A season pass for City Repertory Theatre is $165. Book here. For a preview of “Jesus Christ Superstar,” opening tonight, go here..
When City Repertory Theatre opens in 14th season on tonight with “Jesus Christ Superstar,” patrons will be greeted by a newly renovated venue space at CRT’s black box theater in Palm Coast’s City Marketplace. The new seating risers and new paint, says founding director John Sbordone, are courtesy of a $69,000 gift bequeathed to City Rep by the Palm Coast Arts Foundation when that non-profit folded in June and needed to empty its coffers.
“The first thing, although it had been in the works beforehand, was to get new risers to make it safer in the theater,” Sbordone says. “And we were able to get professional painters in and strip the theater and have it completely repainted and the lobby repainted. We’re using the funds first of all to improve the audience experience.”
Here’s a look at City Repertory Theatre’s 2024-2025 season. Performances will be in CRT’s black box theater at City Marketplace, 160 Cypress Point Parkway, Suite B207, Palm Coast. Shows are at 7:30 p.m. Fridays and Saturdays, and 3 p.m. Sundays. Note: “The Country Girl,” a staged reading, also will be presented at 7:30 p.m. Thursday Dec. 5.
Individual tickets are $30 adults and $15 students for “Jesus Christ Superstar” and “Violet,” and $25 adults and $15 students for “Jake’s Women,” “The Country Girl,” “Topdog/Underdog,” “The Niceties” and “A Midsummer Night’s Dream.”
Season tickets are $165. Individual show tickets and season subscriptions are available online at crtpalmcoast.com or by calling 386-585-9415. Tickets also will be available at the venue just before curtain time.
Dates in the list below are the opening and final performance of each production.
* “Jesus Christ Superstar” – Sept. 13-29. The 1971 rock opera, with music by Andrew Lloyd Webber and lyrics by Tim Rice, was based on the biblical account of the betrayal, trial and crucifixion of Christ. City Rep is staging an all-female version, a concert whose roots go back to 2017.
* “Jake’s Women” – Nov. 1-17. Neil Simon’s 1992 comedy-drama follows Jake, a successful novelist whose rocky marriage to Maggie sends him into a tailspin and finds him in conversations – both real and imaginary – with his deceased wife Julie, his daughter Molly, his sister Karen and his psychiatrist Edith.
* “The Country Girl” – Dec. 5-8. This 1950 drama by Clifford Odets portrays Frank Elgin, an aging, struggling, boozing actor, his gamely supportive younger wife, and a theater director who is offering Frank one last chance at regaining his on-stage glory days.
* “Topdog/Underdog” – Jan. 17-26, 2025. This 2001 dark comedy by Suzan-Lori Parks made her the first African-American woman to win the Pulitzer Prize for drama. It’s the tale of two Black brothers, named Lincoln and Booth by their jokester father. Lincoln dons whiteface for his job as an Abraham Lincoln impersonator, while Booth earns his income by shoplifting, although both brothers have a predilection for three-card monte grifting. Matters of sibling rivalry, broken romances, a dysfunctional family, race, fate, history and violence surface as the brothers make their way in life.
* “The Niceties” – Feb. 20-23. This 2018 drama by Eleanor Burgess explores race, white privilege, history and power as Zoe, a Black student at a liberal arts college, is called into her white professor’s office to discuss her paper about slavery and the American Revolution . . . Yes, tempers and tension soon escalate.
* “Violet” – March 21-30. This 1997 musical, with music by Jeanine Tesori and libretto by Brian Crawley, was based on the short story “The Ugliest Pilgrim” by Doris Betts. Set in 1964, it’s the story of Violet, who is traveling by bus from North Carolina to Tulsa, Okla., to have her face, disfigured in an accident, healed by a televangelist.
The play won the New York Drama Critics’ Circle Award for Best Musical for its Off-Broadway production, and was nominated in 2014 for numerous Tony Awards for its 2014 Broadway production.
* “A Midsummer Night’s Dream” – April 25-May 4. Area theater director and actor Bethany Stillion is adapting Shakespeare’s timeless comedy for City Rep’s black box space and a cast of only six performers. The Bard’s play revolves around a royal marriage, the romantic entanglements of four young Athenians, and a troupe of amateur actors – even as Oberon the King of the Fairies, Titania the Queen of the Fairies, and their mischievous sprite-servant Puck meddle in the affairs of these humans.
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