Second Stage Theater
Announces the New York Premiere of
WALDEN
By Amy Berryman
Directed by Whitney White
Previews Begin October 16th
Opening November 7th
At The Tony Kiser Theater
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Previously Announced Production of
Donald Margulies’ LUNAR ECLIPSE
Moved to Spring 2025
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August 12, 2024 – Second Stage Theater (Bennett Leak, Interim Artistic Director; Lisa Lawer Post, Executive Director) has announced that Amy Berryman’s play, WALDEN, directed by Whitney White, has been added to the Company’s upcoming season by special arrangement with Seaview and Soto Production. WALDEN will begin previews on October 16th and will officially open on November 7th at the Tony Kiser Theater (305 West 43rd street). The previously announced production of Donald Margulies’ LUNAR ECLIPSE, directed by Kate Whoriskey has been moved to spring 2025.
Second Stage’s fall season will also include the New York debut of Emmy Award-nominee Leslye Headland’s (Bachelorette, “Star Wars: The Acolyte,” “Russian Doll”) play, CULT OF LOVE, on Broadway at the Hayes Theater (240 West 44th Street), directed by Drama Desk Award-nominee Trip Cullman (2ST’s Lobby Hero, Choir Boy). This production will mark Ms. Headland’s Broadway debut.
“Heaven is under our feet as well as over our heads.” — Henry David Thoreau
Theatrical rising star and O’Neill finalist Amy Berryman brings us an “intelligent, soulful drama” (The Guardian) about how vast the space can be between two people.
In the near future, Stella and her fiancé, Bryan, are waiting at their remote cabin for Stella’s estranged twin sister, Cassie. Raised by their astronaut father to be NASA scientists, the twins have taken different paths: Cassie has just returned from a successful moon mission, while Stella has left NASA behind. When they reunite, old conflicts reignite, forcing the sisters to choose between staying on Earth or pursuing a future in space, as humanity’s fate hangs in the balance. Directed by Tony Award®️ nominee Whitney White (Jaja’s African Hair Braiding), Walden is a thrilling and engrossing new play that wrestles between the gravitational pulls of duty and desire.
Casting and full creative team for WALDEN will be announced in the coming weeks.
WALDEN received its world premiere, presented by Sonia Friedman Productions, in May 2021 on London’s West End at the Harold Pinter Theatre, followed by its American Premiere at TheatreWorks in Hartford, CT in August 2021.
Season Subscriptions are now available, 5-Play packages are $425 and 3-play packages are $295. For those 30 years of age and younger, Flip the Script 5 Play packages are $150. To purchase a subscription, please visit 2ST.com or call 212-246-4422. Subscribers receive early access to a winter festival of plays and readings by new American writers.
Second Stage Theater’s programs are made possible by public funds from the New York City Department of Cultural Affairs in partnership with the City Council, and by the New York State Council on the Arts with the support of the Office of the Governor and the New York State Legislature.
This season is sponsored by the Howard Gilman Foundation. Additional productions will be announced at a later date.
ABOUT THE CREATIVE TEAM
AMY BERRYMAN (Playwright) is a writer, actor, and teaching artist originally from Seattle by way of West Texas. Her play Walden had its world premiere on London’s West End in 2021, directed by Ian Rickson and produced by Sonia Friedman at the Harold Pinter Theatre. Walden then had its US premiere at Theaterworks Hartford directed by Mei Ann Teo (NY Times Critic’s Pick). Other plays include Alien Girls (O’Neill Finalist 2024, Center Theatre Group Writers’ Workshop Commission), God’s Flesh (MTC/Sloan Commission), The New Galileos (O’Neill Finalist 2019), Three Year Summer, The Whole of You, and Epiphany, or What Would You? (Shakespeare’s New Contemporaries Finalist). She is adapting Ben Shattuck’s book Six Walks… into a song cycle with Sam Amidon for Little Island’s 2025 summer season. Amy has a television project in development at Warner Bros and was recently awarded a MacDowell Fellowship. amy-berryman.com
WHITNEY WHITE (Director) returns to Second Stage Theater where she directed Our Dear Dead Drug Lord (New York Times Critic’s Pick) in a co-production with WP Theatre. Whitney is an Obie and Lily Award winning, as well as a Tony Award nominated director, writer and musician. She was a staff writer on Boots Riley’s I’m a Virgo and is a believer of multi-disciplinary work and collaborative processes. Recent directing: Jaja’s African Hair Braiding (Broadway), Jordans (The Public Theatre), The Secret Life of Bees (The Almeida, UK), Soft (New York Times Critic’s Pick, MCC), On Sugarland (New York Theatre Workshop), What to Send Up When it Goes Down (New York Times Critic’s Pick), The Amen Corner (Shakespeare Theatre DC), An Iliad (Long Wharf), Canyon (LA Times Critic’s Choice, IAMA), Jump (National New Play Network Rolling World Premier, PlayMakers Rep), The Spectacularly Lamentable Trial of Miz Martha Washington (Steppenwolf Theatre). Original works include: Semblance (NYTW), Definition (Bushwick Starr), and Macbeth in Stride for which she won an Elliot Norton Award for Best Musical Performance (American Repertory Theatre, Under the Radar Festival at The Public Theatre). Her four-part cycle deconstructing Shakespeare’s women is currently in development with American Repertory Theater (Boston, MA) and the Royal Shakespeare Company (UK). Whitney has developed work with: Sundance, The Roundabout, New York Theatre Workshop, The Vineyard, The New Group, Page 73, Playwrights Realm, Juilliard, Trinity Rep, NYU TISCH, Luna Stage, SUNY Purchase, Princeton University, Atlantic Theater Company Acting School, The Drama League, South Oxford, Jack, The Tank, New York Musical Festival, The Lark, and others. She also has been an Associate to: Sam Gold (Othello, New York Theatre Workshop), Daniel Sullivan (If I Forget, Roundabout), and Anne Kauffman (Marvin’s Room, Broadway). Whitney is a part of the Rolex Mentor and Protégé Arts Initiative, is a recent recipient of the Susan Stroman Directing Award, Herb Alpert Award and the Jerome Fellowship. She is an Artistic Associate at The Roundabout and an associate Artistic Director at Shakespeare DC. Past residencies and fellowships: Colt Coeur, The Drama League, the Roundabout and the 2050 Fellowship at the New York Theatre Workshop. MFA Acting: Brown University/Trinity Rep, BA: Northwestern University. Whitney will direct the upcoming Broadway production of The Last Five Years featuring Nick Jonas and Adrienne Warren.
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ABOUT SECOND STAGE THEATER
SECOND STAGE THEATER currently operates two New York City venues, exclusively dedicated to producing plays by living American playwrights.
The company’s more than 200 citations include the 2024 Tony Award for Best Revival of a Play for Branden Jacobs Jenkins’ Appropriate, as well as Best Actress in a Leading Role in a Play for Sarah Paulson and Best Lighting Design of a Play for Jane Cox; 2022 Tony Award for Best Revival of a Play for Take Me Out, as well as Best Featured Actor in a Play for Jesse Tyler Ferguson; six 2017 Tony Awards for Dear Evan Hansen (Best Musical; Best Lead Actor in a Musical, Ben Platt; Best Featured Actress in a Musical, Rachel Bay Jones; Best Book of a Musical; Best Original Score; Best Orchestrations); the 2009 Tony Awards for Best Lead Actress in a Musical (Alice Ripley, Next to Normal), Best Score (Tom Kitt and Brian Yorkey, Next to Normal), and Best Orchestrations (Tom Kitt and Michael Starobin, Next to Normal); the 2007 Tony Award for Best Actress in a Play (Julie White, The Little Dog Laughed); the 2005 Tony Award for Best Book of a Musical (Rachel Sheinkin, …Spelling Bee) and Best Featured Actor in a Musical (Dan Fogler, …Spelling Bee); the 2002 Tony Award for Best Director of a Play (Mary Zimmerman for Metamorphoses); the 2002 Lucille Lortel Award for Outstanding Body of Work, 29 Obie Awards, 11 Outer Critics Circle Awards, four Clarence Derwent Awards, 20 Drama Desk Awards, 11 Theatre World Awards, one Dorothy Louden Award, 20 Lucille Lortel Awards, the Drama Critics Circle Award and 23 AUDELCO Awards.
For more information, please visit www.2ST.com or follow Second Stage on Instagram, Facebook and TikTok: @2stnyc
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