1st Stage Tysons has announced its thirteenth season, opening in September 2020.
September 10 – October 11, 2020
Mlima’s Tale
by Lynn Nottage
directed by José Carrasquillo
Pulitzer Prize Winner and MacArthur Genius Grant Winner Lynn Nottage gives us the story of Mlima, an elderly “big tusker” elephant from a protected reserve in Kenya. When Mlima is poached for his glorious ivory tusks, those tusks begin a journey across the world, introducing us to a string of characters, each with their own goals and struggles surrounding the ivory trade. In every scene, Mlima’s own magnificent presence hovers in the background, lending the weight of his history to this beautiful story.
“…achieved and sustained with such artful and ingenious simplicity…”
-The New York Times
December 3, 2020 – January 3, 2021
The Rainmaker
by N. Richard Nash
directed by Deidra LaWan Starnes
This beloved, romantic classic follows the Curry family as they love each other in the midst of the Great Depression. Lizzie, the only daughter, is deeply self-conscious about her approaching spinsterhood, while her father and brothers go to sometimes ridiculous lengths to find her a husband who will see the beauty that she doesn’t see in herself. It takes the arrival of Starbuck, a con man promising to bring back the rain, to make Lizzie and her family start believing in their dreams.
“Admirable skill […] [and] insight into the human heart […] The touch of a poet […] A hit you must see.”
– New York Daily Mirror
February 4 – 28, 2021
The Phlebotomist
by Ella Road
directed by Alex Levy
In a sci-fi-inspired future where genomics are the norm, every person gets assigned a “rating” at birth based on their genetic map. Bea, a phlebotomist, finds herself being pulled deeper and deeper into the dark side of the genetic testing underworld even as she falls in love with Aaron, a man she met by accident who has a near-perfect rating that far exceeds her own. Ella Road’s The Phlebotomist was nominated for a Laurence Olivier Award for Outstanding Achievement, and had a sold-out run at the UK’s Hampstead Theater in 2018.
“…a racy dystopian thriller that is part Black Mirror and part Brave New World.”
-The Guardian
April 1 – 25, 2021
The Nance
by Douglas Carter Beane
directed by Nick Olcott
This witty, Tony Award-nominated play, filled with music, dance, and comedy sketches, introduces us to Chauncey Miles, a gay burlesque performer at the Irving Place Theater. Chauncey specializes in playing the stock character of “the nance,” an extremely effeminate, blatantly homosexual staple of the 1930s stage. As New York’s Mayor LaGuardia cracks down on any kind of deviant or scandalous behavior onstage, Chauncey and the cast of the Irving Place Theater have to decide what they are willing to stand up for.
“Beane’s funny but bittersweet portrait of a vanished era contains just enough warning about the guardians of “morality” who are always waiting in the wings to make ‘The Nance’ timely as well as nostalgic.”
The Chicago Tribune
May 20 – June 13, 2021
The Last Match
by Anna Ziegler
directed by Alex Levy
A tension-fraught tennis match between Tim, the reigning champion, and Sergei, a talented younger challenger, quickly evolves into a memoryscape as each competitor reflects on their lives, their families, their motivations, and what they’ve sacrificed for the sake of “the game.”
“The routine back-and-forth of a hard-fought match…approaches the ineffable radiance of one of those moments that tennis fans live for. Time seems to stop in such moments, even as it extends into eternity.”
-The New York Times
1st Stage, recently named “One of America’s most impressive smaller regional companies” by The Wall Street Journal, will also bring back its popular Logan Festival of Solo Performance from July 15-25, 2021.
