Past Shows
Reminiscing about a favorite show? Trying to remember a name, a date, a face, an image? It's all here. Below you can find a production archive for all our past shows, including cast and crew lists, photos, notes from directors, posters, and more. This archive is in reverse chronological order, so if you're looking for a long-ago show, just scroll down. Recent productions are at the top. Read on to find out all about Live Arts's rich production history.
Playwrights Lab presents Summer Shorts
Last show: Sun Aug 1, 2:00 pm
The Playwrights Lab is a group of writers who gather twice a month at Live Arts to read their works in progress and give each other encouragement and constructive feedback. Here they present a selection of monologues and short plays -- all brand new and never produced before!
13: The Musical
Last show: Sun Aug 8, 2:00 pm
When his parents get divorced, and he''s forced to move from New York to a small town in Indiana, Evan Goldman just wants to make friends and survive the school year. Easier said than done. Tony Award-winner Jason Robert Brown's 13 is a hilarious, high-energy musical for all ages about discovering that cool is where you find it, and sometimes where you least expect it.
Cry of the Mountain
Last show: Fri Jul 23, 8:00 pm
This summer, Whole Theatre presents a new play: Cry of the Mountain. A one woman documentary play about Mountaintop Removal in Appalachia, conceived and performed by Adelind Horan. One performer, thirteen characters. Funny, intimate, simple, bold.
Dallas Wesley and the Lost Highway
Last show: Tue Jun 15, 8:00 pm
You loved Hank Williams: Lost Highway -- now join the old gang again for more foot-stompin', hand-clappin', soulful country tunes! Dallas Wesley returns to Live Arts for a one-night-only concert event. And all the Drifting Cowboys are along for the ride!
Les Liaisons Dangereuses
Last show: Sat Jun 19, 8:00 pm
May 28 - June 19
Nasty business seldom comes wrapped in such a refined package. The exquisite language, interiors, and clothes of 18th century French society are layered over the basest of human instincts in this classic black comedy (or comic tragedy?) of seduction, betrayal, and lust.
Henry IV, Parts 1 & 2
Last show: Sat May 22, 8:00 pm
Now Playing! April 23 - May 22
Infinite riches in a tiny room; an epic in a teacup. This production of one of Shakespeare's most magnificent stories will be fast, furious, no frills fun.
Spontaneous Generation presents THE TEMPEST
Last show: Sun Mar 28, 2:00 pm
Come see the first performance of an awesome and completely unique new workshop at Live Arts. SPONTANEOUS GENERATION is a group of adventurous young artists with passion and energy and bravery making theater that's in the moment and in your face.
Hank Williams: Lost Highway
Last show: Sun Apr 11, 2:00 pm
This spectacular musical biography tells the story of legendary singer/songwriter Hank Williams, from his success and celebrity to his tragic self-destruction at age 29.
Mother Hicks (LATTE)
Last show: Sun Mar 7, 2:00 pm
Live Arts teens tackle Susan L. Zeder's imaginative play, which uses poetry, music, sign language, and movement to weave a delicate web of lives both young and old, both difficult and strangely magical.
Twenty-Four Seven
Last show: Sat Feb 13, 10:00 pm
24/7. 7 world premiere plays. Written overnight. Rehearsed all day. Performed once for you... Maybe twice.
Intimate Apparel
Last show: Sat Feb 6, 8:00 pm
January 15 - February 6
This big-hearted play follows Esther, an African-American seamstress living in turn of the (last) century New York, as she looks for love and home.
Gypsy
Last show: Sun Oct 25, 2:00 pm
October 2-25
From the team that brought Sweeney Todd to Live Arts comes a new spin on the ultimate backstage musical.
Glengarry Glen Ross
Last show: Sat Oct 10, 8:00 pm
September 18-October 10
Always. Be. Closing. Fast-talking, foul-mouthed greed takes the stage in this 25th anniversary production of David Mamet's Pulitzer prize-winning modern masterpiece.
Footloose (July 10-August 2, 2009)
Last show: Sun Aug 2, 2:00 pm
Audiences cut loose when the swinging, singing, Tony-nominated musical hit Live Arts. Featuring an Oscar-nominated score brimming with hits -- from the unforgettable title song to the classic 80s tunes "Holding on for a Hero," "Let’s Hear It for the Boy," "Heaven Help Me," and "Almost Paradise" -- Footloose gets your feet tapping to the rhythm of summer fun.
The Garden, an Original NPP Production (July 29-August 1, 2009)
Last show: Sat Aug 1, 8:00 pm
Playwright Peter Gunter and director Ray Nedzel premiere Gunter's play The Garden, a story of love, sex, growing up, and growing apart on the UVa grounds. Developed through work with the New Plays Project.
Eurydice, June 5-27, 2009
Last show: Sat Jun 27, 8:00 pm
Sarah Ruhl's elegant meditation on love and loss. Mourning becomes electric as you "find yourself taken to heights of emotion that theater too rarely achieves" (NY Times). A startlingly original new voice in the American theater takes on the oldest themes with poetry, potency and unforgettable poignancy.
Tartuffe, May 1-23, 2009
Last show: Sat May 23, 8:00 pm
What’s one to do, when ‘neath one’s roof, lives pious schemer, name of Tartuffe? The Lord’s his pal, he deals in Truth; but he’s not what he seems. Forsooth! This rotten bounder, a real rank cad, has got a scheme and it’s too bad. Will he win out? One way to know; Come see this Frenchy, frothy show!
The Matchmaker, March 6-April 4, 2009
Last show: Sat Apr 4, 8:00 pm
Shenanigans, fancy hats, and pudding are just a few of the fads and fashions back in style as Dolly Levi takes it all in hand. A day out in old New York spins merrily out of control, but by the time everyone reaches the Harmonia Gardens Restaurant it’s Game! Set! Match!
Visit to a Small Planet (LATTE), February 6-22, 2009
Last show: Sun Feb 22, 2:00 pm
Based on his widely-acclaimed television comedy of the same name, Gore Vidal's "Visit to a Small Planet" scored a clean sweep of the critics when it premiered on Broadway. This Live Arts LATTE production featured teen performers and technicians.
Sweeney Todd, December 12, 2008-January 12, 2009
Last show: Sat Jan 10, 8:00 pm
It’s not about the meat pies; passion, vengeance, betrayal and lust are the real raw ingredients of the epic thriller. Attend the tale of Benjamin Barker, tonsorialist extraordinaire and serial singer!
Flyin’ West, October 24-November 22, 2008
Last show: Sat Nov 22, 8:00 pm
The tropes and trials of the Old West are given fresh currency when seen through the eyes of African-American women, fleeing racism and the wreckage of Reconstruction. They find big sky and bigger dreams on the prairie, but all they’ve won hangs in the balance as a scoundrel schemes and bullets fly.
Doubt, September 19-October 11, 2008
Last show: Sat Oct 11, 8:00 pm
John Patrick Shanley’s winner of the Pulitzer Prize and Tony Award for Best Play takes two nuns, a priest, and the mother of one pupil into enticingly tense vignettes. Their simple conversations hint at larger issues and ask questions that hardly ever have convenient answers.
Disney’s High School Musical, July 11-August 2, 2008
Last show: Sat Aug 2, 8:00 pm
Jocks, thespians, singers, dancers, skaters, teachers -- it's all there in this cool, carefree summer musical.
String of Pearls, May 30-June 28, 2008
Last show: Sat Jun 28, 8:00 pm
A love letter to love, in all of its incomprehensible forms and venues: teenage, old age, same sex, no sex, wild sex, imaginary, quieted and unrequited. Pearls are a metaphor: after all, love is our own beautiful reaction to flaws and irritations. We join playwright Michele Lowe while she picks among the pebbles and are dazzled by what she comes up with.
The Beard of Avon, May 16-June 7, 2008
Last show: Sat Jun 7, 8:00 pm
Who do you think wrote or co-wrote the plays we attribute to William Shakespeare? Mark Twain voted for Francis Bacon. Woody Allen leans toward Christopher Marlowe. Shakespeare’s folio remains one of the great, gorgeous crop circle mysteries of our language. Amy Freed knocks about Stratford upon Avon some 400 years ago, with a ghost-writing Will who is both sweetly comic and oddly plausible.
A Comic Ballad of Misfortune (LATTE), April 25-May 4, 2008
Last show: Sun May 4, 2:00 pm
A card player... some coffee... a maid... a man... and something almost human come together unexpectedly. What happens next is a mystery, both to the audience and to the actors! LA:T4, Charlottesville's freshest theatre ensemble, uncovers what it is that defines us as individuals and what it is that connects us as members of the same society, species, and world.
In The Blood, March 14-29, 2008
Last show: Sat Mar 29, 8:00 pm
With a language and style all her own, Suzan-Lori Parks takes an unflinching look at the hates, fears and simple misunderstandings that allow homelessness and unintentional parenthood to become a self-perpetuating cycle.
Mother Courage and Her Children, March 28-April 19, 2008
Last show: Sat Apr 19, 8:00 pm
Seeking the seeds of Mother Courage? Look in the music hall, the lecture hall, the beer hall and the drill hall; study the 30 Years War and the accordion, the rise and fall of fascism and musical comedy. Everybody sing along: “And though you may not long survive Get out of bed and look alive!"
Lysistrata, February 7-March 1, 2008
Last show: Sat Mar 1, 8:00 pm
Everything you need to know about how men live and die by the sword. Ribald and profound, this play has gained meaning with each of the 2500 years that have passed since it was written.
The Goat or, Who Is Sylvia?, January 24-February 16, 2008
Last show: Mon Feb 16, 7:00 pm
What do you do when you break something of enormous value (like a vase … or a marriage) so badly it can never be put together again? From the great American master comes comes meditation--by turns hilarious and frightening--on "love, loss, the limits of our tolerance and who, indeed, we really are."
The Little Match Girl (LATTE), December 13-22, 2007
Last show: Sat Dec 22, 8:00 pm
The Live Arts teen ensemble adapts and stages an original version of the classic Hans Christian Andersen story of the power of one little girl's dreams in the face of a world as cold as winter.
A Little Night Music, December 7-22, 2007
Last show: Sat Dec 22, 8:00 pm
Inspired by Ingmar Bergman's 1955 film Smiles of a Summer Night (which was in turn inspired by Shakespeare's A Midsummer Night's Dream), Sondheim and Wheeler's musical masterpiece is a whirl of romantic mischief and mishaps, a delicate dance of loves lost and found.
American Buffalo, September 28-October 20, 2007
Last show: Sat Oct 20, 8:00 pm
A virtuoso piece for three actors, David Mamet's American Buffalo is a terse, tense journey into a frightening yet familiar underworld of manipulation, betrayal, and revenge.
The Clean House, September 14-October 13, 2007
Last show: Sat Oct 13, 8:00 pm
Brilliant young playwright Sarah Ruhl brings us this play about, well, cleaning our houses. But also about grieving, forgiving, laughing, and loving. About marriage and friendship and sisterhood and sorrow. About our hilarious, heartbreaking, and very messy lives.
Old Times, June 8-23, 2007
Last show: Sat Jun 23, 8:00 pm
From master playwright Harold Pinter comes this tangled tale of two women, one man, and an infinity of memories both real and imagined.Over the course of a single evening, what seems to be a simple reunion of old friends becomes a complex, surreal tale of the power of our minds and memories both to warp and shape our lives.
A Streetcar Named Desire, May 11-June 9, 2007
Last show: Sun Jun 10, 2:00 pm
Tennessee Williams' enduring masterpiece, redefined. In this now iconic story of desire, delusion, and despair in the deep south, Williams created a true American legend.
The Servant of Two Masters (LATTE), April 20-May 5, 2007
Last show: Sat May 5, 8:00 pm
Live Arts teens tackle this Commedia del'Arte classic of mistaken identities, delicious disguises, cross-dressing heroines, and wiley servants with wit, humor, and a hearty helping of comic timing.
The Good Times Are Killing Me, March 23-April 14, 2007
Last show: Sat Apr 14, 8:00 pm
Twelve-year-old Edna is growing up in the early 1960s, and still believes that miracles like movie stardom and racial harmony are hers for the asking. She tries to befriend her African-American neighbor, Bonna, but will the two girls' friendship withstand the lines drawn between them by a neighborhood and a nation in the midst of racial upheaval?
The Violet Hour, February 23-March 17, 2007
Last show: Sat Mar 17, 8:00 pm
If your life were a novel, would you read the last page first? If your future came flying in the window one day, neatly printed on bright white paper, would you read it? Would you try to change it? Should you? Could you?
The Pillowman, February 2-17, 2007
Last show: Sat Feb 17, 8:00 pm
By turns terrifying, tender, and unbearably funny, The Pillowman is a story about storytelling, about the unending human drive towards it, and how it can lead us to both savagery and salvation.
Thom Pain (based on nothing), January 12-27, 2007
Last show: Sat Jan 27, 8:00 pm
Thom Pain is an existential stand-up, a big joke, a one-man Beckettian performance piece about one man's insurmountable struggle to tell an audience a simple story about a dog and about true love.
A Child’s Christmas in Wales (LATTE), December 7-16, 2006
Last show: Sat Dec 16, 8:00 pm
A beautiful meditation on childhood by master poet Dylan Thomas, collaboratively reimagined by a vibrant young ensemble.
Ain’t Misbehavin’, December 1-23, 2006
Last show: Sat Dec 23, 8:00 pm
No one merged comedy and music with as much finesse and fun as Thomas "Fats" Waller, and this revue captures all the mirth and energy of his tunes.
Helen, October 6-28, 2006
Last show: Sat Oct 28, 8:00 pm
The legend of Helen of Troy finds new life in this complex modern tale of a woman in captivity, pursued by nations, defined by appearances, and held responsible for violence the like of which the ancient world had never seen.
Amadeus, September 22-October 21, 2006
Last show: Sat Oct 21, 8:00 pm
A story of genius, jealousy, music, madness, and one man's tortured plot to destroy the most gifted composer the world has ever known.
Urinetown, July 14-August 5, 2006
Last show: Sat Aug 5, 8:00 pm
Urinetown -- a musical about a city where people have to pay to pee -- is half spoof, half serious social commentary, half inside-joke, half musical extravaganza, half Bertolt Brecht, half Buzby Berkeley -- it's silly, smart, big-hearted, tough-minded, and right on the money.
The Tale of Pearl and Edmond (LATTE), May 12-20, 2006
Last show: Sat May 20, 8:00 pm
With a nod to the Brothers Grimm, the LATTE ensemble brings to life a piece of original theater based on the wondrous stories of long ago and far away.
