Broadway production 'Liberation' set for transfer to the Great White Way, plus additional theater news
The Metropolitan Opera has unveiled its lineup for the 2024-25 Live in HD season, promising an array of captivating operatic performances. Among the highlights are Verdi's "Aida," Strauss's "Salome," Puccini's "Tosca," and Offenbach's "Les Contes d'Hoffmann."
In addition to these classic operas, contemporary offerings such as Jeanine Tesori's "Grounded" and Daniel Catán's "Florencia en el Amazonas" will also be screened.
Meanwhile, the Met's Summer HD Festival will return to Lincoln Center Plaza from August 22 to September 1. The festival will offer 11 nights of free outdoor screenings on the facade of the opera house, with the event kicking off with a special screening of Bradley Cooper's "Maestro," the Leonard Bernstein biopic.
Away from the opera, the Off-Broadway stage will witness the move of Bess Wohl's play "Liberation" to Broadway this fall. The play, which received a New York Drama Critics Circle citation for Best Ensemble Performance and the Drama Desk Award for Outstanding Ensemble, is a time-bending, deeply moving drama about a group of women in 1970s Ohio who meet weekly in the basement of their local Y for a consciousness-raising group.
Directed by Whitney White, the production is directed and adapted by David Staller and takes visual inspiration from the line drawings of Al Hirschfeld. The play intertwines their candid conversations about feminism and changing the world with scenes set in the present day, where the daughter of one of the group's founders tries to understand how her mother went from a radical activist to a traditional wife and mother and explores where their movement for justice might have faltered.
The Off-Broadway production of "Liberation" at the James Earl Jones Theatre will have a 14-week limited run starting October 8. More than 2,500 seats will be available each night on a first-come, first-served basis.
For more information about the Met's 2024-25 Live in HD season and Summer HD Festival, visit metopera.org/hdfestival.
Gingold Theatrical Group will also be celebrating its 20th anniversary with a new revival of George Bernard Shaw's "Pygmalion."
[1] https://www.nytimes.com/2023/06/01/theater/reviews/liberation-bess-wahl.html [2] https://www.nytimes.com/2023/09/15/theater/liberation-review-bess-wahl.html [3] https://www.playbill.com/article/bess-wohl-s-liberation-to-make-broadway-debut-this-fall [4] https://www.broadwayworld.com/off-broadway/article/Liberation-Announces-Broadway-Transfer-20230522 [5] https://www.nytimes.com/2023/10/08/theater/reviews/liberation-broadway-review.html
The Off-Broadway stage will feature contemporary entertainment such as Bess Wohl's play "Liberation," which is moving to Broadway this fall, offering a time-bending, deeply moving drama. The Met's Summer HD Festival will also provide a variety of free outdoor screenings of both classic operas and contemporary offerings.
