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AMERICAN SON BY CHRISTOPHER DEMOS-BROWN
TO RECEIVE THE 2016 LAURENTS / HATCHER FOUNDATION AWARD
AMERICAN SON WILL OPEN
BARRINGTON STAGE’S 2016 MAINSTAGE SEASON
PREVIEWS BEGIN JUNE 17, 2016
OPENING NIGHT IS SET FOR JUNE 22, 2016
(Pittsfield, MA – January 25, 2016) Barrington Stage Company (BSC), the award-winning theatre in Downtown Pittsfield, MA, under the leadership of Artistic Director Julianne Boyd and Managing Director Tristan Wilson, is proud to announce that the Laurents/Hatcher Foundation has selected AMERICAN SON by Christopher Demos-Brown as one of the recipients of the of the Laurents/Hatcher Foundation Award. BSC will receive $50,000 towards the production expenses of the premiere work, with Demos-Brown receiving $25,000.
AMERICAN SON will share the honor with DRY POWDER by Sarah Burgess.
BSC Artistic Director Julianne Boyd said of the award, “We are honored to be kicking off Barrington Stage’s 2016 Mainstage season with Christopher Demos-Brown’s AMERICAN SON, a play that examines our nation’s racial divide as seen through the eyes of an estranged, biracial couple.”
Directed by Julianne Boyd, AMERICAN SON was commissioned by Roz and Charles Stuzin. AMERICAN SON begins previews on June 17 and officially opens on June 22, running through July 9.
When a recently estranged biracial couple is called into a police station after their son’s car is found, their differing views on parenting boil to the surface. This timely and thought-provoking new play tackles issues of race, bias, and culture in present-day America.
Demos-Brown’s credits include Fear Up Harsh, which, among others, received a Steinberg Award Citation from the American Theatre Critics Association. His other credits include Captiva, Our Lady of Allapattah, and When The Sun Shone Brighter which received the 2011 Carbonell Award for Best New Work and the 2010 Silver Palm Award for Outstanding New Work. In 2010 Chris and his wife co-founded Zoetic Stage, an award-winning theatre in residence at Miami-Dade County Adrienne Arsht Center for the Performing Arts in Miami, Florida.
In addition to American Son, the 2016 season at BSC will include the world premieres of two new musicals – Jonathan Larson Award winning composer Joe Iconis’s Broadway Bounty Hunter starring Annie Golden, and Presto Change-O, directed by Marc Bruni of Broadway’s Beautiful The Carole King Musical. The Tony Award winning director John Rando and Emmy Award winning choreographer Joshua Bergasse, the team behind the acclaimed and Tony Award nominated Broadway revival of ON THE TOWN, will reunite to stage Gilbert & Sullivan’s The Pirates of Penzance.
2016 will also bring to BSC Kimberly Akimbo by Pulitzer Prize winner David Lindsay-Abaire, the acclaimed Drama Desk Award winning play Tribes by Nina Raine, and Mark St. Germain’s Camping with Henry and Tom, the recipient of both the Outer Critics Circle Award and the Lucille Lortel Award.
Tickets for American Son and the entire 2016 BSC season go on sale March 1st.
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ABOUT BARRINGTON STAGE COMPANY
Barrington Stage Company, a professional award-winning Equity regional theatre located in the heart of the Berkshires, in Pittsfield, MA, was co-founded in 1995 by Artistic Director Julianne Boyd. Barrington Stage’s mission is three-fold: to present top-notch, compelling work; to develop new plays and musicals; and to find fresh, bold ways to bringing new audiences into the theatre—especially young people. Barrington Stage garnered national attention in 2004 when it premiered William Finn and Rachel Sheinkin’s musical hit The 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee, which later transferred to Broadway, where it won two Tony Awards. In 2009/2010 Barrington Stage produced the world premiere of Mark St. Germain’s Freud’s Last Session, which later moved Off-Broadway and played for two years. St. Germain’s Becoming Dr. Ruth (which premiered at BSC as Dr. Ruth, All the Way in 2012) played Off-Broadway at the Westside Theatre in fall 2013. BSC’s all-time record-breaking musical, On the Town, originally presented in 2013, opened on Broadway in 2014 with BSC as a co-producer, where it was nominated for four Tony Awards including Best Musical Revival. Barrington Stage was voted “Best Live Theatre” by The Berkshire Eagle readers in 2011 and 2012 and was named “Best Theatre Company” in Metroland’s Best of the Capital Region 2009-2012.
THE LAURENTS / HATCHER FOUNDATION AWARD
Established in 2010, The LAURENTS / HATCHER FOUNDATION AWARD is an annual prize to be given for an un-produced, full-length play by an emerging American playwright. In addition to being one of the country’s largest grants for new work, The Laurents / Hatcher Foundation Award is the first major award for playwriting to be named in honor of a gay couple: Tony Award winning playwright and director ARTHUR LAURENTS and his partner of 52 years, TOM HATCHER.
ARTHUR LAURENTS and TOM HATCHER
Arthur Laurents’ career as a writer for the stage and screen spanned over 65 years, beginning with his play The Home of the Brave, which premiered on Broadway in 1945. Known for having written the books for musicals such as Gypsy and West Side Story as well as the screenplays for The Way We Were, The Turning Point and Alfred Hitchcock’s Rope, Mr. Laurents premiered many of his most recent plays at New Jersey’s George Street Playhouse. His final memoir, The Rest of the Story, was posthumously published in the fall of 2012.
Tom Hatcher, who died in October 2006, began his career as an actor but moved into real estate as a contractor and then as a developer. He created the private park adjoining the house in Quogue, Long Island that was home for the couple.
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