.org
Bells Are Ringing has been generously supported by The Joseph S. and Diane H. Steinberg Charitable Trust and Roz and Jerry Meyer.
Tickets: $25, $50, $100
Press: Helene Davis, (212) 354-7436, helene@helenedavispr.com
ALVIN AILEY AMERICAN DANCE THEATER
December 1, 2010 - January 2, 2011
Tickets on Sale Sept. 7
Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater, recognized by U.S. Congress as a vital American “Cultural Ambassador to the World,” returns to the stage of New York City Center with exciting performances that have become a joyous holiday tradition. Led by the renowned Judith Jamison in her final year as artistic director, and joined by artistic director designate Robert Battle, Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater inspires in a universal celebration of the human spirit using the African-American cultural experience and the American modern dance tradition. Ailey’s extraordinary artists will move audiences with a diverse repertory by a variety of choreographers, including seven premieres and new productions joining a cornucopia of repertory favorites. The season will also celebrate five decades of Alvin Ailey’s timeless masterpiece Revelations. www.alvinailey.org
Tickets: Starting at $25
Press: Christopher Zunner, 212-405-9028, czunner@alvinailey.org
ENCORES! - LOST IN THE STARS
February 3 – 6, 2011
Tickets on Sale Sept. 7
Lost in the Stars has music by Kurt Weill and book and lyrics by Maxwell Anderson. The pair set to work fashioning Alan Paton's novel Cry, the Beloved Country into a musical tragedy within weeks of its momentous publication. This story of life in South Africa under apartheid stirred generations to action, and was the basis for a beautiful, brooding, dramatic musical that produced not only the immortal title song, but an entire score that pulses with the life of a people. It opened at the Music Box Theater on October 30, 1949, and played 273 performances. www.NYCityCenter.org
Tickets: $25, $50, $100
Press: Helene Davis, (212) 354-7436, helene@helenedavispr.com
FLAMENCO HOY BY CARLOS SAURA
February 16 – 20, 2011
Tickets on Sale Sept. 7
Flamenco Hoy, choreographed by Rafael Estévez & Nani Paños under the musical direction of Chano Domínguez, is one of the largest and most popular contemporary flamenco shows in Spain. The dancing takes audiences on a highly visual historical journey of the genre, vividly portraying the struggle and emotions of the people of Andalusia. Dances and music from the various parts of the region, such as Malaga, Cordoba and Seville, are represented through the authentic cast and performers. The performance pays tribute to the historical significance of flamenco, but also emphasizes the vitality of the genre in the 21st century.
Tickets: $35, $45, $65, $85
Press: Jaime Avendaño, 34-963-739-361, info@flamencofuturo.com
PAUL TAYLOR DANCE COMPANY
February 22 – March 6, 2011
Tickets on Sale Sept. 7
Paul Taylor, the last living member of the pantheon that created modern dance, returns with time-honored masterworks and two New York premieres. Highlights include the new Phantasmagoria - a dreamscape propelled by Renaissance music - and the long-awaited revival of Orbs, set to Beethoven’s fabled late string quartets, as well such riveting dramas as Speaking in Tongues and
The Word.
Tickets: $10, $25, $50, $60, $75, $100, $150
March 1 Black Tuesday Great Depression Special: $19.29 for all seats normally $25-$150, and $5 for all seats normally $10
Press: Lisa Labrado, (212) 431-5562,ll@ptdc.org
ENCORES! - WHERE’S CHARLEY?
March 17 – 20, 2011
Tickets on Sale Sept. 7
Where’s Charley?, Frank Loesser's first Broadway score, immediately demonstrated the master's easy command of wit and romance, sophistication and high jinks. George Abbott's adaptation of Brandon Thomas’ classic college farce Charley's Aunt delivered “Once in Love With Amy,” “My Darling, My Darling” and “The New Ashmolean Marching Song” to the hit parade, and launched Loesser into the songwriting stratosphere. The musical opened at the St. James Theater on October 11, 1948, and played 792 performances. It was directed by George Abbott, choreographed by George Balanchine and starred Ray Bolger, who won a Tony Award for his performance. www.NYCityCenter.org
Tickets: $25, $50, $100
Press: Helene Davis, (212) 354-7436, helene@helenedavispr.com
MANHATTAN THEATRE CLUB
Tickets on Sale: Sept. 7
Under the leadership of Artistic Director Lynne Meadow and Executive Producer Barry Grove, MTC has become one of the country’s most prominent and prestigious theater companies. Over the past three decades, MTC productions have earned a total of 17 Tony awards and six Pulitzer prizes, an accomplishment unparalleled by a New York theatrical institution. MTC’s City Center season includes the world premiere of Beau Willimon’s Spirit Control, directed by Henry Wishcamper and the world premiere of Pulitzer Prize winner Alfred Uhry’s Carl’s Sister, based on the book Apples and Oranges by Marie Brenner, to be directed by Lynne Meadow. Rounding out the season is the New York premiere of Matthew Lopez’s The Whipping Man, directed by Doug Hughes. (Note: MTC will also present three additional plays at their Samuel J. Friedman Theatre on Broadway). www.manhattantheatreclub.com
Tickets: $80
Press: Aaron Meier: ameier@bbbway.com; Christine Olver: colver@bbbway.com
THE PEARL THEATRE COMPANY
Tickets on sale online and by phone on Aug. 23
The Pearl Theatre Company’s award-winning Resident Acting Company will present its 27th season of plays rooted in the classics at New York City Center Stage II. The season includes Michael Frayn’s The Sneeze, adapted from plays and stories by Anton Chekhov, directed by J.R. Sullivan (September 17 – October 31); the American premiere of a new adaptation of Henrik Ibsen’s Rosmersholm, adapted by Mike Poulton, directed by Elinor Renfield (November 12 – December 19); Molière’s The Misanthrope, translated into English verse by Richard Wilbur, directed by Joseph Hanreddy (January 14 – February 20, 2011); and the New York premiere of Wittenberg, byDavid Davalos, directed by J.R. Sullivan (March 11 – April 17, 2011).
Tickets: $35, $45, $55
Press: Aaron Schwartzbord, (212) 505-3401, aschwartzbord@pearltheatre.org |
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2010 FALL FOR DANCE FESTIVAL ANNOUNCED
Released July 26, 2010 |
TICKET PRICES ONCE AGAIN $10 FOR ALL SEATS
WITH SUPPORT FROM NEW SPONSORS
BLOOMBERG and METLIFE FOUNDATION
Festival Debuts:
Companhia Urbana de Dança, Company Rafaela Carrasco,
Corella Ballet Castilla y León, Dresden Semperoper Ballett, Emanuel Gat Dance,
Gallim Dance,
Miami City Ballet, Russell Maliphant Company,
Shu-Yi & (Dancers) Company and Tero Saarinen Company
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Highlights include: |
- Merce Cunningham Dance Company performs NY premiere of XOVER
- World premiere of collaboration by Jason Samuels Smith and Mr. Wiggles
- World premiere from Madhavi Mudgal
- U.S. premiere of Emanuel Gat’s My Favorite Things
- U.S. premiere of Shu-Yi Chou’s award-winning [1875] Ravel and Bolero
- Tero Saarinen performs U.S. premiere of Carolyn Carlson’s Man in a Room
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September 28 – October 9, 2010 |
New York City Center’s seventh annual Fall for Dance Festival, running September 28 – October 9, will showcase 20 national and international companies and choreographers. With ticket prices remaining at $10 for all seats, a night of dance is more affordable than a night at the movies. The festival will include world and U.S. premieres, and will feature several companies making their first U.S. appearances. A wide range of dance styles and traditions, ranging from contemporary dance and classical ballet to Odissi, tap and hip hop, will be represented in five programs. (Each program will be repeated once.) Tickets will go on sale Sunday, September 12 at 11 a.m.
Ten companies will make their festival debuts: Companhia Urbana de Dança (Brazil), Company Rafaela Carrasco (Spain), Corella Ballet Castilla y León (Spain), Dresden Semperoper Ballett (Germany), Emanuel Gat Dance (France), Gallim Dance (New York), Miami City Ballet (Florida), Russell Maliphant Company (England), Shu-Yi & (Dancers) Company (Taiwan) and Tero Saarinen Company (Finland).
The festival welcomes back: American Ballet Theatre, Bill T. Jones / Arnie Zane Dance Company, Jason Samuels Smith & Friends, KEIGWIN + COMPANY with Juilliard Dance, Madhavi Mudgal, Merce Cunningham Dance Company, New York City Ballet, Paul Taylor Dance Company, Ronald K. Brown / Evidence, A Dance Company and San Francisco Ballet.
City Center’s Fall for Dance Festival has received national and international recognition for its quality, innovation and success in introducing new and younger audiences to the world of dance. Since its inception, the festival has presented 135 different dance companies to more than 130,000 dance enthusiasts for just $10 per ticket. Newcomers and ballet fans alike now look forward to the festival as both an introduction to new artists and a welcome return to familiar and beloved companies.
“We’re thrilled to be heading into our seventh season of Fall for Dance, and we’re especially excited to be able to continue offering tickets at the original $10 price,” said New York City Center President & CEO Arlene Shuler. “At a time when securing arts funding is more difficult than ever, we are fortunate to have two new sponsors, Bloomberg and MetLife Foundation, as well as new major individual donors. Thanks to their generous commitments, we can preserve our mission to provide an accessible way for new audiences to discover the joy of dance, while giving dance lovers an opportunity to experience new artists and genres.”
New York City Center gratefully acknowledges its new Leadership Sponsor, Bloomberg, and its new Principal Sponsor, MetLife Foundation. City Center is also delighted to announce the new support of Lead Presenting Partners Jody and John Arnhold, and Barbara and David Zalaznick.
Bloomberg is a leading financial information services, news and media company. Bloomberg provides real-time news, financial and market data, analytics, pricing, and trading and communications tools to customers around the world via the BLOOMBERG PROFESSIONAL® service and its media services.
“MetLife Foundation has a longstanding commitment to strengthening access to the arts for people of all ages and backgrounds,” said Dennis White, president and CEO, MetLife Foundation. “We are proud to support New York City Center’s Fall for Dance Festival, which continues to serve as an invaluable cultural resource and leader in creating opportunities for diverse audiences to experience world-class dance.”
New York City Center also recognizes the extraordinary leadership support of The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation, which inaugurated a $10 million endowment campaign to ensure the future stability of the annual Fall for Dance Festival. Additional generous funding for the Fall for Dance Festival endowment has been received from The Peter Jay Sharp Foundation, The Ford Foundation, The Rockefeller Brothers Fund, The Fan Fox and Leslie R. Samuels Foundation and an anonymous donor. More than $5 million in commitments have been received to date.
TEN NIGHTS, FIVE UNIQUE PROGRAMS
Program One: Tuesday, September 28 and Wednesday, September 29
The festival opens with Merce Cunningham Dance Company, making its first New York stop on its two-year Legacy Tour. The company will present the New York premiere of Cunningham’s XOVER (2007),with music byJohn Cage and scenery by Robert Rauschenberg. Gallim Dance, making its festival debut, follows with Andrea Miller’s I Can See Myself in Your Pupil (2008), adapted for the festival. Indian Odissi dancer and choreographer Madhavi Mudgal returns to the festival to perform the world premiere of her new work, Vistaar, with a commissioned score by her brother, renowned musician Madhup Mudgal. The evening concludes with the festival debut of Miami City Ballet performing Twyla Tharp’s exhilarating The Golden Section (1983), featuring 13 dancers and music by David Byrne.
Program Two: Thursday, September 30 and Friday, October 1
Company Rafaela Carrasco from Spain makes its festival debut with Carrasco’s Three Movements (2008), adapted for Fall for Dance and performed to live music, followed by New York City Ballet performing Ulysses Dove’s Red Angels (1994), a work for four dancers set to a score for electric violin by Richard Einhorn. Next up, Bill T. Jones / Arnie Zane Dance Company presents Jones’ Duet (1995), an exploration of two people moving in perfect unison. The evening ends withthe U.S. debut of Companhia Urbana de Dança of Brazil, presenting ID:ENTIDADES (2010), a blend of hip hop and contemporary dance choreographed by Sonia Destri.
Program Three: Saturday, October 2 and Sunday, October 3 (matinee)
Shu-Yi & (Dancers) Company from Taiwan makes its U.S. debut with Shu-Yi Chou’s [1875] Ravel and Bolero (2007). Shu-Yi was the winner of Sadler’s Wells’ 2009 Global Dance Contest, in which choreographers from all over the world submitted their entries via YouTube. San Francisco Ballet returns to the festival with a pas de deux from Yuri Possokhov’s Diving into the Lilacs (2009), followed by the U.S. premiere of Emanuel Gat Dance’s My Favorite Things (2007), a solo danced to music by John Coltrane. City Center resident company Paul Taylor Dance Company wraps up the program with Taylor’s exuberant Company B (1991), set to popular tunes by The Andrews Sisters.
Program Four: Wednesday, October 6 and Thursday, October 7
Kicking off week two is KEIGWIN + COMPANY with Juilliard Dancein Larry Keigwin’s Megalopolis (2009), a hyper-kinetic work for 16 dancers performed to music by Steve Reich and M.I.A. Corella Ballet Castilla y León, which had its U.S. debut at City Center in March, makes its festival debut with María Pagés’ Soleá (2010), a duet created especially for Ángel Corella and his sister, Carmen Corella. Russell Maliphant Company presents the U.S. premiere of Maliphant’s AfterLight (Part 1) (2009), a solo work with music by Erik Satie that was nominated for the 2009 Olivier Award for Best New Dance Production. The evening ends with Peace of Mind: The Remix, a world premiere choreographed by tap master Jason Samuels Smith and hip-hop legend Mr. Wiggles, performed by Jason Samuels Smith & Friends.
Program Five: Friday, October 8 and Saturday, October 9
The final program begins with Tero Saarinen Company, featuring Finnish dancer/choreographer Tero Saarinen in the U.S. premiere of Man in a Room (2000), a solo work created by Carolyn Carlson and inspired by the life of abstract expressionist painter Mark Rothko. Dresden Semperoper Ballett of Germany makes its festival debut with William Forsythe’s The Vertiginous Thrill of Exactitude (1996), followed byAmerican Ballet Theatre with the Thaïs Pas de Deux by Sir Frederick Ashton (1971).The festival concludes with Ronald K. Brown / Evidence, A Dance Company performing Brown’s signature work Grace (1999),a joyful ensemble piece with accents of hip hop and West African pop to a score by Duke Ellington.
Jed Wheeler and Wendy Perron serve as artistic advisors to the festival.
EDUCATION
The Fall for Dance Festival will present DanceTalk, a series of pre-performance discussions and demonstrations that explore aspects of the Fall for Dance programming. On October 1, City Center and the Barnard College Department of Dance will co-present Does Culture Influence Performance? with panelists Ronald K. Brown, Rafaela Carrasco, Sonia Destri and Shu-Yi Chou. On October 7, City Center and the Hunter College Department of Dance will co-present Movement and Image: How do Choreographers Use Visuals to Enhance Their Work? with panelists Nancy Dalva, Tero Saarinen, Janet Wong and others.
Panels will take place in City Center’s Studio 5 from 6:30 to 7:30 p.m. Each event will be free and open to the public. Educational groups can make advanced reservations by contacting Chelsea Koenig in New York City Center’s Education Department at ckoenig@nycitycenter.org or 212.763.1265.
City Center is also proud to be working with the New York City Department of Education to present a Fall for Dance seminar for dance educators, Word and Movement: Creating Artistic Tension. Though not open to the public, dance teachers from public schools, private studios and other settings are welcome to register. Participants will take master classes focusing on two pieces of repertoire featured in the festival: Bill T. Jones’ Duet and Andrea Miller’s I Can See Myself in Your Pupil. City Center teaching artists will then facilitate a follow-up workshop centered on exploring dance techniques and applications to classroom practice. The seminar will take place in City Center’s studios from 9:30 a.m. to 4 p.m. on Saturday, September 11.
FESTIVAL LOUNGE
For each Fall for Dance performance, the public atrium between 55th and 56th streets (immediately west of the theater’s main entrance) is transformed into Lounge FFD, a vibrant gathering place for audience members and artists. Featuring music by a rotating roster of NYC DJs, Lounge FFD offers festival attendees, performers and neighborhood friends a place to relax and mingle, share a cocktail and have a snack before and after the show as well as during intermission while video monitors throughout the lounge follow the action onstage. Lounge FFD is open to the general public as well as to festival artists and attendees. No tickets are required and everyone is welcome.
NEW YORK CITY CENTER (Arlene Shuler, President & CEO) has played a defining role in the cultural life of the city for more than 60 years. It was Manhattan’s first performing arts center, dedicated by Mayor Fiorello LaGuardia in 1943, with a mission to make the best in music, theater and dance accessible to all audiences. Today, City Center is home to many distinguished companies, including: Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater, Paul Taylor Dance Company and Manhattan Theatre Club; a roster of renowned national and international visiting artists; and its own critically acclaimed and popular programs. The Tony-honored Encores! musical theater series has been hailed as “one of the very best reasons to be alive in New York.” In 2007, Encores! Summer Stars was introduced with Gypsy, starring Patti LuPone, which transferred to Broadway and garnered three Tony awards for its lead actors. Dance has been integral to the theater’s mission from the start, and dance programs, including the annual Fall for Dance Festival and a partnership with London’s Sadler’s Wells Theatre, remain central to City Center’s identity.
The 2010 Fall for Dance Festival runs Tuesday, September 28 through Saturday, October 9 at New York City Center (West 55th Street between 6th and 7th avenues). All performances are at 8 p.m., except for the Sunday, October 3 performance, which is a 3 p.m. matinee. All tickets are $10 and go on sale on Sunday, September 12 at 11 a.m. Tickets can be purchased online, by calling CityTix at 212.581.1212, or at the City Center Box Office. |
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MATTHEW BOURNE'S SWAN LAKE RETURNS TO NEW YORK
Released June 3, 2010 |
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MATTHEW BOURNE’S SWAN LAKE, the triumphant modern re-interpretation of the legendary ballet,turned tradition upside down and took both the theater and dance worlds by storm when it arrived on Broadway in 1998 and went on to win three Tony Awards® and five Drama Desk Awards.
Produced by New York City Center, Sadler’s Wells Theater London and Back Row Productions, the groundbreaking and multi-award-winning international hit production will return to New York for a strictly limited run October 13 – November 7, 2010 at New York City Center (West 55th Street between 6th and 7th Avenues).
Tickets for MATTHEW BOURNE’S SWAN LAKE go on sale on Monday, June 7th at the New York City Center Box Office, through CityTix at 212-581-1212, or online. Tickets are $110 (Orchestra and Grand Tier); $85 (Orchestra, Grand Tier and Mid-Mezzanine); $50 (Mid-Mezzanine and Rear Mezzanine) and $25 (Orchestra and Rear Mezzanine).
Matthew Bourne blends dance, humor and spectacle with extravagant, award-winning set and costume designs by Lez Brotherston and lighting design by Rick Fisher, to create a provocative and powerful Swan Lake for our times. Now firmly crowned as a modern-day classic, this iconic production is perhaps best known for replacing the traditional female corps de ballet with a menacing male ensemble.
Collecting over 30 international theater awards, MATTHEW BOURNE’S SWAN LAKE has been acclaimed as a landmark achievement on the international stage. It has become the longest running ballet in the West End and on Broadway and enjoyed four hugely successful tours in the UK and thrilled audiences all over the world.
Tony Award® winning creator and New Adventures artistic director Matthew Bourne said: "Can it really be over a decade ago that my production of Swan Lake was on Broadway? A memorable experience that culminated in our winning three Tony Awards®. An incredible journey for a piece that started out as a government subsidized project that was seen as, at best, a creative gamble and, at worst, an outrageous folly! Of course, this was before people had seen the power and the majesty of our now famous male swans. I am happy to say that that journey has since continued and Swan Lake has been seen all over the world, inspiring young (particularly male) dancers and creating an unprecedented new audience for dance.
I remember at the Tony Awards®, when I won my second award of the evening for Best Director of a Musical, looking down at the award and saying incredulously ‘Best Director of a Musical that isn't a musical?’ I was of course alluding to the fact that the show was deemed ineligible for Best Musical. What I forgot to say at the time was that although Swan Lake is probably not a musical, it is certainly musical theater, and this has been borne out over the years with its incredible cross-over popularity. I am particularly delighted to be returning to New York with my own New Adventures company, which features a cast of homegrown stars who have worked in many of my productions over the last decade.
I have never stopped working on Swan Lake. It has never become frozen as a show but has, I believe, gotten richer and more heartfelt. In fact, this current production features, in my opinion, the finest company that has ever performed the piece. I am thrilled to be co-presented at New York's famed City Center by my producers: Back Row Productions, who have produced Swan Lake all over the world since 2005; London’s legendary dance house, Sadler’s Wells; and New York City Center, one of New York’s leading presenters and producers of both dance and musical theater. I am truly excited at the prospect of Swan Lake’s return to New York and performing, once again, to the best audiences in the world."
MATTHEW BOURNE’S SWAN LAKE stars a mix of established New Adventures performers and newcomers. Richard Winsor and Jonathan Ollivier return to the coveted role of “The Swan” following their 2009 debuts.
Richard Winsor is one of New Adventures’ leading performers, having created the title roles in both Edward Scissorhands (2005) and Dorian Gray (2008). He was also in the original cast of Bourne’s Play Without Words (2002) and was seen as “Angelo” in The Car Man and the title role in Nutcracker!. He recently starred in his first major film, Street Dance, the first British movie to be shot in 3D.
After graduating from The Rambert School in 1996, Jonathan Ollivier joined The Cape Town City Ballet Company and became a principal before returning to England in 1999 to join Northern Ballet. Here he created many leading roles, most notably “Stanley Kowalski” in Didy Veldman’s contemporary ballet of A Streetcar Named Desire and “Heathcliffe” in David Nixon’s Wuthering Heights. Ollivier joined the Alberta Ballet Company as a principal dancer in 2007 and returned to the UK to pursue a freelance career in 2009.
The pivotal role of “The Prince” will be performed by Dominic North, a veteran New Adventures company member who has also played the title role in Edward Scissorhands for which he was nominated for Best Male Dancer at the 2010 National Dance Awards. Simon Williams will also return to the production to recreate the role. A Royal Ballet School graduate and former member of the English National Ballet, he has performed with New Adventures in Matthew Bourne’s Nutcracker! and also appeared in Billy Elliot in the West End and as the leading male dancer in the Michael Clark Dance Company.
Returning to the role of “The Queen” will be American dancer and original Broadway cast member Nina Goldman, who has performed in various roles within the production, including “The Girlfriend.” Nina also performed in The Car Man and enjoyed great success as “Joyce Monroe” in Edward Scissorhands. Sharing the roles of both “The Queen” and “The Girlfriend” will be veteran New Adventures company member Madelaine Brennan, who studied with The Royal Ballet and has appeared in Trevor Nunn’s productions of Oklahoma! and My Fair Lady at The Royal National Theatre, and most recently performed in Cabaret on the West End.
“The Girlfriend” will also be played by New Adventures veteran Shelby Williams, who has appeared in the original 2005 cast of Edward Scissorhands, The Car Man, Highland Fling and Nutcracker!
The role of the “The Private Secretary” will be shared by New Adventures resident director Steve Kirkham and company member Ashley Bain. Kirkham returns to Swan Lake after being in the original cast as a “Cygnet.” He was in the original cast of the multi-award-winning Play Without Words, Edward Scissorhands and Nutcracker! Bain has appeared with New Adventures in Nutcracker!, the Swan Lake 10th Anniversary world tour and Dorian Gray, in which he created the role of “Edward Black.”
The complete company of MATTHEW BOURNE’S SWAN LAKE will be announced shortly.
NEW ADVENTURES Matthew Bourne’s New Adventures is the UK’s premier contemporary dance/theater touring company. Its repertory includes some of the most successful dance productions of the last two decades. The company was launched in 2002 to create and perform both large - and small-scale work by Matthew Bourne. Since its launch it has built an enviable repertoire of exciting new work (Play Without Words, Edward Scissorhands and Dorian Gray) and new productions of favorite works from the repertory of Matthew Bourne’s former company, Adventures In Motion Pictures (Nutcracker!, Swan Lake, Cinderella, Highland Fling and The Car Man). New Adventures is committed to reviving these popular works on a regular basis, along with the creation of new work. As well as being a resident company at Sadler’s Wells Theatre in London, New Adventures is also a touring company. It has become Britains' biggest dance export with regular seasons throughout Europe, Asia, Australia and North America. Both at home and internationally, it annually gives more performances than any other UK dance company.
NEW YORK CITY CENTER has played a defining role in the cultural life of the city for more than 60 years. It was Manhattan’s first performing arts center, dedicated by Mayor Fiorello LaGuardia in 1943 with a mission to make the best in music, theater and dance accessible to all audiences. Today, City Center is home to many distinguished companies, including Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater, Paul Taylor Dance Company and Manhattan Theatre Club; a roster of renowned national and international visiting artists; and its own critically acclaimed and popular programs. The Tony-honored Encores! musical theater series has been hailed as “one of the very best reasons to be alive in New York.” Dance has been integral to the theater’s mission from the start, and dance programs, including the annual Fall for Dance festival and a partnership with London’s Sadler’s Wells Theatre, remain central to City Center’s identity.
SADLER’S WELLS THEATRE LONDON is the UK’s leading venue for dance, presenting the widest forms of world-class international and UK dance to the widest possible audiences. A well established producing house under the artistic directorship of Alistair Spalding, the theater’s acclaimed program spans cutting edge contemporary works by artists such as William Forsythe, Hofesh Shechter and Wayne McGregor, sell-out runs from Matthew Bourne and his company New Adventures, hugely successful tango, street dance and flamenco shows, international companies including American Ballet Theater and Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater, and award-winning Sadler’s Wells Productions on an international scale including Sylvie Guillem and Russell Maliphant’sPUSH and groundbreaking cross-art form collaborations such aszero degrees andSutra. An associate artist at Sadler’s Wells, Matthew Bourne’s iconicSwan Lake premiered at the theater 15 years ago. Since then he has presented a host of acclaimed works at Sadler’s Wells includingNutcracker!,The Car Man andEdward Scissorhands. His company, New Adventures, has been a Sadler’s Wells resident company since 2006.
BACK ROW PRODUCTIONS LTD. The Managing Directors of Back Row Productions are Liz Koops and Garry McQuinn. Back Row has successfully developed or presented innovative productions throughout the world including Tap Dogs (in 37 countries and over 320 cities), Slava’s Snowshow, Gumboots, Wadaiko Ichiro, Shaolin Monks, Bounce and Circus Oz. Back Row's international reputation was consolidated through booking and/or producing seasons of Jerry Seinfeld, An Inspector Calls, Lady Chatterley’s Lover, Mum's The Word, Fosse, Cats, Chicago, Starlight Express, Grease, Miss Saigon, Disney's Beauty and the Beast and Matthew Bourne's Swan Lake. Back Row Productions is presently producing Matthew Bourne's Swan Lake internationally, Through A Glass Darkly with the prestigious Almeida Theatre, a reinvented production of Tap Dogs in London, Europe and Asia, and Priscilla Queen of the Desert the Musical, running at the Palace Theatre in London and opening in Toronto later this year and Broadway early in 2011. |
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NEW YORK CITY CENTER ANNOUNCES 18TH ENCORES! SEASON
Released May 4, 2010 |
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New York City Center’s 2010-2011 Encores! season will open with the 1956 Jule Styne, Betty Comden and Adolph Green musical Bells Are Ringing, November 18 – 21, 2010. The season will continue with Kurt Weill and Maxwell Anderson’s Lost in the Stars, February 3 – 6, 2011, followed by Frank Loesser and George Abbott’s Where’s Charley?, March 17 – 20.
In Bells Are Ringing, with music by Jule Styne and book and lyrics by Betty Comden and Adolph Green, a lonely girl who runs an answering service falls for a client she has met only by voice, and typical 1950s mayhem ensues. The score, by turns brassy, sweet and romantic, includes “Just in Time,” “The Party’s Over,” “I Met a Girl,” “Long Before I Knew You” and a fistful of other great tunes from one of Broadway's greatest tunesmiths. The original production opened at the Shubert Theater on November 29, 1956, and played a total of 924 performances. Directed by Jerome Robbins and choreographed by Robbins and Bob Fosse, it won Tony awards for its stars Judy Holliday and Sydney Chaplin. Bells Are Ringing will run November 18–21, 2010.
Lost in the Stars has music by Kurt Weill and book and lyrics by Maxwell Anderson. Weill and Anderson set to work fashioning Alan Paton's novel Cry, the Beloved Country into a musical tragedy within weeks of its momentous publication. This story of life in South Africa under apartheid stirred generations to action, and was the basis for a beautiful, brooding, dramatic musical that produced not only the immortal title song, but an entire score that pulses with the life of a people. It opened at the Music Box Theater on October 30, 1949, and played 273 performances. Lost in the Stars will run February 3–6, 2011.
Where’s Charley?, Frank Loesser's first Broadway score, immediately demonstrated the master's easy command of wit and romance, sophistication and high jinks. George Abbott's adaptation of Brandon Thomas’ classic college farce Charley's Aunt delivered “Once in Love With Amy,” “My Darling, My Darling” and “The New Ashmolean Marching Song” to the hit parade, and launched Loesser into the songwriting stratosphere. The musical opened at the St. James Theater on October 11, 1948, and played 792 performances. It was directed by George Abbott, choreographed by George Balanchine and starred Ray Bolger, who won a Tony Award for his performance. Where’s Charley? will run March 17–20, 2011.
The 2010-11 Encores! season is made possible, in part, by the Stephanie and Fred Shuman Fund for Encores!
The Newman’s Own Foundation is a proud sponsor of Encores! The Newman’s Own Foundation is an independent, private foundation that derives its grant-making income from royalty payments received in conjunction with the sale of Newman’s Own food products. Since the inception of Newman’s Own in the early 1980s, more than $280 million has been donated to thousands of charities around the world.
New York City Center Encores! (Jack Viertel, Artistic Director; Rob Berman, Music Director) has, since 1994, celebrated the rarely heard works of America’s most important composers and lyricists. Conceived as
concert versions, each Encores! season gives three scores the chance to be heard as originally intended by their creators. Over the years, Encores! has presented the works of the Gershwins, Rodgers and Hart,
Rodgers and Hammerstein, Cole Porter, Irving Berlin, Kurt Weill, Bock and Harnick, Stephen Sondheim, Burt Bacharach, Kander and Ebb, Comden and Green, and many others. The program is the recipient of a special 2000 Tony Honor for Excellence in the Theatre, as well as an Outer Critics Circle Award, Lucille Lortel Award and Jujamcyn Theaters Award.
New York City Center (Arlene Shuler, President and CEO) has played a defining role in the cultural life of the city for more than 60 years. It was Manhattan’s first performing arts center, dedicated by Mayor Fiorello LaGuardia in 1943 with a mission to make the best in music, theater and dance accessible to all audiences. Today, City Center is home to many distinguished companies, including Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater, Paul Taylor Dance Company and Manhattan Theatre Club; a roster of renowned national and international visiting artists; and its own critically acclaimed and popular programs. The Tony-honored Encores! musical theater series has been hailed as “one of the very best reasons to be alive in New York.” In 2007, Encores! Summer Stars was introduced with Gypsy, starring Patti LuPone, which transferred to Broadway and garnered three Tony awards for its lead actors. Dance has been integral to the theater’s mission from the start, and dance programs, including the annual Fall for Dance Festival and a partnership with London’s Sadler’s Wells Theatre, remain central to City Center’s identity.
Tickets for Encores! 2010-11 go on sale September 7, 2010, at the New York City Center Box Office (West 55th Street between 6th and 7th avenues), through CityTix® at 212-581-1212, or online at www.NYCityCenter.org. Tickets for the Orchestra, Grand Tier and Mid-Mezzanine are $100; tickets for the Rear Mezzanine and Front Gallery are $50; tickets for the Rear Gallery are $25. |
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NEW YORK CITY CENTER UNVEILS PLANS TO
MODERNIZE AND RESTORE ITS HISTORIC THEATER
$75 Million Campaign Will Realize Design by Ennead Architects LLP and
Support City Center's Popular Programs, Now and in the Future
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NEW YORK, NY, (March 17, 2010) - New York City Center today unveiled plans to modernize the organization’s home in midtown Manhattan to provide a sparkling 21st-century facility for audiences and performers, while at the same time restoring this historic, neo-Moorish building to its elaborately decorative glory.
Constructed in 1923 as a meeting hall for the Ancient Order of the Nobles of the Mystic Shrine, City Center’s building was dedicated by Mayor Fiorello LaGuardia in 1943 as Manhattan’s first performing arts center. A comprehensive project designed by Ennead Architects LLP will now upgrade the building from the canopies in front to the back of house with new lighting, improved seating and sightlines, gracious new amenities and more. This increased comfort, convenience and functionality will be achieved within a showplace where the shimmering mosaic walls, richly colored arabesque ceilings and intricately detailed plasterwork are again as fresh as new.
The $75 million Stepping Forward: The Campaign for City Center—already 76% of the way toward its goal—will both realize the renovation of the landmark building and support City Center’s current and future programs, such as the acclaimed Encores! Great American Musicals in Concert and the immensely popular Fall for Dance festival.
The much-needed renovation will be carried out in two phases, from late April through September 2010 and from mid-March through October 2011. This schedule ensures that there will be no significant interruption over the next 18 months to the world-class programs and performances presented at City Center.
In recognition of the civic importance of City Center’s artistic contributions to the cultural life of New York, its educational outreach throughout the five boroughs and its vital place in the architectural fabric of midtown Manhattan, the City of New York has committed more than $35.6 million to the capital campaign to renovate the city-owned property, with funds coming from the Office of the Mayor through the Department of Cultural Affairs, the City Council and the Office of the Manhattan Borough President.
“With this campaign, we are ensuring that City Center can better serve its artists and audiences in the future, even as we celebrate and restore the glory of our past,” stated Arlene Shuler, President and CEO of New York City Center. “We are deeply grateful to our Board and the other supporters who have already stepped forward to make this campaign a success, beginning with the City of New York.”
“From its early stages as Manhattan’s first performing arts center to its present day as a welcoming home to so many terrific companies, New York City Center has an extraordinary track-record of embracing artists and diverse audiences,” said Cultural Affairs Commissioner Kate D. Levin. “This renovation will bring the landmark facility into the 21st century, providing amenities that contemporary audiences expect and resources that help performers do their best work.”
According to Duncan Hazard, Partner in Charge, Ennead Architects LLP, “When people step into the refreshed and reanimated City Center, we hope they will feel we’ve given them a thoroughly top-line, modern performing arts center, that remains true to their affection for this wonderful place. It is a privilege for us to be working with this gorgeously ornamented building, which simply could not be constructed today. We want it to be a pleasure for the audiences and performers to experience every aspect, old and new, of City Center.”
Renovation Highlights
Ennead Architects LLP’s design preserves the essential character of New York City Center, while beautifully restoring and dramatically enhancing the building with modern patron amenities.
The design addresses and resolves a number of functional shortcomings inherent in the original building while retaining its distinctive appeal. A new canopy on the exterior with additional exterior lighting and signage, subject to the approval of the New York City Landmarks Preservation Commission, will announce the theater’s presence more visibly on the street and define the building more dramatically within its urban context. In the interior, the original box office lobby and mezzanine lobby will be faithfully restored, and several dramatic new spaces will be introduced, including an expanded and redesigned street level lobby and a new patrons’ lounge that capitalizes on an existing alley space. The number of restroom facilities of the theater will be increased by fifty percent. Upgrades to the auditorium will include the re-sloping of the floors to improve sightlines within the house, and the reconfiguration, respacing and resizing of theater seating throughout to make it compatible with contemporary standards and to provide more comfort and improved ADA accessibility for all patrons.
The renovation respects and enhances the original theater’s much-loved Moorish-accented design motifs. In addition to the careful restoration of many of the spaces, the new design insertions have been based on a careful study of the underlying geometric motifs of Islamic architecture, reinterpreted to be complimentary but not imitative of the existing fabric. The architects’ goal is to create a vibrant new venue, with all of the conveniences and amenities that contemporary patrons expect, but one that is still “City Center,” beloved by generations of New York City theatergoers.
Back of house improvements include a new “sprung” stage floor suitable for dance, all new theatrical support systems, a completely refurbished dressing room tower and ADA accessible toilets for the performers.
History of the Building
Built in 1923 as a Moorish-style meeting hall for the Ancient Order of the Nobles of the Mystic Shrine, the former temple officially became New York City Center on December 11, 1943, with Mayor LaGuardia himself taking the baton to conduct the New York Philharmonic-Symphony Orchestra in the national anthem. Throughout the 1940s and 50s, City Center flourished as a popular, affordable alternative to the Broadway theater, the Metropolitan Opera House and Carnegie Hall. City Center was so successful in fostering the performing arts that New York City Opera, New York City Ballet and New York City Symphony were founded under its dome. A very young Leonard Bernstein conducted the New York City Symphony in low-cost, after-work concerts. Luminaries of the theater, including Paul Robeson, Orson Welles and Tallulah Bankhead, played the classics on City Center’s stage. Still-rising stars such as Bob Fosse and Walter Matthau appeared in popular revivals of Broadway musicals.
After the opening of Lincoln Center and the departure of New York City Opera and New York City Ballet, the building was under-utilized and was threatened with demolition. It was saved in the 1970s when, under the leadership of then-chairman Howard M. Squadron, the theater was dedicated as New York’s premier home for dance and given landmark status, and New York City Center was formed to manage the complex and ensure its survival as a performing arts center. By this point, however, much of the vintage architectural detail had faded or been covered up, and the functional shortcomings of a former Shriners’ hall had never been adequately addressed in converting the building into a home for dance and musical theater. The grand re-opening, in October 2011, of the modernized and restored theater will give way to a new era for the building and for New York City Center.
About New York City Center
www.NYCityCenter.org
New York City Center has played a defining role in the cultural life of the city for more than 60 years. It was Manhattan’s first performing arts center, dedicated by Mayor Fiorello LaGuardia in 1943 with a mission to make the best in music, theater and dance accessible to all audiences.
Today, City Center is home to many distinguished companies, including Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater, Paul Taylor Dance Company and Manhattan Theatre Club; a roster of renowned national and international visiting artists; and its own critically acclaimed and popular programs. The Tony-honored Encores! concert series has been hailed as “one of the very best reasons to be alive in New York.” In 2007, Encores! Summer Stars was introduced with Gypsy, starring Patti LuPone, which transferred to Broadway and garnered three Tony Awards for its lead actors. Dance has been integral to the theater’s mission from the start, and dance programs, including the annual Fall for Dance Festival and a partnership with London’s Sadler’s Wells Theatre, remain central to City Center’s identity.
The City Center performing arts complex, with its 2,753-seat mainstage, two smaller theaters, four studios and 12-story office tower, provides a nurturing environment where artists can rehearse, present their work and build audiences. City Center offers a wide array of services on behalf of the non-profit performing arts community and honors the theater’s founding mandate of accessibility with a broad range of ticket prices, starting as low as $10.
Educational programming is vital to City Center’s mission and the theater’s many initiatives for students, teachers and artists help integrate the performing arts with public school curricula. Programs include in-school and on-site student workshops in New York City public schools, special student performances, and professional development training for teachers and teaching artists, who reach more than 5,000 student participants each season. City Center also administers long-term artist residencies in public schools.
About Ennead Architects LLP
www.ennead.com
Ennead Architects LLP is an internationally acclaimed architectural firm, whose work includes new building design, planning, renovation and adaptive re-use projects, largely for not-for-profit educational, cultural, scientific, and governmental institutions. Among Polshek Partnership’s award-winning projects are: The Standard New York, The Public Theater renovation, Rose Center for Earth and Space at the American Museum of Natural History, William J. Clinton Presidential Center, Carnegie Hall renovation and expansion, Yale University Art Gallery renovation and expansion, Brooklyn Museum renovation and expansion, Holland Performing Arts Center, Weill Cornell Medical College Weill Greenberg Center. Projects in progress include Stanford University Concert Hall, Tisch School of the Arts, Utah Museum of Natural History, Vietnam Veterans Memorial Education Center, and New York City Center. Polshek Partnership is the recipient of the AIA Firm Award, the President’s Medal of the AIA/New York Chapter, and the Smithsonian Institution’s Cooper-Hewitt National Design Award. |
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NEW YORK CITY CENTER HONORS STEPHEN SONDHEIM
ON THE OCCASION OF HIS 80TH BIRTHDAY
Released February 23, 2010 |
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Len Cariou, Nathan Lane, Angela Lansbury, Alexander Hanson and Michele Pawk have joined other stars who have shone in Stephen Sondheim musicals, including Michael Cerveris, Raúl Esparza, Sutton Foster, Joanna Gleason and Donna Murphy in a gala celebration of Pulitzer Prize and Tony Award winner Stephen Sondheim on the occasion of his 80th birthday on Monday, April 26. The gala, directed by Tony Award winner John Doyle, will highlight numbers from shows for which Mr. Sondheim has written both music and lyrics, and will feature a full orchestra conducted by Encores! Music Director Rob Berman. The benefit will help fund New York City Center’s artistic and education programs. In addition, a portion of the evening’s proceeds will go to Young Playwrights Inc, a charity of great importance to Mr. Sondheim.
The birthday celebration cast (as of March 22, 2010) includes: Len Cariou, Michael Cerveris, Claybourne Elder, Raúl Esparza, Sutton Foster, Alexander Gemignani, Joanna Gleason, Alexander Hanson, Mark Jacoby, Nathan Lane, Angela Lansbury, Debra Monk, Donna Murphy, Michele Pawk, Jim Walton, B.D. Wong, Catherine Zeta-Jones and Chip Zien.
The gala will begin at 6:00 pm with cocktails at City Center, 55th Street (between 6th & 7th Aves.), followed by the show at 7:00 pm. The evening will end with a post-performance dinner at The Plaza Hotel, 5th Ave. and Central Park South. [See below for complete ticket information.] Gala co-chairs are Joanne Woodward, Bobbie and Lew Frankfort, Perry and Marty Granoff, Stacey and Eric Mindich, and Mary Jo and Ted Shen.
“I am so delighted to be invited to play some part in the celebrations for Stephen Sondheim,” said John Doyle. “City Center is taking a look back, in concert, at moments from all the shows for which Steve wrote both the words and the music. Highlights will be sung by some of Broadway’s most shining stars – all of whom either originated or revived major roles in these shows. We can never celebrate Steve enough. He has done more than any other artist to influence the development of musical theatre. This is simply City Center’s way of saying, ‘Thank You’."
As a group, the gala’s performers have appeared in over 75 Sondheim shows:
Len Cariou created the title role in the original production of Sweeney Todd, winning a Tony Award for Best Actor. He was nominated for a Tony Award for his portrayal of Fredrik in A Little Night Music, a role he repeated in the 1977 film version.
Michael Cerveris won a Tony Award for his performance as John Wilkes Booth in Assassins. Other Sondheim roles include the Broadway revival of Sweeney Todd, Road Show at the Public Theater, Passion at the Kennedy Center, A Little Night Music at Chicago Shakespeare and Sunday in the Park With George at Ravinia.
Claybourne Elder made his New York stage debut in Road Show at the Public Theater.
Raúl Esparza was nominated for the Tony Award for his performance as Bobby in the revival of Company. Other Sondheim roles include Sunday in the Park With George, Merrily We Roll Along at the Kennedy Center and Company at the Cincinnati Playhouse.
Sutton Foster will star in Anyone Can Whistle, the final Encores! production of the New York City Center 2009‑10 season.
Alexander Gemignani starred as Addison Mizner in Road Show at the Public Theater, in Assassins on Broadway, and in the Broadway revivals of Sunday in the Park With George and Sweeney Todd.
Joanna Gleason won the Tony Award for her performance as The Baker’s Wife in Into the Woods.
Alexander Hanson is currently starring as Fredrik on Broadway in A Little Night Music, a role he also played in London.
Mark Jacoby starred as Judge Turpin in the 2005 Broadway revival of Sweeney Todd. He played Fredrik in the White Plains Performing Arts Center’s production of A Little Night Music.
Nathan Lane won the Tony Award for his performance as Pseudolus in the 1998 revival of A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum and starred in The Frogs at Lincoln Center Theater. He played Addison Mizner in the workshop production of Wise Guys (subsequently retitled Road Show). He also sang a song written especially for him by Sondheim in the film The Birdcage.
Angela Lansbury is currently starring on Broadway in A Little Night Music. She made her Broadway musical debut starring in Anyone Can Whistle, and won Tony Awards for her performances in Gypsy and Sweeney Todd.
Debra Monk starred as Joanne in the Broadway revival of Company. Her other Sondheim credits include the off-Broadway production of Assassins andthe Broadway benefit Children and Art.
Donna Murphy won the Tony Award for Passion and starred as Phyllis in the Encores! production of Follies.
Michele Pawk appeared in the off-Broadway production of Merrily We Roll Along and at The Kennedy Center in Bounce (subsequently retitled Road Show). She also performed in the Broadway benefit Children and Art, and on the recording, Sondheim: The Stephen Sondheim Album.
Jim Walton starred as Franklin Shepard in the original Broadway production of Merrily We Roll Along and as Anthony in the 1989 revival of Sweeney Todd.
B.D. Wong starred in the 2004 Roundabout Theatre production of Pacific Overtures and performed in the Broadway benefit Children and Art.
Catherine Zeta-Jones is currently starring on Broadway in A Little Night Music.
Chip Zien played The Baker in the original Broadway production of Into the Woods.
John Doyle has garnered great acclaim for his fresh interpretation of Sondheim’s works. His 2004 staging of Sweeney Todd was a big hit in London and was re-mounted on Broadway, winning Tony Awards for Best Revival of a Musical and Outstanding Direction. He was nominated for a Tony Award for Outstanding Direction for his revival of Company. Most recently, Doyle directed Sondheim's Road Show at the Public Theater.
Rob Berman is entering his third season as Music Director of Encores!. Mr. Berman won a Helen Hayes Award for Best Musical Direction for his work on the Kennedy Center’s production of Sunday in the Park with George. He was also Music Director of the Sondheim revue Opening Doors at Zankel Hall.
Stephen Sondheim will celebrate his 80th birthday on March 22, 2010. Mr. Sondheim wrote the music and lyrics for Road Show (2003), Passion (1994), Assassins (1991), Into the Woods (1987), Sunday in the Park with George (1984), Merrily We Roll Along (1981), Sweeney Todd (1979), Pacific Overtures (1976), The Frogs (1974), A Little Night Music (1973), Follies (1971), Company (1970), Anyone Can Whistle (1964), and A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum (1962), as well as lyrics for West Side Story (1957), Gypsy (1959), Do I Hear A Waltz? (1965), and additional lyrics for Candide (1973). He won Tony Awards for Best Score for a Musical for Passion, Into the Woods, Sweeney Todd, A Little Night Music, Follies, and Company. Sunday in the Park with George received the 1985 Pulitzer Prize.
New York City Center (Arlene Shuler, President and CEO) has long been known and beloved by New York audiences not only as one of the City’s preeminent performing art institutions but also as an accessible and welcoming venue for dance and theater. New York City Center produces the Tony-honored Encores! musical theater series, and is home to some of the country’s leading dance companies, including Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater, American Ballet Theatre and Paul Taylor Dance Company, as well as Manhattan Theatre Club, one of New York’s leading theater companies. In 2004 New York City Center launched the acclaimed Fall for Dance Festival, continuing to fulfill its mission to make the arts accessible to the broadest possible audience. In 2006, New York City Center formed partnerships with London’s Sadler’s Wells Theatre to facilitate the exchange of innovative dance works, and with Carnegie Hall to work together on exciting new programming initiatives between the two neighboring institutions. In 2007 New York City Center introduced the Encores! Summer Stars series with the critically-acclaimed production of Gypsy¸ starring Patti LuPone, which subsequently enjoyed a successful run on Broadway, and which was followed by Damn Yankees starring Sean Hayes and Jane Krakowski and this past summer’s The Wiz starring Ashanti.
Sponsorship and tickets to the benefit are available by calling 212-763-1205. Support levels are:
Vice Chairman Table for ten: $50,000
Golden Benefactor Table for ten: $25,000
Silver Benefactor Table for ten: $15,000
Benefactor Ticket: $2,500
Patron Ticket: $1,500
Sponsor Ticket: $500
Tickets to the benefit show only are $25, $60, $85 and $250 and are available at the New York City Center Box Office (West 55th Street between 6th and 7th Avenues), through CityTix® at 212-581-1212, or online. Program and artists subject to change. |
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TWYLA THARP AND SAN FRANSISCO BALLET TO RECEIVE JEROME ROBBINS AWARD
NEW YORK CITY CENTER TO RECEIVE INAUGURAL FLORIA V. LASKY AWARD
Released July 23, 2008 |
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Twyla Tharp and San Francisco Ballet will receive The Jerome Robbins Award for excellence in the dance arts on Friday, September 26, 2008 at a ceremony at New York City Center. Each recipient will receive $100,000 from The Jerome Robbins Foundation. On the same evening, The Jerome Robbins Foundation will present the inaugural Floria V. Lasky Award, in the amount of $25,000, to New York City Center. The Awards and dinner will precede the final program of City Center’s Fall for Dance Festival, which will include a special tribute to Mr. Robbins and The Jerome Robbins Prize recipients.
“New York City Center is honored to receive the inaugural Floria V. Lasky Award and to celebrate Jerome Robbins’ legacy on our stage,” stated Arlene Shuler, City Center President & CEO. “Floria was a wonderful friend and an inspiration to so many and we feel privileged to receive this award which recognizes City Center’s long history of presenting dance and musical theater.”
Jerome Robbins, a towering figure in the dance and theater world, established The Jerome Robbins Foundation in 1970 with the intent to support dance, theater and their associative arts. Following the outbreak of AIDS, he directed the Foundation’s resources almost exclusively to addressing the AIDS crisis. Before his death in 1998, Mr. Robbins expressed his wish that the Foundation again extend its resources to the performing arts – dance and theater especially, but not exclusively – including what later developed into The Jerome Robbins Award.
In 1995, Jerome Robbins wrote to the directors of his foundation, “I would like there to be established a prize to some really greatly outstanding person or art institution. The prizes should lean toward the arts of dance and its associative collaborators but not necessarily be defined by that surround.” In explanation, he cited many callings, from teachers and designers to choreographers and presenting organizations, enjoining the directors to award the prize only when warranted by the distinction of the person, organization, or project. Past recipients of the awards, each in the amount of $100,000, have included Jennifer Tipton, New York City Ballet, The Brooklyn Academy of Music (BAM) and Mikhail Baryshnikov.
"Twyla Tharp and San Francisco Ballet under Helgi Tomasson's leadership epitomize the breadth and depth of American dance, embracing the art's rich history, building on it and moving it forward," said the Directors of the Jerome Robbins Foundation. "It is only appropriate, in this year celebrating Jerome Robbins, that Ms. Tharp and San Francisco Ballet will be the recipients of the first award statues inspired by Mr. Robbins' seminal works, Fancy Free and On the Town."
The Jerome Robbins Award
Twyla Tharp and San Francisco Ballet, 2008 Recipients
“Jerry was a very good friend for a very long time,” Ms. Tharp said. “My thanks to the Jerome Robbins Foundation for this honor in his name.”
“Throughout my professional dance career, I’ve considered Jerome Robbins my mentor, and having San Francisco Ballet awarded the Jerome Robbins Award is indeed an honor,” said San Francisco Ballet Artistic Director Helgi Tomasson. “We are very proud to receive such a prestigious award.”
Twyla Tharp has choreographed more than 125 dances, five Hollywood movies, directed and choreographed two Broadway shows, and received one Tony Award, two Emmy Awards, the 2004 National Medal of the Arts, the Astaire Award, the Drama League Award for Sustained Achievement in Musical Theater, and both the Drama Desk Award and the Outer Critics Circle Award for Outstanding Choreography, among her many honors.
San Francisco Ballet, America’s oldest professional ballet company, has a long and rich tradition of artistic “firsts” since its founding in 1933, including performing the first American productions of Swan Lake and The Nutcracker as well as the first 20th-century American Coppélia. SFB is one of the three largest ballet companies in the United States. Under the direction of Helgi Tomasson for more than two decades, the Company has achieved an international reputation as one of the preeminent ballet companies in the world. This year, SFB celebrates its 75th anniversary.
The Floria V. Lasky Award
New York City Center, Inaugural Recipient
The Floria V. Lasky Award was established this year by The Jerome Robbins Foundation in memory of their loving friend and fellow director of many years. In a legal career spanning seven decades, Floria V. Lasky, Esq., was instrumental in paving the way for numerous modern theater classics as well as representing an array of theatrical and literary talent. Her counsel and guidance were essential to numerous theatrical guilds and studios and her contributions were further enhanced in her capacity as the president of both The Jerome Robbins Foundation and The Frederick Loewe Foundation. The Floria V. Lasky Award shall be given to those that exemplify her values and have provided long outstanding service of championing the arts of theater and dance.
New York City Center has long been known and beloved by New York audiences not only as one of the city's preeminent performing arts institutions but also as an accessible and welcoming venue for dance. New York City Center is the New York home to some of the country’s leading dance companies, including Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater, American Ballet Theatre and Paul Taylor Dance Company. Continuing to fulfill its mission to make the arts accessible to the broadest possible audiences, in 2004 New York City Center launched the acclaimed Fall for Dance Festival which, for $10 a ticket, annually celebrates the vitality and creativity of dance today. In 2006, New York City Center and London’s Sadler’s Wells Theatre created a partnership to facilitate the exchange of innovative dance works and new commissions by up-and-coming and acclaimed choreographers and dance companies, both in London and in New York City. In addition to its rich dance offerings, New York City Center also produces the Tony®-honored Encores! and Encores! Summer Stars musical theater series, and is the home of Manhattan Theatre Club, one of New York City’s premier theater companies.
Mr. Robbins’ works have a long history of being performed on the New York City Center stage, with ballets such as The Guest (1949), The Cage (1951), Ballade (1952), and Afternoon of a Faun (1953) created for New York City Ballet while they were the resident ballet company at City Center; now American Ballet Theatre regularly performs Robbins’ ballets as part of their fall season at City Center. Robbins also choreographed Broadway classics The King and I and West Side Story, performed by the City Center Light Opera Company. In 2007, City Center produced the acclaimed Encores! Summer Stars production of Gypsy, which has since transferred to Broadway. The original 1959 production of Gypsy was directed and choreographed by Jerome Robbins, and the City Center production recreated Mr. Robbins’ classic choreography. In November 2008, City Center will produce another Robbins masterpiece, On the Town, as part of a city-wide Leonard Bernstein Festival.
For more information on the Fall for Dance Festival and the September 26 performance featuring a Jerome Robbins tribute, please visit www.NYCityCenter.org. |
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