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San Diego REP's
33rd Season
(tickets on sale August 2008) |
The
Good Body
By Eve Ensler
Directed by
Delicia Turner Sonnenberg
September 6 - 28, 2008
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Eve Ensler could
have coined the word “provocative.” An irrepressible playwright and
social activist, she changed the landscape of dialogue about women
and their bodies with her Obie Award-winning The Vagina
Monologues. Inspired by its worldwide success, she founded
V-Day, a global movement to end violence against women and girls.
As she built the movement, Ensler traveled to more than 40 countries
interviewing women of all ages and classes — from surgical centers
in Beverly Hills, to the beaches of Brazil, the gyms of Moscow, New
York and Mumbai, and the beauty salons of Rome, Istanbul and South
Africa. With few exceptions, Ensler discovered that each woman had
one part of their body that they loathed and believed if they could
make that part ‘good,’ everything would change for the better.
Ensler’s response is her intimate tale The Good Body — told
with her rare ability to deliver profoundly illuminating commentary
with an unchained comic wit. At the center of the story is her own
quest to stop trying to be anyone other than she truly is and to
“move into herself,” be bold and love the body that was never truly
broken.
The Story
Traveling through and beyond Botox, treadmills, closet surgeries and
fat farms, Ensler exposes the naked truths from women who share
their deepest secrets, obsessions and hard won peace and celebration
of themselves — a Puerto Rican street gal who is an expert on “the
spread,” a black teenager playing hooky from a fat farm, a
too-eager-to-please wealthy Jewish housewife, an African mystic,
underground Afghani entrepreneurs in Kabul, and many more.
Extraordinary and ordinary women told Eve their inspiring stories.
The Good Body is their story woven through one woman’s global
journey from obsession to enlightenment — a personal wake-up call to
love the “good bodies” we inhabit.
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Water & Power
By Richard
Montoya
for Culture Clash
Featuring Herbert Siguenza
of Culture Clash
Directed by Sam Woodhouse
October 21 - November 16, 2008
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Culture Clash,
America’s premier Latino theatre troupe, has been called “The Marx
Brothers meet the Rolling Stones.” We call them our favorite
ensemble of actor-writers in America. They are sly and incisive
theatrical anthropologists, commentators on who we are today, in an
America that has never looked the way it does before. Trust us…
nobody writes about Californians like they do!
Ensemble leader Richard Montoya has written a truly humorous,
tough-minded and penetrating look at Southern California’s power
politics, and the Latinos and Gringos who hold our future in their
hands. Ranging from the hilarious to the chilling, this is a
gripping piece of Southern California noir fiction in the tradition
of Raymond Chandler, Walter Mosley and the film “Chinatown.” At the
center of the intrigue lives the power of brotherly love as two
brothers, flush with the temptations of new and immense influence,
attempt to save themselves from the abyss of realpolitik.
The Story
A hardworking Chicano father nicknamed his twin sons Water and
Power, underscoring the family motto: “There is no power without
water, and no water without power.” Water has become a rising star
State Senator with his eye on Washington; Power is an honored Police
Lieutenant who breaks all the rules.
It has been raining for 17 days and nights. The brothers are trapped
inside Motel Paradise on Sunset Boulevard. On the eve of an election
that could propel Water’s political career into the fast lane, Power
has ignited a life-or-death scandal that threatens to derail the
lives and dreams of each of them. The brothers, and the city, are in
trouble.
This is theatre of the moment: Montoya’s careening, buoyant
imagination bursts forth in an explosive story that is political,
social, satirical, ethnic, fearless, often moving and always
dramatic. Water & Power won the Los Angeles Theatre Critic’s
Circle and Ovation Awards for Best New Play when it premiered in
2006. REP audiences will be the first to see this award-winning work
prior to its feature film debut at the Sundance Film Festival in
2009.
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The
Princess and
the Black-Eyed Pea
Book and
Lyrics by Karole Foreman Music and Lyrics by
Andrew Chukerman
Presented by Special Arrangement
with Chris Bensinger
Directed by Stafford Arima
Recipient of the
Edgerton Foundation
New American Plays Award
November 23 - December 21, 2008
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Hans Christian
Andersen’s cherished fairy tale, The Princess and the Pea,
becomes a soulful musical comedy set in two exotic African kingdoms!
Winner of the Richard Rodgers Award for Most Promising New Musical,
and acclaimed for concert versions at Carnegie Hall, Madison Square
Garden, and the International Musical of the Year Competition finals
in Europe, this Princess is ready for its world premier.
The Story
Colorful characters rule the exotic African kingdoms of Torel and
Kheba — one a tyrannical Queen Mother, and the other a befuddled
King, whose teenaged Princess has never been outside the palace
walls. When the most feared warrior in the land vows he will force
her to be his queen, the defiant Princess climbs the walls, braves a
wild storm, and heads into the dangerous forest to seek her freedom.
Meanwhile, in Torel, a sad Prince Gallant has not yet found the
princess of his dreams. To assist, the royal couple is inviting the
finest lovelies in the land to a “choose your bride” ball. The now
ragged and starving Princess from Kheba stumbles upon the palace
gate and is rushed inside for food and shelter. Suddenly she is face
to face with the Prince — they lock eyes, sparks fly, and the
promise of true love is, yes, an ecstatic musical duet!
But will true love prevail? Certainly not before the villainous
warrior, a shameless womanizer, and a straight-from-Motown chorus do
a whole lot of messin’ around with the wannabe lovers. Messin’ that,
of course, includes the ancient test for royal blood, known only to
the women of Queen Zauba’s family… the sacred and legendary test of
The Black-Eyed Pea!
The quest for true love is the theme. Rousing gospel, funky rhythm
and blues, tropical African world beat and soaring pop ballads are
the medium. Ambitious women in search of emancipation are the
messengers. A giant party in a palace becomes a celebration of our
global culture.
With a charming sense of fun and play, this musical is a delight for
all ages!
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Doubt: A
Parable
By John
Patrick Shanley
Directed by Todd Salovey
January 10 - February 8, 2009
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Winner of The
Pulitzer Prize, a Tony and the New York Drama Critics Award for Best
Play, Doubt is one of the most lauded American dramas in
years. Playwright Shanley penned the Academy Award-winning film
“Moonstruck,” but Doubt is the triumph of his career, turning
headline material into deeply moving and gripping mystery, a quiet
indictment of the reverence for righteousness in American culture.
Some of you may have seen Doubt before, but not in the
intimate Lyceum Space, where you will sit no farther than 24 feet
from the stage to experience one of the finest plays of our time.
The Story
1964. Sister Aloysius, the fierce and regal principal of a Catholic
school in the Bronx, has a hunch that the only black student in the
school may be in danger. Father Flynn, a devout priest determined to
bring a revolutionary gust of fresh air to teaching, may be the
danger — or he may be the boy’s only friend.
Sister Aloysius marshals all her personal fervor to prove Father
Flynn is carrying on an inappropriate relationship with the student,
devoting her formidable conviction to protect the children at any
cost. The audience is invited to be judge and jury —
to deduce what is known, what is unknown, what is likely, and
finally, who is telling the truth? But what is the TRUTH?
This is the rare play you won’t stop debating about for days… where
no matter how unshakable your interpretation may be, your most
trusted confidant may very well come to a different conclusion.
According to playwright John Patrick Shanley, Doubt is a play
about “our American culture of extreme advocacy, of confrontation,
of judgment and of verdict.” Rest assured, Shanley is not a
propagandist: “I started the play thinking about black and white and
the certainty that this implies. But it wouldn’t make much sense if
there was no doubt in a play called Doubt.” The genius of
this brilliant play is that YOU render the final verdict.
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The
Threepenny Opera
Book and Lyrics
by Bertolt Brecht Music by Kurt Weill
Directed by Sam Woodhouse
February 28 - March 29, 2009
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1928. From the
moment the opening ballad of “Mack the Knife” filled the theatre,
this radical re-imagining of The Beggars Opera was an
immediate, scandalous hit, and is now universally acclaimed as a
musical theatre masterpiece of the 20th century. Bertolt Brecht, one
of the most controversial and influential revolutionaries of his
time, weaves a cunning and glorious story of love, deception and
greed run wild. Kurt Weill creates the perfect match, with a
legendary score that is jazzy, gusty and as colorful as a Berlin
cabaret — an astonishing mix of musical forms and influences. No
less than 23 instruments (ranging from ukulele to piccolo to
bassoon) come together in an eclectic score combining folk, opera,
jazz, atonal, and neoclassical styles, cabaret ballads, political
protest songs and military marches. This musical marriage forges its
own genre — the music of irony.
The Story
The devilish bandit, Mack the Knife, is in deep trouble when he
marries the irresistible Polly Peachum in a ceremony of “doubtful
legality.” Mack’s got his old army buddy, now the Chief of Police,
in his pocket. But Polly’s father, Jonathan Peachum, king of the
underworld, is determined to see Mack sent to the gallows. In the
battle for Polly and the control of their seedy Soho neighborhood,
Mack the Knife recruits prostitutes, crooked cops, thieves, a street
army of real and imposter beggars, and, of course, The Queen!
There are countless accolades for the sting and song of
Threepenny. The legendary director Harold Prince said, “Many
have tried to imitate Brecht and Weill. No one has succeeded.” Bob
Dylan said, “I was aroused straightaway by the raw intensity of the
songs.” Join us for our intimate production of one of the most
exotic and provocative classics of world theatre in the Lyceum
Space. You will have the opportunity to be enthralled, as so many
others have been, by this influential masterpiece.
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