PCTC produces Michigan premiere of play tackling issues of race, housing, aspirations for a better life
Peppermint Creek Theatre Company, is proud to announce the two week run of Clybourne Park, a humorous and insightful new play by Pulitzer Prize winning playwright Bruce Norris. The play was awarded the 2011 Pulitzer Prize for Drama and the 2012 Tony Award for Best Play. Clybourne Park closes PCTCs eleventh season, titled “Battlelines”.
Clybourne Park, by playwright Bruce Norris, takes its title from the white neighborhood mentioned in Lorraine Hansberry's groundbreaking 1959 drama A Raisin in the Sun, about an African-American family busting the color barrier in a white Chicago suburb. The sole white character of Raisin, Karl Lindner, has been lifted from Hansberry's play for Clybourne Park. Here, he's trying to convince white neighbors not to sell their home to a black family.The play portrays fictional events set before and after the Hansberry play and is loosely based on historical events that took place in the city of Chicago. It premiered in 2010 in New York. The Washington Post raved that the play "applies a modern twist to the issues of race and housing and aspirations for a better life."
Clybourne Park is a wickedly funny and fiercely provocative play about race, real estate and the volatile values of each, exploding in two outrageous acts set 50 years apart. Act One takes place in 1959, as nervous community leaders anxiously try to stop the sale of a home to a black family. Act Two is set in the same house in the present day, as the now predominantly African-American neighborhood battles to hold its ground in the face of gentrification. It is through this prism of property ownership that Norris' lacerating sense of humor dissects race relations and middle class hypocrisies in America.
Clybourne Park Director, Blake Bowen, spoke about what drew him to the play, “Clybourne Park, with its humorous text about racial and economic changes in a neighborhood over a 50-year period, is a genius riff on A Raisin in the Sun. I was really drawn to the many layers in which the play is tackling the issues of race, and communities, and just how far we’ve come in regard to prejudice and acceptance in 50 years. As I read the play, I was laughing one minute at the intelligent and honest ways the characters speak to each other and tackle some very prickly topics, only to be silenced by the play's tragic streaks just moments later. Bruce Norris has written a tremendous play that speaks immediately to Peppermint Creek’s mission statement to create dialogue around issues that are both current and universal.”
The production will take place at Peppermint Creek’s performance venue, the Miller Performing Arts Center, 6025 Curry Lane, South Lansing MI 48911. The show will run Thursday, May 15 - Sunday, May 18, and Thursday, May 22 – Saturday, May 24, 2014. Show times are Thursday – Saturday at 8pm, and the first Sunday at 2pm. Tickets can be ordered online at www.peppermintcreek.org, and are $15 general admission, and $10 for students/seniors 65+.
This production of “Clybourne Park” is being directed by PCTC’s Associate Artistic Director, Blake Bowen, and stars a cast of 8 veteran performers from the Greater Lansing area.
To purchase tickets, visit www.peppermintcreek.org. Follow “PCTC”on Twitter: @PeppermintCreek or on Facebook. Press photos are available on request.
Clybourne Park Peppermint Creek Theatre Company
CAST LIST
RUS/DAN - Jack Dowd
BEV/KATHY - Heather Lewis
KARL/STEVE - Joe Dickson
BETSY/LINDSEY - Shannon Bowen
JIM/TOM - Scott Laban
FRANCINE/LENA - Jenise Cook
ALBERT/KEVIN - Jerry Parker
KENNETH - Devin Faught
Peppermint Creek Theatre Company, is proud to announce the two week run of Clybourne Park, a humorous and insightful new play by Pulitzer Prize winning playwright Bruce Norris. The play was awarded the 2011 Pulitzer Prize for Drama and the 2012 Tony Award for Best Play. Clybourne Park closes PCTCs eleventh season, titled “Battlelines”.
Clybourne Park, by playwright Bruce Norris, takes its title from the white neighborhood mentioned in Lorraine Hansberry's groundbreaking 1959 drama A Raisin in the Sun, about an African-American family busting the color barrier in a white Chicago suburb. The sole white character of Raisin, Karl Lindner, has been lifted from Hansberry's play for Clybourne Park. Here, he's trying to convince white neighbors not to sell their home to a black family.The play portrays fictional events set before and after the Hansberry play and is loosely based on historical events that took place in the city of Chicago. It premiered in 2010 in New York. The Washington Post raved that the play "applies a modern twist to the issues of race and housing and aspirations for a better life."
Clybourne Park is a wickedly funny and fiercely provocative play about race, real estate and the volatile values of each, exploding in two outrageous acts set 50 years apart. Act One takes place in 1959, as nervous community leaders anxiously try to stop the sale of a home to a black family. Act Two is set in the same house in the present day, as the now predominantly African-American neighborhood battles to hold its ground in the face of gentrification. It is through this prism of property ownership that Norris' lacerating sense of humor dissects race relations and middle class hypocrisies in America.
Clybourne Park Director, Blake Bowen, spoke about what drew him to the play, “Clybourne Park, with its humorous text about racial and economic changes in a neighborhood over a 50-year period, is a genius riff on A Raisin in the Sun. I was really drawn to the many layers in which the play is tackling the issues of race, and communities, and just how far we’ve come in regard to prejudice and acceptance in 50 years. As I read the play, I was laughing one minute at the intelligent and honest ways the characters speak to each other and tackle some very prickly topics, only to be silenced by the play's tragic streaks just moments later. Bruce Norris has written a tremendous play that speaks immediately to Peppermint Creek’s mission statement to create dialogue around issues that are both current and universal.”
The production will take place at Peppermint Creek’s performance venue, the Miller Performing Arts Center, 6025 Curry Lane, South Lansing MI 48911. The show will run Thursday, May 15 - Sunday, May 18, and Thursday, May 22 – Saturday, May 24, 2014. Show times are Thursday – Saturday at 8pm, and the first Sunday at 2pm. Tickets can be ordered online at www.peppermintcreek.org, and are $15 general admission, and $10 for students/seniors 65+.
This production of “Clybourne Park” is being directed by PCTC’s Associate Artistic Director, Blake Bowen, and stars a cast of 8 veteran performers from the Greater Lansing area.
To purchase tickets, visit www.peppermintcreek.org. Follow “PCTC”on Twitter: @PeppermintCreek or on Facebook. Press photos are available on request.
Clybourne Park Peppermint Creek Theatre Company
CAST LIST
RUS/DAN - Jack Dowd
BEV/KATHY - Heather Lewis
KARL/STEVE - Joe Dickson
BETSY/LINDSEY - Shannon Bowen
JIM/TOM - Scott Laban
FRANCINE/LENA - Jenise Cook
ALBERT/KEVIN - Jerry Parker
KENNETH - Devin Faught
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