2024 Season Archive
Support for the 47th season was provided by the Rodgers Family Foundation, The James H. & Irene M. Hunter Charitable Trust, and the members of the Festival’s World Premiere Circle.
The Beauty Queen of Leenane
A darkly comic and unsettling Irish tale by Academy Award-Winner Martin McDonagh
JUNE 21 - JULY 6
By Martin McDonagh
Directed by Theresa Rebeck
Kristine Nielson, David Mason and Maxine Linehan in The Beauty Queen of Leenane, Directed by Theresa Rebeck. Photo by Joey Moro
Starring
KRISTINE NIELSON as Mag
MAXINE LINEHAN as Maureen
EIMHIN FITZGERALD DOHERTY as Ray
DAVID MASON as Pato
Scenic Design by CHRISTOPHER AND JUSTIN SWADER
Costume Design by FABIAN FIDEL AGUILAR
Lighting Design by MARY ELLEN STUBBINS
Sound Design by FITZ PATTON
Fight Director ROD KINTER
Wig Designer RACHEL PADULA-SHUFELT
Casting Director JUDY BOWMAN, CSA
Production Stage Manager BENJAMIN E. C. PFISTER
A 6-time Tony Award-Nominated play by Academy Award-Winning playwright, screenwriter, producer, and director, Martin McDonagh, recently known for blockbusters films like Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri (2017), and The Banshees of Inisherin (2022). Directed by Dorset’s Resident Playwright and Emmy and Pulitzer Prize Nominee Theresa Rebeck.
In this darkly comic Irish tale, 40-year-old spinster Maureen Folan is good and stuck in the house she grew up in, caring for her aging mother, Mag. Mag is a nightmare and their mutual antagonism hits a new level when Maureen's first, and possibly final, chance at love suddenly appears. Who’s most vulnerable? Who’s scheming the most? Who’s crazy? Is anyone? The laughably dysfunctional relationship of these two isolated souls in rural Ireland comes to a boiling point when the possibility of romance, or even survival, sets in motion a train of tragically funny yet heartbreaking events.
“In the telling, this play seems as clear as day. When you look back on it, it’s the shadows that you can’t stop thinking about.”
— Ben Brantley, The New York Times
Newsroom:
Native Gardens
One of America’s top 10 most produced plays hailed as “Timely, thoughtful, and hilarious”
JULY 12 - JULY 21
By KAREN ZACARIAS
Directed by TATYANA-MARIE CARLO
Orlando Javier Hernàndez, Maribel Martinez, Sally Wingert, and Tom Aulino in Native Gardens. Direected by Tatyana-Marie Carlo. Photo by Joey Moro
Starring
MARIBEL MARTINEZ as Tania Del Valle
ORLANDA JAVIER HERNÁNDEZ as Pablo Del Valle
SALLY WINGERT as Virginia Butley
TOM AULINO as Frank Butley
ARTURO PUENTES as Surveyor
JAIME JOSÉ HERNÁNDEZ as Inspector
Associate Director RACHEL ROPELLA
Scenic Design by RODRIGO ESCALANTE
Costume Design by AMANDA DOWNING-CARNEY
Lighting Design by CAROLINA ORTIZ HERRERA
Sound Design by GERMÁN MARTÍNEZ
Casting Director JUDY BOWMAN, CSA
Production Stage Manager AVERY TRUNKO
Do good fences really make good neighbors?
Cultures clash when the new neighbors' plans for a “native garden,” along with a property line disagreement, threaten the perfectly pristine posies and a chance at a Horticultural Society Award for the long-time residents next door. Things turn into an all-out border dispute and no one comes out smelling like a rose when good intentions and bad manners bloom in Karen Zacarias’s brilliant comedy.
“A true breath of comic fresh air. It’s a biting, perceptive, and ultimately hopeful sendup to our fraught relationships with those around us – even right next door.”
— DC Theatre Scene
NEWSROOM
Sidekicked
A powerful "One-Broad" comedy about the Ethel Mertz you never knew on I LOVE LUCY!
August 2 - 17
By KIM POWERS
Directed by JACKSON GAY
Kelly McAndrew in Sidekicked. Directed by Jackson Gay. Photo by Joey Moro
Starring
KELLY McANDREW as Vivian Vance
Scenic Design by RIW RAKKULCHON
Costume Design by FABIAN FIDEL AGUILAR
Lighting Design by SETH REISER
Sound Design by SINAN REFIK ZAFAR
Wig Design by RACHEL PADULA-SHUFELT
Casting Director JUDY BOWMAN, CSA
Production Stage Manager Kate Croasdale
Set on Friday night, March 2, 1960, with I LOVE LUCY star Vivian Vance in her dressing room about to hit the Hollywood soundstage as America’s most beloved neighbor for the very last time.
This one-woman tour-de-force play takes Vance through the heights of hilarity, heartbreak, and most of all, her love/hate relationship with her one and only iconic co-star, Lucille Ball. It’s about the woman we all think we knew, but whose real life couldn’t have been more unlike the unassuming, housecoat wearing Ethel, perpetual sidekick to the star.
Content Warning: This production features mild adult language
Run time: Sidekicked runs 70 minutes with no intermission
“A moving and memorable portrait of America’s favorite sidekick.”
— BroadwayWorld
NEWSROOM
True Art
Deception, champagne, and Michelangelos collide in a World Premiere comedy about the discovery of a lost masterpiece
August 23 - September 7
By JESSICA PROVENZ
Directed by MICHELLE JOYNER
Jayne Atkinson and Bob Ari in True Art. Directed by Michelle Joyner. Photo by JT Charles Erickson
Starring
BOB ARI as Buddy Silver / Auctioneer
JAYNE ATKINSON as Jodi Dean
CHARLIE REID as J.J. Winchester
FIONA ROBERSON as Lauren Sanders
Scenic Design by CHRISTOPHER AND JUSTEN SWADER
Costume Design by BARBARA BELL
Lighting Design by PATRICIA M. NICHOLS
Projection Design by JOEY MORO
Sound Design by JANE SHAW
Casting Director JUDY BOWMAN, CSA
Production Stage Manager AVERY TRUNKO
In this suspenseful World Premiere comedy, a wide-eyed art history major takes a job at a prominent museum and soon discovers that her infamously no-nonsense boss isn't the only potential shark in the pond of curators, board directors, and dealers. Now she must navigate a quick-witted game of deception, while deciphering who to trust and questioning everything she knows about art, truth, and her own ambition.
“TRUE ART is a world premiere that I am thrilled to be helming at The Dorset Theatre Festival! To me the central question in this very funny new play is a more serious one: After fighting her way to the top of her field, to what lengths will an older, powerful woman go when faced with encroaching ageism and irrelevance? Does she become the thing she fought against on her rise up? Will she reach out a hand to lift up a young woman who is at the beginning of her career journey? We’re all excited to dive into the heady world of art and provenance, commerce and perception, and office politics at the most famous museum in the country. Join us!”
— Michelle Joyner, Director
NEWSROOM
EUGENE ONEGIN: A New Bluegrass Musical - Developmental Workshop Presentation
FRIDAY, SEPT 13 - 7:00 PM
ARKELL PAVILION
SOUTHERN VERMONT ARTS CENTER
Join us for a developmental workshop presentation, sharing songs and stories from Eugene Onegin, a new bluegrass musical by Sarah Gancher directed by Jade King Carroll.
CAST:
MARIANNE RENDON as Tanya
ALEX LYDON as Eugene
PETE LANCTOT as Lensky
DIANE DAVIS as Olga
Ensemble:
MARY BACON, MELODY BERGER, MOWGLI GIANNITI, ALEX DEANE, MIKE LAVENDAR, NIKOLAI MARGULIS, MIKE SHAPIRO
Music Director GINGER DOLAN
Line Producer LARA RUSSEL
Stage Manager ALEXANDRA KOSTIS
ABOUT THE MUSICAL
Part picking party, part gossip session on the back porch, part epic love story.
Eugene Onegin by Sarah Gancher (creator of the Obie Award-winning Russian Troll Farm) is a modern bluegrass musical inspired by Pushkin's novel-in-verse and Tchaikovsky's opera, which have been reset and given new life set in 1940s rural Arkansas and then 1960s Nashville at the Grand Ole Opry. Eugene Onegin retells the story of Eugene and Tanya—one of history’s greatest tales of ‘The One Who Got Away,’ when a girl who dreams of writing songs falls for a magnetic but jaded touring musician.
MUSICIANS, JOIN US AFTER for a jam circle open to all. Bring an instrument and get in free! Feel free to call a tune or two! (Contact the box office to get your free ticket)
SATURDAY,
JULY 27, 2024
WE HAD A BLAST!
A HUGE thank you to EVERYONE who made this event possible. There’s still time to give!!! Join all the fabulous folks in attendance who helped support professional theatre in Southern Vermont by making a donation.