Announcing Beowulf Alley Theatre's
Provocative 2011-2012 Season of Plays
Beowulf Alley Theatre, at 11 South 6th Avenue, announces an entertaining, thought-provoking and challenging Main Stage Season of five plays for its seventh exciting year in Downtown Tucson.
Rough Crossing
by Oscar and Tony Award-winning Tom Stoppard
from an original play by Ferenc Molnar
Directed by Dave Sewell
September 8—October 2, 2011
Aboard the Italian Castle bound for New York are a quirky assemblage of show business egos, led by the writing team of Turai and Gal. Turai’s impossible mission: to somehow maneuver his partner, Gal, their neurotic composer, and two fading stars into cobbling together the next Broadway smash hit: The Cruise of the Dodo. His only prayer for success may well depend on the cabin steward with the unpronounceable name. Stoppard’s adaptation is no less than a retro-romp on the high seas!
“...(Stoppard) weaves an increasingly amazing pattern of verbal misunderstandings, eccentric character development, showbiz spectacle, and seagoing hazards, all of which come to occupy equal importance in the plot.” --London Times
Lear
by William Shakespeare
Adapted and Directed by Michael Fenlason
October 27—November 20, 2011
Lear’s decision to divide his kingdom among his three daughters ignites a firestorm of greed, betrayal, and murder. Cast out as patriarch, upended by pride and anger, Lear walks into the night with a madman and a fool. One of the greatest plays in world literature, Shakespeare’s tragedy strips away the trappings of society to reveal the unforgiving truth about the human condition: love and deceit, power and poverty, good and evil. This play’s special understanding of old age explains in part why this most devastating of Shakespeare’s tragedies is also perhaps the most moving. Considered to be the ultimate Shakespearean tragedy, we bring you this contemporary adaptation of a classic work.
We Won’t Pay! We Won’t Pay!
Adapted from 1997 Nobel Prize-winner, Dario Fo’s Can’t Pay! Won’t Pay!
Translated by Ron Jenkins
Directed by Susan Arnold
January 26-February 19, 2012
Dario Fo, one of Italy’s foremost playwrights, is a rarity-a Marxist with a sense of humor. This hilarious farce, a success Off-Broadway and across the U.S., is set in motion when a housewife comes home with groceries she has swiped as part of a spontaneous community action where 300 women did the same. In her effort to keep her secret from her husband, she hides some of the groceries under her best friend’s raincoat. Her husband and his friend, the accomplice’s husband, notice the bulge, of course, but they believe the explanation that the accomplice is pregnant! Hilarity is piled upon hilarity as the characters try to extricate themselves from the mess they have gotten into. Eventually, they all unite to support the spontaneous resistance to eviction in their housing project. This translation was prepared in consultation with Dario Fo and Franca Rhame in 1999 for its premiere at the American Repertory Theatre in Cambridge, MA.
The work of a social reformer with a fractured funny bone . . . Mr. Fo’s manic farce should be obligatory viewing for anyone battling, i.e., succumbing to, the high cost of living.” – The New York Times
Radium Girls
by D.W. Gregory
Directed by Sheldon Metz
March 15-April 8, 2012
In 1926, radium was a miracle cure, Madame Curie an international celebrity, and luminous watches the latest rage—until the girls who painted them began to fall ill with a mysterious disease. Inspired by a true story, Radium Girls traces the efforts of Grace Fryer, a dial painter, as she fights for her day in court. Her chief adversary is her former employer, Arthur Roeder, an idealistic man who cannot bring himself to believe that the same element that shrinks tumors could have anything to do with the terrifying rash of illnesses among his employees. As the case goes on, however, Grace finds herself battling not just with the U.S. Radium Corporation, but with her own family and friends, who fear that her campaign for justice will backfire. This story changed laws in the country regarding protection of employees. Written with warmth and humor, Radium Girls is a fast-moving, highly theatrical ensemble piece. Nine actors portray more than 30 parts— friends, co-workers, lovers, relatives, attorneys, scientists, consumer advocates, and myriad interested bystanders. Radium Girls offers a “powerful” and “engrossing” theatrical experience, as well as, a wry, unflinching look at the peculiarly American obsessions with health, wealth, and the commercialization of science.
“a playwright with a talent to enlighten and provoke”
Sins of the Mother
by Israel Horovitz
Directed by Vince Flynn
May 3-27, 2012
Douggie returns to Gloucester after a long absence, wanting to learn more about his dead mother. He encounters a group of out-of-work stevedores whose knowledge of his mother’s past is as detailed as his is sketchy. As the past is dredged up, the depths of wounds it left are exposed and retribution is exacted. A powerful and compelling drama about revenge, forgiveness, and the comically human struggle to decipher which is which. This play contains strong language.
BEST NEW PLAY – The Independent Reviewers of New England Awards 2009
2011-2012 Season Subscriptions are on sale now by phone at (520) 882-0555 or on our website at www.beowulfalley.org. Subscribers who purchase their subscriptions by April 23, 2011 will receive one or two FREE tickets per subscription, depending on the type of subscription purchased, to be used for a regularly scheduled main stage performance in the season.
A sixth special event will be offered for the holiday season. 2011-2012 subscribers may purchase tickets at their single ticket price beginning September 1st. General public tickets will go on sale October 1st.
:
A Cactus Christmas
by John Vornholt
Directed by TBA
December 9—23, 2011
In the ghost town of Wishbone, AZ stands a run-down saloon called the Yellow Dog, a dusty, run-down place that hasn't been used for anything in a century or so. Two desert rats, Alice and Pete, have taken up residence in early October in the old saloon, declaring squatter’s rights. They’re searching for The Treasure Trove of the Lost Turk that Pete believes is in the old mine on the property. Visitors from the East Coast arrive quite unexpectedly. This is dad Jeffery’s year to pick the family vacation and he’s looking for a tour of ghost towns. The rest of the family members like the resort life. Pete drums up a plan to take advantage of the Easterners’ good fortune but somehow that darned ghost keeps interfering.
This original script has been written for Beowulf Alley as a family-friendly tale for the holiday season by Tucson’s own John Vornholt. Performances are limited but will be an entertaining evening for your out of town guests, too!
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2011-2012 Season Subscriptions
Full Season 5-plays: $80.00
Flex Pass (4 your way): $72.00
Sunday Senior 60+ , Student, Military (ID required): $60.00
