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      Head of Classic Stage Company to Depart in 2022

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      The Tony Award-winning director John Doyle will leave after six years at the theater — but not before directing two musicals.John Doyle, the artistic director of Classic Stage Company since 2016, announced on Monday that he would step down from the Off Broadway theater next summer.“I feel like it’s somebody else’s turn,” Doyle, 68, said in a video interview from Britain. “It’s as simple as that. I think art is better with a kind of turnover.”Classic Stage Company on Monday also revealed its 2021-22 season, Doyle’s last with the company. The productions include: Stephen Sondheim and John Weidman’s “Assassins”; Marcus Gardley’s “black odyssey”; Frances Ya-Chu Cowhig’s “Snow in Midsummer”; and Lynn Ahrens, Stephen Flaherty and Terrence McNally’s “A Man of No Importance.”Doyle, a Tony Award-winner in 2006 for his revival of “Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street,” will direct the musicals “Assassins” and “A Man of No Importance.”“Assassins,” which will be Classic Stage Company’s first in-person production since the start of the pandemic, was in rehearsals last year when New York theaters were closed to slow the coronavirus’s spread.Given the events of the past year and a half, Doyle said, storytellers “must be addressing the stories they tell.”“How they tell those stories, why they tell those stories, who are they for?” he said. “We have to pick up that responsibility very strongly.”Doyle has also asked of Classic Stage Company: What does it mean for a piece of theater to be a “classic” today?“It need no longer mean plays by dead, white, European men,” Doyle said. “Which is inevitably what most classical theater has been.”Two of the coming season’s works — “black odyssey,” directed by Stevie Walker-Webb, and “Snow in Midsummer,” directed by Zi Alikhan, both planned for the first half of 2022 — are by living artists of color. Both reimagine classic stories: Homer’s “The Odyssey” and Guan Hanqing’s “The Injustice to Dou Yi That Moved Heaven and Earth.”Those plays, Doyle said, are “trying to take the worldwide stories and make those available to the modern audience, in the hope and intention of bringing in new audiences into the theater.”“A Man of No Importance” resonates with Doyle. It’s a musical about a Celtic man (Doyle is Scottish) making theater for his local community (which Doyle once did).“It celebrates what theater can do, and it celebrates how theater can make change,” Doyle said. “And I’m hoping that my leaving will help to make more change. And I’m hoping that my doing a piece about how spiritual, in a way, the theater can be, in terms of how it touches our souls, is a nice way to leave.”Reflecting on his tenure, Doyle said he was especially proud of reconfiguring the physical space of the theater itself. “It really feels like a New York space to me now, not just a black box,” he said. “Plays come and go, but the space stays. And it is a truly remarkable space.”His departure is not a retirement. Doyle said that the pandemic made him realize the importance of family, self and quiet time, but that theater remains as important to him as ever. And although he would like to spend more time in the Scottish Highlands with his husband, he has no plans to leave New York any time soon.“I’m really hopeful that I could do another Broadway show or two, before I pop my clogs, as we say in Britain,” Doyle said. “I would love that.” More

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      Theater to Stream: ‘Assassins’ and ‘Romeo and Juliet’

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      Highlights include a virtual production of Adam Rapp’s “The Sound Inside” and a new reading series by Roundabout Theater Company.In March of last year, Classic Stage Company announced that its revival of the Stephen Sondheim musical “Assassins” was postponed. “The production was to begin performances on April 2,” the email said. “C.S.C. intends to resume rehearsals and present ‘Assassins’ in the coming months.”Fast forward 13 months, and the company is indeed presenting “Assassins,” or at least a stopgap event until the director, John Doyle, can fully proceed. Still, fans will enjoy “Tell the Story: Celebrating Stephen Sondheim and John Weidman’s ‘Assassins,’” a tribute to the show — which is told from the perspective of people who have tried, successfully and not, to kill an American president — featuring chats (including with Sondheim and Weidman), performances and testimonies, with actors from the 1990 premiere and the 2004 Broadway production joining the Classic Stage Company cast.This is a rare opportunity to hear, for example, three John Wilkes Booths (Victor Garber, Michael Cerveris and Steven Pasquale) talk about their craft — and killing Lincoln. Among Doyle’s most alluring casting moves: Tavi Gevinson as Lynette “Squeaky” Fromme and Judy Kuhn as Sara Jane Moore. Even the theater superfan Hillary Clinton will weigh in on the show’s impact. Thursday through Monday; classicstage.orgMaggie Bofill, left, and Ephraim Birney “The Sound Inside.”Pedro Bermudez‘The Sound Inside’A drama as suspenseful as any thriller, Adam Rapp’s brilliant two-character Broadway debut considers how fiction can be uncomfortably close and personal. TheaterWorks Hartford’s digital version was hatched by the stage director Rob Ruggiero and the filmmaker Pedro Bermúdez, with Maggie Bofill as a Yale professor of creative writing and Ephraim Birney (the son of Reed Birney) as a student both troubled and troubling. Through April 30; twhartford.orgFrom left, Jessie Buckley, Lucian Msamati and Josh O’Connor in “Romeo and Juliet.”Rob Youngson‘Romeo and Juliet’With Jessie Buckley (“Fargo”) and Josh O’Connor (“The Crown”) as the unluckiest lovers ever, the swoon factor is high in Simon Godwin’s staging of Shakespeare’s tragic romance for the National Theater. Watch also for Deborah Findlay (a Tony Award nominee for “The Children”) and Tamsin Greig, who almost hijack the show as Juliet’s nurse and mother. April 23-May 21; pbs.orgSecond ChancesAfter a prologue set in 1600, the Chilean theater collective Bonobo’s “Tú Amarás” (“You Shall Love”) jumps to a present-day medical conference, where the arrival of aliens weighs on the proceedings. The Baryshnikov Arts Center captured the play’s New York premiere in February 2020, and is now featuring it as part of the center’s digital season. April 22-29; bacnyc.orgAnother small show getting a welcome encore online is Lizzie Vieh’s dark comedy “Monsoon Season.” All for One Theater is streaming a performance filmed during the play’s 2019 run at the Rattlestick Theater in Manhattan. Danny (Richard Thieriot) and his ex-wife, Julia (Therese Plaehn), live in a world of tech-support jobs, wannabe YouTube influencers and crummy apartments. The couple are almost never onstage at the same time yet share a weird chemistry, until an even weirder finale. Through Sunday; afo.nyc‘The Norman Conquests’In 2009, a terrific British cast led by Stephen Mangan and Jessica Hynes barreled through an inspired Broadway revival of this Alan Ayckbourn trilogy, in which each play offers a different perspective on the same hectic weekend in the country. If you want another take on these farcical shenanigans, the streaming platform Acorn and Broadway HD have made available the British mini-series adaptation from 1978. It’s deliciously drenched in 1970s aesthetics — behold the brown palette — with Tom Conti in the pivotal role of Norman. acorn.tv and BroadwayHDFrom left, Florencia Lozano, Jimmy Smits and Daphne Rubin-Vega in “Two Sisters and a Piano.”via New Normal RepNew Normal RepIt takes moxie to create a theater company these days. Welcome to the emerging New Normal Rep, which is presenting Nilo Cruz’s “Two Sisters and a Piano.” In the play, which predates Cruz’s Pulitzer Prize-winning “Anna in the Tropics” by a few years, the siblings of the title are under house arrest in the Havana of 1991. The cast of this virtual production, directed by the playwright, includes Daphne Rubin-Vega, a veteran of both shows, and Jimmy Smits, who was also in “Tropics.” April 21-May 23; newnormalrep.orgThe ReFocus ProjectThe powerhouse Roundabout Theater Company is launching an initiative to help rethink what constitutes the American theatrical canon. For the first year, which focuses on 20th-century works by Black playwrights, Roundabout has partnered with Black Theater United and unearthed promising texts for readings. The first is Angelina Weld Grimké’s “Rachel,” from 1916, which is thought to be the first professionally produced play by a Black woman in the United States (April 23-26). The following week brings Samm-Art Williams’s “Home,” originally produced by the Negro Ensemble Company before transferring to Broadway in 1980. (April 30-May 3). roundabouttheatre.orgThe Gay ’80sDid the recent Russell T Davies mini-series “It’s a Sin” leave you wanting more? Two solo shows explore a similar milieu: the lives of gay men in the 1980s. Ben SantaMaria’s semi-autobiographical solo play “Really Want to Hurt Me,” captured in 2018, depicts the coming-of-age of a young gay man (portrayed by Ryan Price) in 1984 Britain. bensantamaria.comThe protagonist of “Cruise” discovers he is H.I.V. positive in 1984 and spends the following four years living life to its fullest. Written and performed by Jack Holden, who was inspired by a story he heard while working at a hotline, this play is getting a digital run before a physical one (if all goes as planned) in May. Thursday through April 25; stream.theatreRosalyn Coleman in “The Woman’s Party.”via Clubbed Thumb‘The Woman’s Party’The Clubbed Thumb company, whose discoveries include “What the Constitution Means to Me” and “Tumacho,” is serializing Rinne Groff’s play, about the battle for the Equal Rights Amendment, over three episodes released weekly. The show, directed by Tara Ahmadinejad, tracks the arguments among feminist activists as they wrangled over goals and strategy. This should be catnip to the terrific cast, which includes Alma Cuervo, Marga Gomez, Marceline Hugot and Emily Kuroda. April 22 through August; clubbedthumb.orgBen Thompson, left, and David Ricardo-Pearce in rehearsal of “The Lorax.”Manuel Harlan, via The Old Vic‘The Lorax’As part of its In Camera series (“Lungs,” “Three Kings”), the Old Vic Theater in London is bringing back its 2015 production of Dr. Seuss’s “The Lorax” for a handful of livestreamed performances that jointly celebrate the book’s 50th anniversary and Earth Day. Max Webster directs David Greig and Charlie Fink’s adaptation of the eco-minded story. “I am the Lorax,” the title character says. “I speak for the trees, for the trees have no tongues.” Wednesday through Saturday, with free performances for schools on April 22; oldvictheatre.com More