THEATER LATTÉ DA ANNOUNCES NEXT 25X25, THE COMPANY’S COMMITMENT TO THE FUTURE OF ADVENTUROUS MUSICAL THEATER
/FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
July 28, 2022
T. Mychael Rambo (left) and Curtis Bannister (right) star in Theater Latté Da’s world premiere musical adaptation, TWELVE ANGRY MEN: A NEW MUSICAL.
THEATER LATTÉ DA ANNOUNCES NEXT 25X25, THE COMPANY’S COMMITMENT TO THE FUTURE OF ADVENTUROUS MUSICAL THEATER
(Minneapolis/St. Paul) Theater Latté Da (Peter Rothstein, Founding Artistic Director and Elisa Spencer-Kaplan, Managing Director) today announces NEXT 25X25, the company's commitment to cultivate 25 new musicals, or plays with music, by 2025. Under the leadership of Elissa Adams, Associate Artistic Director and Director of New Work, this initiative is rooted in the belief that it is the responsibility of the regional theater not only to speak to audiences today, but to contribute to the dramatic canon of tomorrow. Through NEXT 25X25, Theater Latté Da will invest deeply in the future of the American musical theater through world premiere productions, our annual NEXT Festival, NEXT UP development program, and the NEXT Generation Commission.
NEXT 25X25 builds on the success of the NEXT 20/20 campaign, which supported the commissioning, development and/or premiere productions of more than 20 new musical works between 2015 and 2020, among them the theater’s current critically acclaimed production of Twelve Angry Men: A New Musical. Since its founding in 1998, Theater Latté Da has always found ways to bring artists together to create new work, resulting in fifteen world premieres, including some of its most memorable and celebrated productions. World premiere productions in addition to Twelve Angry Men: A New Musical include All is Calm: The Christmas Truce of 1914, A Christmas Carole Petersen, Five Points, C., To Let Go and Fall, Knock!, Bankrupt City Ballad, Underneath the Lintel, Lullaby, Steerage Song, New York Musical Shorts, Passage of Dreams, Steerage Song, and Oh $#!% I’m Turning Into My Mother.
“Developing new musical theater is an expensive endeavor. We are grateful to the NEA, the Ruth Easton Fund of the Edelstein Family Foundation, the Minnesota State Arts Board, and the Nara Fund, as well as the individual Latté Da donors who have given generously to our new works initiatives. We are proud to support living playwrights, composers and lyricists.” says Founding Artistic Director, Peter Rothstein.
“Supporting twenty five new musicals by 2025 is a wonderfully ambitious goal, but one we’re well on our way to achieving,” says Adams. “Thanks to the many artists, based here in the Twin Cities as well as around the country, who have chosen to make Theater Latte Da an artistic home, we are commissioning artists and workshopping new musicals on a year-round basis, and currently have more than ten projects in our pipeline including two new opera adaptations, a new holiday show, and several musical projects led by BIPOC artists and women artists. There are so many new stories to tell and such an abundance of talent in this field. NEXT 25x25 allows Theater Latté Da to continue to play a crucial role in amplifying those voices and crafting those stories.”
Theater Latté Da will use its robust platform of new work development programs to meet the NEXT 25X25 goal of developing and/or premiering twenty-five new musicals or plays with music by 2025. These programs include commissions, workshops, residencies, our annual NEXT Festival and our NEXT Generation Commission.
Celebrating its 25th anniversary in the 2022-23 season, Theater Latté Da is an award-winning Twin Cities musical theater company that combines music and story to illuminate the breadth and depth of the human experience. The company seeks to create new and impactful connections between story, music, artist, and audience by exploring and expanding the art of musical theater. www.latteda.org
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