LONG WHARF THEATRE 2008-2009 SEASON

Hughie
By Eugene O'Neill
October 8 to November 9 on Stage II

Erie Smith, a small-time gambler, wanders home to a seedy New York hotel fresh from a grief-stricken bout of drinking: Hughie, night clerk and once-captive audience for Erie’s tall tales, has died.

Will Erie find in Hughie’s replacement the affirmation and friendship he craves? One loner seeks solace in another in Eugene O’Neill’s snapshot of two souls on a city’s margins.

Brian Dennehy, leading American stage and screen actor (Death of A Salesman, Long Day's Journey Into Night on Broadway), will star in this play about coming to grips with the past.

“When true greatness comes our way in the theatre, we have to pause and try to find the words to express it properly.” – The Toronto Star [on Brian Dennehy in Hughie at the Stratford Shakespeare Festival].

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A Civil War Christmas
By Paula Vogel
Directed by Tina Landau
November 26 through December 21 on the Mainstage
WORLD PREMIERE

It’s 1864, and Washington, D.C. settles down to the coldest Christmas Eve in years - in the White House, where President and Mrs. Lincoln plot their gift-giving; on the banks of the Potomac, where a young rebel challenges a Union blacksmith’s mercy; and in the alleys downtown, where an escaped slave loses her daughter just before finding freedom.

This new musical by Pulitzer Prize-winner Paula Vogel intertwines many lives showing us that the gladness of one’s heart is the best gift of all.

“Ms. Vogel has a gift for sustaining humor and pathos at the same time, without trivializing either emotion.” - The New York Times

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Coming Home
By Athol Fugard
Directed by Gordon Edelstein
January 14 through February 8, 2009 on the Mainstage
WORLD PREMIERE

Athol Fugard, inarguably one of the most important living playwrights working in the English language today, is premiering his newest play Coming Home at Long Wharf Theatre.

Veronica Jonkers left her beloved grandfather's farm to pursue her dream of a singing career in Cape Town. Carrying a painful secret and a heart filled with disappointment, she returns after his death and strives to plant the seeds of a new life for her young son.

In this stunning world premiere, master playwright Athol Fugard, hailed by Time magazine as "the greatest active playwright in the English-speaking world," finds hope in human relationships and the power of the imagination.

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Scarborough
By Fiona Evans
Directed by Eric Ting
February 18 through March 22, 2009, on Stage II
AMERICAN PREMIERE

In a faded hotel room in a coastal town, a young couple share an illicit weekend. Beneath the peeling wallpaper, they laugh, quarrel, and make love, but they don't dare go out.

In this startlingly charged romance played out with humor, compassion, and poignancy, one is just a boy on the verge of 16 - the other, his 29-year-old teacher. A hit at the 2007 Edinburgh Festival Fringe and at London’s Royal Court Theatre, this award-winning play makes its American premiere.

“Not only does the pathos rocket, you can feel the audience’s concentration as we watch difference in gender politics made superbly visible.” – Variety

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The Old Man and The Sea
By Ernest Hemingway
Adapted and Directed by Eric Ting
April 1 through April 26 on the Mainstage
WORLD PREMIERE

In this illuminating adaptation of Hemingway’s classic novella, a young boy recounts the tale of an old Cuban fisherman’s 85-day struggle to land the greatest catch of his life.

Armed with little more than a few coils of fishing line, the old man comes to respect and love his adversary even as he confronts his own mortality in this sublime tale of man against the elements, of courage and faith, and of the enduring human spirit.

“Mr. Ting creates memorable stage pictures, deploying his actors in tableaus that approach but do not tip over into stylized expression” – The New York Times

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The Glass Menagerie
By Tennessee Williams
Directed by Gordon Edelstein
May 13 to June 7 on the Mainstage

Laura, a timid girl living in a world of delicate cut glass animals, has her quiet life shattered when her mother, Amanda, encourages a meeting with a gentleman caller.

Stage and screen actress Judith Ivey stars in this seminal American play about one family’s desperate need to hold onto their illusions.

“There are no sure things in theatre, but when Gordon Edelstein decides to stage a classic American play, attention must be paid” – Connecticut Post

Titles subject to change.