LCT3'S "ON THE LEVEE" OPENS TONIGHT, 6/28
Published 2010-06-28
Lincoln Center Theater (under the direction of Andre Bishop, Artistic Director and Bernard Gersten, Executive Producer) has announced that Amari Cheatom, Brian D. Coats, Chuck Cooper, Maria Couch, Harriett D. Foy, Dion Graham, April Matthis, Jacob Ming-Trent, Seth Numrich, Stephen Plunkett, Michael Siberry and Shelley Thomas will be featured in its upcoming LCT3 world premiere Off Broadway production of ON THE LEVEE, an Off Broadway play with music, conceived and directed by Lear deBessonet, with play by Marcus Gardley, and music and lyrics by Todd Almond. The production will be presented at The Duke on 42nd Street, a New 42nd Street® project (229 West 42 Street) beginning Monday, June 14, through Saturday, July 10. Opening night is Monday, June 28 at 6:45pm. LCT3 is Lincoln Center Theater's programming initiative devoted to producing the work of new artists and developing new audiences. Paige Evans is the Director of LCT3.
ON THE LEVEE tells the story of two fathers and sons - a white cotton farmer (Michael Siberry) and his poet son (Sam Numrich), and an African-American bootblack (Dion Graham) and his offspring (Amari Cheatom) - inspired by the Great Flood of 1927 in Greenville, Mississippi when 5000 black laborers were left stranded on a levee.
ON THE LEVEE has sets by Peter Ksander, costumes by Emily Rebholz, lighting by Justin Townsend, sound by Leon Rothenberg and projections by Austin Switser. Acclaimed visual artist Kara Walker will be creating new art for the production.
Conceiver-Director Lear deBessonet's productions include a site-specific Don Quixote in collaboration with playwright Lucy Thurber in Philadelphia, Brecht's Saint Joan of the Stockyards at PS 122, transfigures (Women's Project) and productions at the HERE Arts Center, NY Fringe and NYU's Experimental Theatre Wing. Marcus Gardley (play) is a playwright-poet who received the 2008 Helen Merrill Award for Emerging Playwright and the prestigious 2007 Kesselring Honoree Award. His plays include Love is a Dream House in Lorin (Shotgun Players, Berkeley, CA.), dance of the holy ghost (Yale Rep), (L)imitations of Life (Empty Space Theatre) and like sun fallin' in the mouth (National Black Theatre Festival). Todd Almond (music and lyrics) is a composer, lyricist and performer whose musicals include People Like Us (NY Musical Theatre Festival), Girlfriend (Berkeley Rep), Ahraihsak (Theatre Mitu) and the upcoming We Have Always Lived In The Castle (Yale Rep). His songs have been performed by such theatre performers as Victoria Clark, Cheyenne Jackson, Jayne Houdyshell, Laura Benanti and Stephen Pasquale.
This world premiere of ON THE LEVEE will be the final production in Lincoln Center Theater's 25th Anniversary year during which it produced a season of entirely new work. In addition to ON THE LEVEE, LCT is currently presenting the LCT3 New York premiere of Graceland, a new play by Ellen Fairey, directed by Henry Wishcamper, May 3 through May 29, at The Duke on 42nd Street and the world premiere of A.R. Gurney's The Grand Manner, directed by Mark Lamos, beginning Wednesday, June 2 at the Mitzi E. Newhouse Theater, and the Tony Award winning production of Rodgers & Hammerstein's South Pacific, directed by Bartlett Sher, which will end its record-breaking run at the Vivian Beaumont Theater on Sunday, August 22.
ON THE LEVEE will be performed Off Broadway at The Duke on 42nd Street Monday through Saturday evenings at 8pm, with Wednesday and Saturday matinees at 2pm. Tickets, priced at $20, are available at The Duke on 42nd Street Box Office or online here.
Amari Cheatom; Off-Broadway: Book of Grace (Public Theater), Zooman and the Sign (Signature Theatre). TV: Numb3rs.
Brian D. Coats Off-Broadway: Merry Wives of Windsor and Two Gentlemen of Verona (NYSF at the Delacorte), and productions at HERE, Theatre for the New City and The Culture Project. TV: Law & Order, How To Make It in America, The Sopranos, Jag. Film: Friendship.
Chuck Cooper; Broadway: Finian's Rainbow, Lennon, Caroline or Change, Chicago, The Life (Tony Award). Off Broadway: Marco Polo Sings a Solo, Avenue X, Police Boys. TV/Film: Gossip Girl, Nurse Jackie, Law & Order, Without a Trace, Third Watch, Oz, American Gangster, Evening, Noise.
Maria Couch; New York theater: Wallenberg, A Time to be Born, Unlock'd, Iron Curtain, Happy Anniversary. National tours: Phantom, Annie, Music of Andrew Lloyd Webber.
Harriett D. Foy; Broadway: The American Plan, Mamma Mia!, Once On This Island. Off-Broadway: Crowns, Lone Star Love. National Tours and Regional Theater: The Women of Brewster Place (Helen Hayes Award nomination), After the War (ACT), Dance of the Holy Ghost (Yale Rep), Seven Guitars (Center Stage). TV: Rescue Me, Law & Order.
Dion Graham; Broadway: Not About Nightingales. Off Broadway: 10 Things to Do Before I Die, Lobby Hero, Elliot Loves, A View of the Dome. Regional: productions at The Old Globe, Williamstown Theatre Festival, Center Stage, Cincinnati Playhouse. . TV: Gossip Girl, The Wire, Third Watch, Law & Order: SVU, Homicide, NYPD Blue.
April Matthis, Off Broadway: LEAR (Soho Rep), The Sound & the Fury (ERS/NYTW), Dead City, Anna Bella Eema (New Georges). Regional: Rust (Magic, San Francisco), San Culottes in the Promised Land (Actors, Louisville), Home (NC Stage), Venus (SVT, Austin).
Jacob Ming-Trent; Broadway: Shrek, The Musical. Regional: Continental Divide (La Jolla Playhouse, Berkeley Rep, Barbican/London) and productions at ACT in San Francisco, Pittsburgh Musical Theatre and Vermont Shakespeare Co. Film/TV: Law & Order: C.I., The Unexpected, The Crime.
Seth Numrich; Off-Broadway: Blind and Slipping (Rattlestick Theatre), Gates of Gold, Too Much Memory, Iphigenia 2.0. Regional credits include: The History Boys (Ahmanson Theatre/LA), Summer and Smoke (Guthrie Theater). TV: Gravity. Film: How To Kill A Mockingbird.
Stephen Plunkett; Off-Broadway: The Orphan's Home Cycle, Finding Neverland, This Beautiful City, Gone Missing, The Horton Foote Project. TV: Mercy, Law & Order:C.I.. Film: Baader Meinhof.
Michael Siberry; LCT: When the Rain Stops Falling, The Frogs. Broadway: Spamalot, The Sound of Music, Nicholas Nickleby. Many productions with England's RSC including: Richard III, Macbeth, The Taming of the Shrew, All's Well That Ends Well, As You Like It. Film and TV: If Looks Could Kill, Victoria & Albert, Beast, Sherlock Holmes, Noble House.
Shelley Thomas; Broadway: Brooklyn, The Musical; Rent. Off-Broadway: Zanna, Don't. TV: Immaculate Conception (Lifetime).
Click for tickets and more information about ON THE LEVEE
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