HARTFORD, CONN.: Hartford Stage has announced its 2017-18 season, featuring six productions.
“The upcoming season is entertaining and glamorous,” said artistic director Darko Tresnjak in a statement. “It is also political and provocative. It is a season strong in women’s voices; it deals with race and with censorship; and it addresses the most pressing concerns of our age.”
The season will open with Shakespeare’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream (Sept. 7-Oct. 8), a comedy that follows four impulsive and lovestruck teenagers. Tresnjak will direct.
Next up will be Sarah Gancher’s Seder (Oct. 19-Nov. 12), about a retired typist for the Hungarian KGB who visits her former workplace, now a museum devoted to Communist atrocities, and finds her photo on the museum’s Wall of Murderers. Elizabeth Williamson will direct.
The first play of 2018 will be Feeding the Dragon (Jan. 11-Feb. 4, 2018), written and performed by Sharon Washington, about her story of growing up in the custodial apartment of a Manhattan library. The coproduction with Primary Stages will be directed by Maria Mileaf.
Following will be a presentation of McCarter Theatre Center’s production of Agatha Christie’s Murder on the Orient Express (Feb. 15-March 18, 2018), adapted by Ken Ludwig from Agatha Christie. The comical thriller follows legendary detective Hercule Poirot as he solves mysteries. Emily Mann will direct.
Next will be the world premiere of The Age of Innocence (March 29-April 29, 2018), adapted by Douglas McGrath from Edith Wharton, a romance about an upstanding lawyer, his fiancée, and her free-spirited cousin. Doug Hughes will direct.
The season will conclude with Athol Fugard’s Statements After an Arrest Under the Immorality Act* (May 10-June 3, 2018), about a biracial couple secretly dating during apartheid in 1972. Tresnjak will direct.
Founded in in 1963, Hartford Stage produces innovative revivals, new plays, musicals, and offers education programs.
*A previous version of this story misspelled the title of Fugard’s play, it is Statements After an Arrest Under the Immorality Act, not Statements After an Arrest Under the Immortality Act.
