Round House Theatre Unveils Its 2013-2014 Season: ‘Round House Reinvented’ by Sarah Pressler

For Producing Artistic Director Ryan Rilette’s first full season, Round House Theatre in Bethesda has unveiled its 2013-2014 season entitled Round House Reinvented. It’s a season full of comedy, drama, and music – “two modern classics, two Broadway comedies, an Off-Broadway comedy, and an Off-Broadway musical.”

“This season reflects a new artistic vision that we hope will excite current patrons and new theatergoers,” says Rilette. “In Bethesda, we will be producing revivals of modern classics and area premieres of celebrated new plays and musicals. We’re also presenting a great slate of new plays by some of the area’s best theatre companies through our ‘In Residence’ program in Silver Spring.”

The Beauty Queen of Leenane
By Martin McDonagh
Directed by Jeremy Skidmore
August 21 – September 15, 2013

 Maureen, a lonely spinster in her forties, lives with her diabolically manipulative mother Mag in an isolated cottage in the west of Ireland. Mag whines and bullies to get her way while Maureen resentfully fulfills her mother’s every command. When Maureen is offered a last chance at love, she sees a chance to escape. But Mag has other ideas, setting in motion a chain of deceptions, secrets, and betrayals that are both heartbreaking and hilarious. With savage irony, this Tony and Drama Desk Award-winning tragicomedy by Ireland’s greatest living playwright surprises audiences through to its horrifying conclusion.

THIS
By Melissa James Gibson
Directed by Ryan Rilette
October 9 – November 3, 2013

Jane is a poet-without-a-muse, a single mother trying to reignite her life after she suddenly loses her husband. Her supportive friends try to help but only make things more complicated while a sexy, French Doctor-Without-Borders incites temptation – and perspective. This un-romantic comedy with music is a sharp, superbly crafted portrait of a group of friends as they navigate their way through parenthood, death, and adultery into the choppy waters of middle age. An Off-Broadway hit by Obie-winning playwright Melissa James Gibson, it points out with wit and searing grace the absurdities of modern life. (AREA PREMIERE).

 THE LYONS
By Nicky Silver
Directed by John Vreeke
November 27 – December 22, 2013

Indomitable matriarch Rita Lyons is at a major crossroads. Her husband is dying, her son is in a dubious relationship, and her daughter is barely holding it together. Tempers flare, words are exchanged, and secrets are revealed. Worst of all, Rita can’t figure out how to redesign her living room. Nicky Silver, that “strange progeny of a coupling between Neil Simon and Edward Albee” (New York Times), brings another of his deliciously dysfunctional families to the stage in the scathingly funny Broadway smash that earned Tony Award and Drama Desk nominations. (AREA PREMIERE).

SEMINAR
By Theresa Rebeck
Directed by Jerry Whiddon
February 5 – March 2, 2014

There’s no such thing as an “easy A” in this class! Writing turns into a contact sport in the fast, funny, and smart new comedy by Pulitzer Prize nominee Theresa Rebeck. Four aspiring young novelists sign up for private classes with Leonard, an international literary figure. Under his recklessly brilliant and unorthodox instruction, some thrive and others flounder, alliances are made and broken, sex is used as a weapon, and hearts are unmoored. They came for a class in writing but got a lesson in survival. Laughter abounds in this hit from Broadway’s most-produced female playwright. (AREA PREMIERE).

TWO TRAINS RUNNING
By August Wilson
April 2 – 27, 2014

It’s 1969 and change is in the air. But for Memphis, the owner of a rundown diner in a dying Pittsburgh neighborhood, the civil rights movement may just be an impractical dream. Torn between whether to gamble on an urban‐renewal buyout or sell his building to a predatory businessman, he finds himself caught between idealism and brutal reality. Pulitzer Prize winner August Wilson’s searing, humorous, and potent portrait of African American life in the ‘60s tells a complex story of the inner lives of ordinary people at a turning point in American history.

 ORDINARY DAYS
Music and Lyrics by Adam Gwon
Directed by Matthew Gardiner
May 28 – June 22, 2014

From one of musical theatre’s most exciting new composers comes this refreshingly honest, funny musical about making real connections in the city that never sleeps. When Deb loses her most precious possession ‑ the notes to her graduate thesis ‑ she unwittingly starts a chain of events that turns the ordinary days of four New Yorkers into something extraordinary as they search for fulfillment, happiness, love, and cabs. Told through a series of intricately connected songs and vignettes, this Off-Broadway hit is a vibrant, original musical about growing up and enjoying the view.