lippanew200ACAA8704-A153-F8DD-D100646F90DC8127

 

 

 

 

 

 

Drama Desk and Obie Award-winning Keen Company today announced that their 2014 – ’15 season will begin with the first major New York revival of Lee Blessing’s A Walk In The Woods starring Kathleen Chalfant and Paul Niebanck, directed by Keen Artistic Director Jonathan Silverstein. It will be followed in the spring by a rare revival of John & Jen, the musical with music by Andrew Lippa, lyrics by Tom Greenwald, and a book by Lippa and Greenwald.

A Walk in the Woods, Lee Blessing’s Pulitzer Prize nominated drama, is a revealing debate on the hope and ultimate futility of high-stakes politics. Two super power arms negotiators— one a cynical Russian veteran and the other an idealistic American newcomer — meet informally in the woods after long, frustrating hours at the bargaining table. A Walk in the Woods is a surprisingly humorous and timely story of the politics that divide us and the humanity that unites us. Mr. Blessing’s play is a fictionalized account of the meeting between Paul Nitze and Yuli Kvitsinsky, who took a ”walk in the woods” during the 1982 Geneva peace talks and came up with their own deal, which was later turned down by the United States and the Soviet Union. A Walk in the Woods was also nominated for the Tony Award for Best Play. Performances for this limited Off-Broadway engagement of A Walk In The Woods at The Clurman Theatre at Theatre Row (410 West 42nd Street, between 9th and 10th Avenues) will begin Tuesday, September 9th and continue through October 18th only, with opening night set for September 30th.

John & Jen, also directed by Jonathan Silverstein, an earlier work from Lippa & Greenwald, will begin performances February 10th, with Opening Night set for March 3rd. John & Jen has music by Andrew Lippa, lyrics by Tom Greenwald, and a book by Lippa and Greenwald. In a changing America between 1950 and 1990, John & Jen is a musical about brothers and sisters and parents and children. It tells the story of Jen and her relationships with the two Johns of her life: her younger brother, and his namesake, her son who is trying to find his way in a confusing world. Performances at The Clurman Theatre at Theatre Row (410 West 42nd Street, between 9th and 10th Avenues) will be Tuesday through Thursday evenings at 7pm; Fridays at 8pm; Saturdays at 2pm & 8pm; and Sunday matinees at 3pm.

Telecharge.com or call 212/239-6200. For subscriptions, call the Subscriber Hotline at 212/560-2185.

For more information, visit www.keencompany.org