The PHOENIX THEATRE ANNOUNCES
2011-12 SEASON
Indianapolis –
The Phoenix Theatre of
Indianapolis proudly announces the
2011-12 season. It includes three World Premieres, two Tony Award winners, a Pulitzer Prize winner, four Midwest premieres and another entry in the ever-popular holiday variety show.
Spring Awakening
September 22-October 23, 2011
Music by Duncan Sheik, Lyrics and Book by Steven Sater
Mainstage – Midwest Premiere
Spring Awakening is a rock musical adaptation of the controversial 1891 German play of the same title by Frank Wedekind. Set in late nineteenth-century Germany, it is all about teenagers who are discovering the inner and outer tumult of sexuality. The original play was banned in Germany for a while due to its portrayal of abortion, homosexuality, rape, child abuse and suicide. In the musical, alternative rock is employed as part of the folk-infused rock score. Spring Awakening received 11 Tony Award nominations in 2007, winning eight, including Tonys for best musical, direction, book, score and featured actor. The show also won four Drama Desk Awards, while its London production won four Olivier Awards.
Jericho
October 27-November 20, 2011
By Jack Canfora
Frank and Katrina Basile Theatre – National New Play Network (NNPN) Rolling World Premiere
As we approach the 10th anniversary of 9/11, this comic drama that deals in a sharp and witty way with where we are as a nation in regard to this tragedy and more specifically the process of grief, forgiveness and healing. Beth’s husband Alec died in the World Trade Center on 9/11 and she sees and talks with him often. In fact, she sees him when she speaks with her female Korean therapist. Beth is dating for the first time since her husband was killed and through her relationship with Ethan, she meets Ethan’s brother, Josh. On the verge of divorcing, Josh’s mother Rachel is putting her life together after the death of her husband, ironically in the same tower as Alec on 9/11.
A Very Phoenix Xmas 6: Our Goose is Cooked!
December 1-December 23, 2011
By Various Artists
Phoenix Mainstage
The Phoenix Theatre continues its “tradition” of providing counter-programming to the traditions of other arts organizations, starting with all-new sketches. After receiving submissions from playwrights across the country, Fonseca will once again shape the show with the selection of sketches – mostly humorous, but some poignant – which send up the winter holidays. Add to this music and dance and you have A Very Phoenix Xmas.
Current Economic Conditions
January 12-February 12, 2012
By Don Zolidis
Frank & Katrina Basile Theatre – World Premiere
Current Economic Conditions is a charming, yet bitingly sarcastic, look at the serious social message of how skewed our society’s perceptions of our work force have become. Lily Booker is trained as a writer and has an entry-level job at a publishing company. She soon finds out that her job is being eliminated and she has the option of staying on at the company as an unpaid intern or leaving entirely. Rather than go backwards in her career, she leaves and begins a journey that will take her through various scenarios as she must move back in with her parents (at 26), contemplate graduate school, and go on one miserable failed job interview after another while her parents judge her for staying out at night at clubs.
August: Osage County
February 16-March 11, 2012
By Tracy Letts
Phoenix Mainstage – Midwest Premiere
Winner of the Pulitzer Prize and a Tony Award for Best Play, Tracy Letts’ darkly comic drama August: Osage County is set on the plains of modern day, middle-class Oklahoma. The Weston family members are all intelligent, sensitive creatures who have the uncanny ability of making each other absolutely miserable. When the patriarch of the household mysteriously vanishes, the clan gathers to simultaneously support and attack one another.
Freud’s Last Session
March 15-April 15, 2012
By Mark St. Germain
Suggested by The Question of God by Dr. Armand M. Nicholi, Jr.
Frank & Katrina Basile Theatre – Midwest Premiere
This exciting and thought-provoking drama centers on legendary psychoanalyst Dr. Sigmund Freud who invites the young, rising Oxford Don C.S. Lewis to his home in London. On the day England enters World War Two, Freud and Lewis clash about love, sex, the existence of God and the meaning of life, just weeks before Freud takes his own life. Freud’s Last Session is a deeply touching play filled with humor and exploring the minds, hearts and souls of two brilliant men addressing the greatest questions of all time.
TBA
April 19-May 13, 2012
Phoenix Mainstage
Special Presentation
May 17-May 26, 2012
Frank & Katrina Basile Theatre
We will soon be announcing details about our sixth annual bilingual play to be seen during this time slot.
Next Fall
June 7-July 8, 2012
Geoffrey Nauffts
Phoenix Mainstage – Midwest Premiere
Next Fall takes a witty and provocative look at faith, commitment and unconditional love. While the play’s central story focuses on the five-year relationship between Adam and Luke, Next Fall goes beyond a typical love story. This timely and compelling new American play forces us all to examine what it means to “believe” and what it might cost us not to.
With A Whimper
July 12-August 12, 2012
By Pete McElligott
Frank & Katrina Basile Theatre – World Premiere
Pete McElligott continues his postmodern superhero tale with the second in a trilogy that started with last season’s With A Bang.
Ticket Details: The Phoenix FlexPass
The Phoenix FlexPass will be available through October 31, 2011. A FlexPass for $100 gets a patron five vouchers that can be traded in for any combination of tickets for any of the 2011-2012 productions.
CheapSeats performances will continue on Thursdays with tickets remaining at $15 per person. Friday, Saturday, and Sunday performance tickets will be $25 for all shows. The Phoenix will continue to offer a youth rate of $15, for those individuals aged 20 and younger.
Tickets for the new season may be purchased by calling the box office at 317.635.7529 to charge by phone, and will be available to purchase online at
phoenixtheatre.org beginning August 1, 2011. All seating is general admission on a first-come, first-served basis. Performances are Thursdays at 7 pm; Fridays at 8 pm, Saturdays at 8 pm and Sundays at 2 pm, unless otherwise noted on our website. Doors open 30 minutes prior to curtain. The Phoenix Pub, located inside the theatre, offers beer, wine, soft drinks, coffee and bottled water, as well as treats. Refreshments are allowed into theater during performances.
ABOUT THE PHOENIX THEATRE
The Phoenix Theatre is
Indiana's only professional contemporary theatre, and has presented productions to challenge and entertain the
Indianapolis community for 29 years. An Equity house, the theater presents the Midwest and
Indiana premieres of many popular Broadway and Off-Broadway plays, and has presented more than 83 world premieres in its quarter century.
The Phoenix operates the 130-seat proscenium Mainstage as well as the 75-seat cabaret-style black box Frank & Katrina Basile Theatre. Both venues are housed along with administrative offices in a renovated 1907 church in downtown Indianapolis' historic Chatham Arch neighborhood, part of the Mass Ave Arts & Theatre District.
The Phoenix Theatre is a member of the National New Play Network and the League of Indianapolis Theatres. It is supported by the Indiana Arts Commission, the Arts Council of Indianapolis and the National Endowment for the Arts, as well as local corporate and foundation funders and more than 400 individual donors.
Elizabeth J. Musgrave is a syndicated columnist, travel writer, performing arts and restaurant critic. Catch her as Indy’s Arts & Entertainment Adviser on 93 WIBC, and follow her on Twitter @ejmusgrave1 and Facebook.
Gotta Go is published in the following newspapers: South Sider Voice, Indiana Weekender, New Palestine Reporter, Pendleton Times Reporter and Fortville-McCordsville Reporter.
