Theater News

A New Work By Peter Brook Joins Theatre for a New Audience's Season

The legendary British director contributes a U.S. premiere to the Brooklyn-based theater.

Two-time Tony Award-winning director Peter Brook will open Theatre for a New Audience's coming season with the U.S. premiere of his new work, The Valley of Astonishment.
Two-time Tony Award-winning director Peter Brook will open Theatre for a New Audience's coming season with the U.S. premiere of his new work, The Valley of Astonishment.

Theatre for a New Audience has announced its lineup of productions set for its second season at Polonsky Shakespeare Center, the company's new permanent home.

The season will open with the U.S. premiere of the internationally acclaimed The Valley of Astonishment, a new work conceived and directed by Peter Brook and Marie-Hélène Estienne. The cast features Kathryn Hunter, Marcello Magni, and Jared McNeill. Performances will begin September 14 in advance of a September 18 opening and will run through October 5.

The first major New York production in 58 years of Christopher Marlowe's Tamburlaine, Parts I and II will follow, starring Drama Desk Award winner John Douglas Thompson (Satchmo at the Waldorf). The production has been edited to 3.5 hours plus a 30-minute intermission and is directed by Michael Boyd, former artistic director of the Royal Shakespeare Company. Performances will run from November 1-December 21, with an official November 16 opening.

The season will conclude with the New York premiere of Fiasco Theater's production of Shakespeare's The Two Gentlemen of Verona, directed by Jessie Austrian and Ben Steinfeld. Originally produced by Folger Theatre in Washington, D.C., performances will run at the Polonsky Shakespeare Center from April 24-May 24, 2015.

Theatre for a New Audience's inaugural season opened with Julie Taymor's imaginative production of Shakespeare's A Midsummer Night's Dream, followed by King Lear, starring Michael Pennington, and closed with Eugène Ionesco's The Killer, featuring a new translation by Pulitzer Prize finalist and TheaterMania contributing writer Michael Feingold.