Broadway's most talked about new musical and the biggest Tony Award-winner in years is coming to the Orange County Performing Arts Center. Spring Awakening, the eight-time Tony- Award winning Broadway show, will visit Segerstrom Hall for a two-week engagement November 17 - 29.
Spring Awakening swept the 2007 Tony Awards winning eight out of its 11 nominations, including Best Musical, Best Director (Michael Mayer), Best Book (Steven Sater), Best Choreography (Bill T. Jones), Best Orchestrations (Duncan Sheik), Best Lighting Design (Kevin Adams) and Best Featured Actor (John Gallagher, Jr.).
Hailed as the "Best Musical of the Year" by the NY Drama Critics Circle, the Drama Desk, the Outer
Critics Circle and the Tony Awards, Spring Awakening has emerged as the most talked about new
musical on Broadway. Charles Isherwood of The New York Times proclaimed, "Broadway may never be the same. This brave new musical, haunting and electrifying by turns, restores the mystery and the thrill to that shattering transformation that stirs in all of our souls." John Heilpern with The New York Observer called the show, "A miracle that must be seen to be believed...The best new musical in a generation." And Michael Sommers of The Star-Ledger said, "The most explosive new musical since RENT!"
Tickets to see Spring Awakening are $20 - $70 and go on sale September 27. They will be available at OCPAC.org, at the Center's Box Office at 600 Town Center Drive in Costa Mesa or by calling 714.556.2787. For inquiries about group ticket discounts for 15 or more, call the Group Services office at 714.755.0236. The TTY number is 714.556.2746. The 2 p.m. performance on Saturday, November 28 will be sign-language interpreted.
Cox Communications is the Media Partner of the Center's 2009-2010 Broadway Series.
Based on the infamous 1891 Frank Wedekind play, Spring Awakening features an electrifying score by Duncan Sheik, book and lyrics by Steven Sater, direction by Michael Mayer and choreography by award- winning Bill T. Jones.
Set against the backdrop of a repressive and provincial late 19th century Germany, Spring Awakening tells the timeless story of teenage self-discovery and budding sexuality as seen through the eyes of three teenagers. Haunting and provocative, Spring Awakening celebrates an unforgettable journey from youth to adulthood with a power, a poignancy and a passion you will never forget.
Set design is by Christine Jones, costume design is by Tony Award-winner Susan Hilferty, lighting design by Tony Award-winner Kevin Adams and sound design by Brian Ronan.
Spring Awakening opened on Broadway on December 10, 2006 at the Eugene O'Neill Theatre,
following its world premiere at the Atlantic Theatre Co. The original cast recording of Spring Awakening won the 2008 Grammy Award for Best Musical Show Album. Spring Awakening is produced by Ira Pittelman, Tom Hulce, Jeffrey Richards, Jerry Frankel and the Atlantic Theatre Co.
Spring Awakening contains mature themes, sexual situations and strong language.
For more information please visit springawakening.com. To join the Guilty Ones and be eligible for discount tickets, merchandise, autographed items and a chance to meet the cast go to OCPAC.org/GuiltyOnes.
Ira Pittelman won a Tony Award in 2002 for Private Lives starring Alan Rickman and Lindsay
Duncan. In that same year, he co-produced TopDog/UnderDog, which went on to win the Pulitzer Prize for Drama. His additional Broadway credits include the acclaimed revival of The Iceman Cometh starring Kevin Spacey, Neil Simon's The Dinner Party starring Henry Winkler and John Ritter, Stones In His Pockets, 45 Seconds From Broadway, Baz Luhrman's production of La Boheme and Mark Twain Tonight starring HAl Holbrook and Neil Simon's The Odd Couple starring Nathan Lane and Matthew Broderick. His Off-Broadway productions include: Our Lady of 121st Street, Border Clash with Staceyanne Chin and Loves Fire which featured new works by Wendy Wasserstein, Tony Kushner, John Guare and Marsha Norman, among others. His London credits include The Prisoner of Second Avenue starring Richard Dreyfus and Marsha Mason and Collected Stories with Helen Mirren. Pittelman has also been active in the music industry for more than thirty years as a producer and co-founder of Heartland Music. Over that period he has worked with artists as diverse as Placido Domingo, John Denver, Randy Newman, Johnny Mathis, Loretta Lynn, Tammy Wynette, George Strait, Smokey Robinson and Ringo Starr.
Tom Hulce starred in Equus and A Few Good Men (Broadway), The Normal Heart (London's West
End), and Hamlet (The Shakespeare Theater). Hulce's films include Amadeus, Dominick and Eugene, Parenthood, The Inner Circle, Animal House, Fearless, Echo Park, Slam Dance, Wings of Courage and Disney's The Hunchback of Notre Dame. He has been nominated for an Academy Award, a Tony, four Golden Globes, two Helen Hayes and an Emmy (which he won for The Heidi Chronicles). In addition to Spring Awakening, Hulce has shepherded two other major projects to fruition: the greatly acclaimed six-hour, two-evening stage adaptation of John Irving's The Cider House Rules and Talking Heads, a festival of Alan Bennett's solo plays which won six Obie Awards, a Drama Desk Award, a special Outer Critics Circle Award, and a NY Drama Critics Circle Award for Best Play. He produced the film of Michael Cunningham's A Home at the End of the World, directed by Michael Mayer and featuring a score by Duncan Sheik and two original songs by Sheik and Steven Sater, which premiered in 2004. Hulce also shepherded a new musical project by Keith Bunin and Grammy Award nominated singer-songwriter Patty Griffin at the Atlantic Theater Company.
Jeffrey Richards (Producer) Broadway: David Mamet's November; Harold Pinter's The
Homecoming; Tracy Lett's August: Osage County; Eric Bogosian's Talk Radio starring Liev Schreiber; August Wilson's Radio Golf; David Mamet's Glengarry GLen Ross (Tony Award); The Pajama Game(Tony Award) starring Harry Connick Jr.; Herman Wouk's The Caine Mutiny Court-Martial; Matthew Barber's Enchanted April; A Thousand Clowns, starring Tom Selleck; Gore Vidal's The Best Man (Outer Critics Circle and Drama Desk Award). Off-Broadway: Never the Sinner: The Leopold and Loeb Story (Outer Critics Circle Award); David Ives' Mere Mortals; The Complete Works of Shakespeare (Abridged); The Great American Trailer Park Musical; Peter Ackerman's Things You Shouldn't Say Past Midnight.
Jerry Frankel (Producer) Credits include: November; The Homecoming; August: Osage County;
Talk Radio starring Liev Schreiber; Radio Golf; Glengarry GLen Ross (winner 2005 Tony Award for Best Revival); Death of a Salesman (Tony Award); Enchanted April (winner Outer Critics Circle Award and Tony-nominated® for Best Play); Gore Vidal's The Best Man (winner Outer Critics Circle Award and Drama Desk Award for Outstanding Revival of a Play); The Caine Mutiny Court-Martial; Jekyll & Hyde; You're a Good Man, Charlie Brown (Drama Desk Award). Frankel has presented numerous productions at the Park Cities Playhouse in Dallas including Love Letters with Charlton Heston and Shakespeare for My Father with Lynn Redgrave??
