Montgomery County-based Perisphere Theater has announced its 2026 season: Silent Sky, by Lauren Gunderson, and I Know How To Curse: a re-blackening of shakespeare, a new one-man show written and performed by Perisphere’s co-artistic director, Gerrad Alex Taylor. Performances will be held at The Writer’s Center in Bethesda.
Submersive Productions’ Susan Stroupe directs Silent Sky, Lauren Gunderson’s moving, magical look at the true story of astronomy pioneer Henrietta Leavitt. In early twentieth-century Wisconsin, hearing-impaired mathematician Henrietta Leavitt can’t stand not knowing where she is in the universe. When she’s recruited to the Harvard Observatory to work as a human “computer” mapping the stars, she embarks on a journey to answer that question and others: how do you balance your commitment to the heavens with your obligations here on Earth? How do you make discoveries when you’re not even allowed to touch a telescope? And what role will women play, in the lab, at the ballot box, and in society? Silent Sky will run January 30-February 14, 2026, and feature Perisphere co-artistic director Lizzi Albert in the role of Henrietta.
In April, Perisphere will present the world premiere of I Know How To Curse: a re-blackening of shakespeare, a fierce and funny solo show confronting the legacy of minstrelsy in American theater. Using the structure of a minstrel show to critique the casting politics of the classical canon, the play interrogates how Black actors are seen — and unseen — onstage. A radical blend of Shakespeare, satire, and self-reflection, it reclaims space for Black artists in the roles we’re too often denied. Part manifesto, part mirror, and fully unflinching, this play is a reclamation — a re-blackening — of Shakespeare and the stages that keep rewriting the same story. Nigel Semaj directs Gerrad Alex Taylor in his solo show debut. I Know How To Curse will run April 3-25, 2026.
About Perisphere Theater: Founded in 2015 by Heather Benjamin, Perisphere Theater produces plays that examine personal and collective history and the notion of history itself. Perisphere strives for a theater experience that gives audiences a greater appreciation of history and of those who are often left out of its retelling. In 2023, the Washington Post included Perisphere on its list of small companies worth bookmarking as a “thought-provoking company.”
