CHAPEL HILL, N.C.: PlayMakers Repertory Company has announced its 2015–16 season, which will include six plays (including a new adaptation of Three Sisters) as well as Stephen Sondheim’s Sweeney Todd. This will be the final season programmed by outgoing artistic director Joseph Haj, who recently accepted a new job as artistic director of the Guthrie Theater in Minneapolis.
Kicking off the season will be Uncle Ho to Uncle Sam (Aug. 26–30, 2015), a one-man-show written and performed by Trieu Tran, about his experience growing up in America following the end of the Vietnam War. Tran first performed the show at A Contemporary Theatre in Seattle in 2012.
Following will be Ayad Akhtar’s Pulitzer-winning Disgraced (Sept. 16–Oct. 4, 2015), about a contentious dinner party between a Pakistani-American lawyer, his Caucasian wife and their friends.
Next is Dear Elizabeth (Oct. 14–Nov. 1, 2015), Sarah Ruhl’s intimate drama about the 30-year-long relationship between Elizabeth Bishop and Robert Lowell. The theatre will also program a holiday show (Nov. 18–Dec. 12, 2015), for which it is currently negotiating the rights.
Another one-person show will open the new year, with Highway 47 (Jan. 6–10), written and performed by KJ Sanchez, a true story set in her hometown in New Mexico, about the 15-year legal feud over the land that her family has lived on since 1734. Sanchez first performed the piece at HERE Arts Center in New York City in 2013.
That same month, PlayMakers will also premiere Libby Appel’s new adaption of Chekhov’s Three Sisters (Jan. 20–Feb. 7, 2016). Appel previously directed Christopher Durang’s Chekhov takeoff Vanya and Sonia and Masha and Spike at the theatre.
Next will be Jackie Sibblies Drury’s metatheatrical We Are Proud to Present a Presentation About the Herero of Namibia, Formerly Known as South West Africa, From the German Südwestafrika, Between the Years 1884-1915 (Feb. 24–March 13, 2016). The play follows a group of actors who are trying to devise a theatre piece about the effects of colonialism.
Closing out the season will be Sweeney Todd (March 30–April 23, 2016), the macabre musical about the notorious London barber and his helpmate.
