Philly Theatre Week Returns With Hundreds Of Performances

PHILADELPHIA — Philly Theatre Week is coming back after a year of dark stages with 11 days, 64 organizations, 72 events, and hundreds of performances.

Philly Theater Week will be held from April 22 to May 2. Events will include a variety of live and pre-recorded virtual performances, panels, workshops, theater-by-mail, audio plays and in-person outdoor events.

All tickets for participating shows are specially priced to be accessible to all, with tickets being free, $15, or $30 each. Philly Theatre Week tickets are on sale now here.

For its fourth outing, Philly Theatre Week will have an entirely new audience.

Participating organizations include a range of professional theaters, academic institutions, community theaters, self-producing artists and small-budget companies.

Theaters range in size from large regional companies like Philadelphia Theatre Company, The Arden and The Wilma, to small and up-and-coming theaters like The Hum'n'bards Theater Troupe, Kaleidoscope Cultural Arts Collective and Wings of Paper.

Originating companies hail from every corner of Philadelphia, from Center City to the suburbs, from Chester County to Wilmington, and from South Jersey to the Main Line.

While the website for Philly Theatre Week has a full rundown of organizations, events and performances, below are a few highlights:

Philly Theatre Week Opening Night Celebration — 6 p.m., Thursday, April 22 (live virtual event; pay what you can)

Join the theatre community for a Philly Theatre Week kick-off celebration. Toast to the beginning of the fourth annual Philly Theatre Week and see previews from participating theatre companies.

Laurel Tree TheaterA Doll’s House 20/20 — April 22 to May 2 (pre recorded theater event; $30)

Ibsen's classic adapted to 2020. Nora Helmer has a beautiful life and a dreadful secret: She’s $300,000 in debt, possibly going to jail and being blackmailed by one of her husband’s subordinates. On top of it all, she’s quarantined alone at home where her only human interaction comes from friends who drop by on Bubble Chat throughout the day. As Nora’s story unfolds, so do the lives of the people around her: COVID19, desperation, unemployment and power struggles interweave over Bubble a Zoom-like environment created specifically for this independently funded film which brings Henrik Ibsen’s Victorian masterpiece to lockdown.

Inis Nua Theatre Company, How To Be Brave — April 22 to April 25 (pre-recorded theater event, pay what you can)

Single-parent Katie is having a terrible morning: her mom is yelling, her daughter is bleeding, and the smoke alarm just went off. Overwhelmed, Katie runs out the door and on a wild ride through Newport, Wales. Featuring a stolen BMX bike, a quick dip in the River Usk, and an impromptu public dance number, How To Be Brave is an uplifting reminder of how our hometowns shape who we are.

Theatre Exile, Zoo Motel — April 22-May 2 (live virtual event; pay what you can)

Theatre Exile invites you to check into ZOO MOTEL, devised by director, designer, and performer and Philadelphia Fringe Festival favorite Thaddeus Phillips in 2020 as a quarantine experiment that offers a window into what’s possible for live performance — a world where audiences from around the globe can share a mind-bending adventure in the comfort of their own home. Broadcast live and online from one room in a South American village, ZOO MOTEL takes audiences on a journey to Spain, Japan, the Mojave Desert, and around the world alongside fellow motel guests in a family friendly performance that showcases how connected we are even in a digital world.

InterAct Theatre Company, The Niceties - A Virtual Presentation — April 22 to May 2 pre-recorded theater event, free)

A "blisteringly smart" (Boston Globe) drama in which Zoe, a brilliant Black college student, and her white history professor Janine square off over the role slavery played in the American Revolution. Heightened by protests and a social media frenzy, their taut and timely debate careens out of control and threatens to derail their careers and their lives. Directed by Kathryn MacMillan. Starring Angela Bey & Janis Dardaris. Audiences register in advance and receive the streaming link on April 22nd. Register after April 22nd, and you'll receive the link directly from InterAct Theatre Company within 24 hours!

Mallbodies, A Performative Elegy to the American Shopping Mall — April 22 to May 2 (audio performance; pay what you can)

Shopping malls hold a strong place in American culture as well as personal culture. Mallbodies, is a soundwalk performance dedicated to - and in critique of - our experience and memory of the American shopping mall. This project is designed to be listened to by individual audience members using headphones while exploring a shopping mall of their choosing. Mallbodies explores the origins of the shopping mall, our attraction to it, our histories within it, and how malls could function today and into the future. Mallbodies is performed for an audience of one (or do it with a friend!) as they stream the series of tracks on a playlist on the Mallbodies website: www.mallbodies.biz.

Hella Fresh Theater, Frauenschlläechterei — April 22 to May 2 (theater by mail)

A German lawyer attempts to make Brigette Helm an American movie star in 1933 Hollywood. A play told in mailed installments sent to you in the mail culminating in a performance in your home.

People’s Light, Spiritual Uprising — April 22 to May 2 (pre-recorded theater event; $15)

Zonya Love (Lights Out: Nat "King" Cole, Broadway’s The Color Purple) brings her forthcoming collection of reimagined Negro Spirituals to the People’s Light stage in this filmed concert event. The nationally acclaimed actor-musician leads a full band through evocative new renditions of songs like “My Way’s Cloudy” and “Swing Low, Sweet Chariot” while illustrating the music’s deep cultural and historical significance.

Philadelphia Young Playwrights, Pandemic! — April 22 to May 2 (audio performance; pay what you can)

Pandemic! By: Katie Lu. Directed by: Cat Ramierez. A professional production of a first-place winning play. From the Playwright: "Pandemic is a politically charged piece that explores racism, both externalized and internalized, through the eyes of two starkly different generations--the 1930s and modern day 2020. It portrays how racism exists today in subtlest ways that are easily missed but also in violent, hateful ways like that of a hundred years ago. It also sheds important light on the Chinese Exclusion Act, an often overlooked part of our history that is not taught in schools, and draws a parallel between those acts and the rise of anti-Asian-American sentiment with the COVID-19 crisis. However, in such a bleak story, I see my play as a sense of hope. The younger generations are turning over the world and sparking change."

The Phoenix Theatre, The Second Annual Surprise Birthday Party for William Shakespeare — 7 p.m to 9 p.m. April 23 (live virtual theater; pay what you can)

Don’t tell Shakespeare, but we’re throwing him another surprise birthday party! This year the bard is turning 457 so we’re all getting together again to perform some more of his work! It'll be a night of scenes, monologues, songs, sonnets, and of course...CAKE!

See the full schedule of events for Philly Theater Week here.