2013-14 Season

First we celebrated the life of Patsy Cline. Last December, Frank Sinatra was honored in all his glory. Now, to open our sixth season, we honor another music legend, “The Man in Black”, Johnny Cash. Climaxing in a concert that will both move and exhilarate, RING OF FIRE features a slick combination of gifted singers and musicians that will have this joint jumpin’ like Folsom Prison! Featuring all of Johnny Cash’s greatest hits, make sure you “Walk the Line” to RING OF FIRE this fall!

Fresh off the heels of our highly successful season opener, RING OF FIRE, Farmers Alley Theatre switches gears and brings it first play to the stage this 2013-14 season with the dramatic work, COLLECTED STORIES, running November 1^st through the 17^th.  Written by Pulitzer Prize winning playwright Donald Margulies, COLLECTED STORIES is a morality play of sorts that asks: Is it ethical to use someone else’s real life for your own artistic gain? Ruth Steiner is a professor and well respected short story author.  Over the course of six years her protégé, Lisa Morrison, journeys from insecure student to successful writer.  As the years pass their friendship develops into a bitter rivalry, concluding in a tension-filled, explosive climax.  Filled with electric performances and elegiac poetry, COLLECTED STORIES is like a great book that you just can’t put down.

Winner of the 2011 Pulitzer Prize for Drama and the 2012 Tony Award for Best Play, CLYBOURNE PARK takes up residence this February at Farmers Alley Theatre. Told in two acts, in the same Chicago house 50 years apart, this timely new play begins in 1959 with a white family selling their home to a black family: the first to move into the neighborhood. 50 years later, a white couple looks to buy the same house in what has now become an all-black neighborhood. Filled with surprising humor and raw emotion, CLYBOURNE PARK is one theatrical experience that is sure to be that genuine piece of art that moves its audiences and starts conversations.

Presented in collaboration with the Irving S. Gilmore International Keyboard Festival, Farmers Alley Theatre is proud to present the haunting and musical play, OLD WICKED SONGS. In 1986 Vienna, a young Jewish pianist has come to study. But before he begins his piano instruction, he must first take singing lessons from the harsh, anti-semitic Professor Mashkan. As the play unfolds through the poetry of Heinrich Heine and the music of Robert Schumann, secrets are revealed, and these two men from different generations find they have much more in common than they think. OLD WICKED SONGS will run this April and May throughout the duration of the Gilmore Festival.

This June, one of the defining shows in musical theatre history comes to Farmers Alley Theatre. A perfect fit for our intimate space, CABARET is a dark and gritty look at the rise of Nazi power in 1931 Berlin, set against the teaming nightlife of The Kit Kat Klub. As powerful today as when it first opened on Broadway in 1966, CABARET contains some of the most famous characters and songs of the last 50 years including “Wilkommen”, “Maybe This Time”, and “Tomorrow Belongs to Me”. Welcome to the CABARET this summer at Farmers Alley!

Our final show of the season is [title of show], and yes, that is the title of the show! A fresh, innovative, and hilarious look at contemporary Broadway, this hip new musical follows the dreams of Hunter, Jeff, Heidi, & Susan, four friends who are looking to create the next big thing on the Great White Way. On this creative journey, they battle writers block by arguing with a piece of paper, overcome their insecurities by slaying vampires, and discover that if you have perseverance, imagination, and great friends, you can accomplish anything. [title of show] is a zany, offbeat, and heartwarming musical unlike anything you’ve ever seen.