Caroline, or Change
Sept 11-Oct 19

Radio Macbeth
Nov 6-Dec 7

The Wild Duck
Jan 15-Feb 15

Wait Until Dark
Mar 5-Apr 5

The Piano Lesson
May 7-June 7

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The 2008/09 Season

CAROLINE, OR CHANGE
Chicago Premiere Musical
Book & Lyrics by Tony Kushner
Music by Jeanine Tesori
Directed by Artistic Director Charles Newell
September 11, 2008 – October 19, 2008

The coins that 8-year-old Noah carelessly leaves behind in his pockets are more than just spare change to Caroline Thibodeax, an African American housekeeper working in a stifling basement laundry room in Louisiana in 1963. Blending blues, gospel, and traditional Jewish melodies in a breathtaking score, this deeply personal story from Pulitzer Prize-winner Tony Kushner (Angels in America) is drawn from the playwright’s own childhood. The vast social change taking place in 1960s America is the perfect backdrop for a powerful story that the New York Times proclaimed “an extraordinary new musical.”  Chicago’s own E. Faye Butler will perform the title role.

RADIO MACBETH
Shakespeare's Haunting Classic
Created and Performed by SITI Company
Co-Directed by Anne Bogart and Darron L. West
November 6 - December 7, 2008

Late at night in the guts of an abandoned theater, a company of actors gathers to rehearse Shakespeare’s Macbeth.  They soon realize that they’re not alone.  As they are drawn deeper into the Bard’s most magnetic play, the ghosts that have haunted the story since its inception hover and encroach.  History, ambition, fortune, fate, free will, hubris, pride, indecision, the eternal male-female conflict, and madness permeate SITI Company’s production, hailed by Variety as “a swift and bracing take that connects to the spellbinding force of this bullet of a play.”

THE WILD DUCK
World Premiere Translation
By Henrik Ibsen
Translated by Richard Nelson
Directed by Artistic Director Charles Newell
Produced at The Museum of Contemporary Art
January 15, 2009 – February 15, 2009

The peaceful lives of the Ekdal family are turned upside down by an idealistic young family friend. Can the truth liberate two families bound together by a web of secrets? Or will it destroy their delicate hold on happiness? One of the giants of modern theatre, Ibsen created a masterpiece that pairs profound tragedy with surprising comedy. Court Theatre is pleased to return to the beautiful performance space at the Museum of Contemporary Art in the heart of downtown Chicago at 220 E. Chicago Ave. The Wild Duck is the inaugural project of the Barbara E. Franke Commisssioning Program for New Classics, Court’s initiative to create new adaptations and translations of classic texts for the stage.

WAIT UNTIL DARK
By Frederick Knott
Directed by Ron OJ Parson
March 5, 2009 – April 5, 2009

A cool-as-ice psychopath smooth talks his way into the home of an unsuspecting blind woman. Unbeknownst to Susie, she’s harboring a dangerous prize, and he’ll use every trick to get it. Spend an evening on the edge of your seat with the genre Hitchcock made classic. This psychological thriller probes which frightens us more—the evil you can see coming, or the one you can’t? Ron OJ Parson’s Artistic Residency is made possible through a grant from The Joyce Foundation.

THE PIANO LESSON
By August Wilson
Directed by Ron OJ Parson
May 7, 2009 – June 7, 2009

Master playwright August Wilson’s Pulitzer Prize-winning play is the 1930s entry in his monumental 20th Century play cycle.  A rich family history with origins in slavery is carved into the wood of the piano that could be Boy Willie’s ticket to self-sufficiency or Berniece’s legacy to her daughter.  The Piano Lesson is the story of two siblings’ struggle to come to terms with their inheritance and the ghosts of their dead.  Jeff Award-winning director Ron OJ Parson (The First Breeze of Summer, Fences) explores Wilson’s poetic text and richly complex characters. 

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