Season Announcement

Hamilton, Wicked, and more big Broadway shows are Dallas-bound in 2021

UPDATE 6-28-2021: Single tickets for Hamilton will go on sale at 10 am Friday, July 2 at DallasSummerMusicals.org or Ticketmaster.com, according to a release.

Prices will range from $49 to $189 with a select number premium seats from $299, and there will be a maximum purchase limit of eight tickets per household for the engagement. A lottery for 40 $10-seats will take place for all performances; more details will be announced closer to the engagement.

For presale access before tickets become available to the general public, sign up for DSM eNotes here or sign up to receive mobile alerts here by midnight on June 29.

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Only a day after a comprehensive COVID-19 plan was outlined by the newly sworn-in President Biden, Dallas Summer Musicals felt optimistic enough to announce a 2021 line-up, with live, in-person touring musicals ostensibly coming to Dallas in August of this year.

It's an ambitious announcement, as Actors' Equity Association is still mandating that "there must be a sustained decrease in new COVID-19 cases for a minimum of 14 days with a local community rate less than 5 per 100,000 population and a positive test rate of new tests done for COVID-19 less than 5 percent for at least one week prior to the start of the work session."

And those regulations were first written and released in May 2020. Granted, sometimes touring operators like DSM and AT&T Performing Arts Center present non-equity tours, which are not beholden to the same restrictions. But Hamilton, which is on DSM's list for a triumphant return engagement, is definitely equity.

But we'll push all skepticism aside for now. Thought DSM does not indicate a contingency plan if these shows are not able to go on as scheduled (something that happened frequently last year), president Ken Novice does say this:

"Broadway is coming back to Dallas in a big way. This is a massive season spanning an entire calendar year, and we can't wait! Our announcement today is made with great optimism related to in-progress wide-spread COVID-19 vaccinations and the soon-to-come reopening of our in-person cultural economy. As the months progress, we will be closely monitoring the on-going health crisis while developing, adapting, and sharing safety protocols to ensure everyone's safe return to live theater."

Assuming that DSM is able to safely present it, here is its proposed lineup:

Wicked flies back into Dallas' Music Hall at Fair Park August 4-September 5, 2021, to open the season as an optional add-on (this was its originally scheduled date). The tale of what happened before Dorothy dropped in follows the green-skinned Elphaba and her bubbly best friend Glinda as they navigate growing up and challenging authority.

Jersey Boys, the hit jukebox musical about pop group Frankie Valli and The Four Seasons, is next (another season add-on). They were just four guys from Jersey, until they sang their very first note. They had a sound nobody had ever heard, and the radio just couldn't get enough of. But while their harmonies were perfect onstage, off stage it was a very different story. It runs at the Music Hall at Fair Park October 19-31, 2021, (rescheduled from November 10-22, 2020).

The mega-smash Hamilton returns to Fair Park November 16-December 5, 2021. It was last here in April 2019, bringing rap battles and hip-hop to America history and the story of one of America's Founding Fathers. Currently, the only way to guarantee a ticket to Hamilton is to purchase a season ticket to the six-show Germania Insurance Broadway Series which launches with Jersey Boys above.

Hadestown, the big winner at the 2019 Tony Awards, will be at the Winspear Opera House January 18-30, 2022, (it was originally scheduled for May 18-30, 2021) as part of an ongoing collaboration with AT&T Performing Arts Center. Intertwining two mythic tales — that of young dreamers Orpheus and Eurydice, and that of King Hades and his wife Persephone — the musical invites you on a hell-raising journey to the underworld and back.

There's one more season option: Jonathan Larson's genre-changing musical Rent, playing at the Music Hall February 18-20, 2022. A retelling of Puccini's La Boheme set in 1990s New York, it covers true love, artistic disillusionment, and the AIDS crisis.

There are also a few reschedulings from the 2019-2020 season:

Come From Away, March 8-20, 2022, at Music Hall at Fair Park (remember, this closed prematurely when the pandemic started)
Jesus Christ Superstar, April 5-17, 2022, at Music Hall at Fair Park
Mean Girls, May 3-15, 2022, at Music Hall at Fair Park
Oklahoma!, May 31-June 12, 2022, at Winspear Opera House
Disney's Frozen, July 20-August 7, 2022, at Music Hall at Fair Park

Tootsie, previously rescheduled to play in 2021, has been canceled and will no longer be included in the season.

Season tickets for the revised line-up are available now, with single tickets on sale at a later date. For more information, patrons can visit DallasSummerMusicals.org or call 1-866-276-4884.

Surprise! Hamilton's coming back to Dallas.

Photo by Joan Marcus

Surprise! Hamilton's coming back to Dallas.

theater tours

arts news

Dallas' Crow Museum of Asian Art names new curator ahead of second outpost opening

Crow Museum curator Natalia Di Pietrantonio

Photo by Natali Wiseman

Newly announced curator Natalia Di Pietrantonio.

The Crow Museum of Asian Art of The University of Texas at Dallas has found its new curator. Natalia Di Pietrantonio, Ph.D., hails from the Seattle Art Museum and was selected after a nationwide search.

There, she served as inaugural curator of South Asian art, caring for the museum's South Asian, Southeast Asian, and Islamic art collections while also serving as an affiliate art history faculty member at the University of Washington.

Di Pietrantonio arrives just as the Crow Museum is preparing to debut a second museum next fall.

Designed by global architecture firm Morphosis, the Edith and Peter O’Donnell Athenaeum is being constructed as part of a 12-acre cultural district on the UT Dallas campus.

Over the next year, the 38-year-old curator will work closely with architects, interior designers, academic faculty, and museum staff to select the artworks that will be on view when the new museum opens its doors. She will also guide the 10,000 square feet of gallery space at the original Crow Museum, which was founded in 1998 and is in the downtown Dallas Arts District.

In addition, Di Pietrantonio will serve as a faculty member in the arts department at UT Dallas.

“Natalia brings a wonderful vision, a fresh and energetic perspective, and a proven track record in elevating Asian American art and culture in compelling ways,” says Amy Lewis Hofland, senior director of the Crow Museum of Asian Art of The University of Texas at Dallas. “With her background in South Asian and Islamic art, she also will help build the Crow Museum of Asian Art collection, strengthening it to better reflect the growing diversity of our region.”

A first-generation Mexican American whose first language was Spanish, a release says that "Di Pietrantonio brings over 10 years of professional and academic experience, ranging from highly lauded museum exhibitions and university cultural events to innovative collaborations and unique community outreach experiences."

From 2014-15, she served as a Jane and Morgan Whitney Fellow for the Islamic department at the Metropolitan Museum in New York. She is multilingual and speaks Spanish, Persian, Urdu and English.

At the Seattle Art Museum, she harnessed her expertise of modern and contemporary art to curate two diverse exhibitions: "Embodied Change: South Asian Art Across Time" (January 2022), which focused on the body and female representations in South Asia; and "Our Blue Planet: Global Visions of Water" (March 2022), which addressed climate change and water access.

During her tenure at the Seattle Art Museum, she grew their South Asian collection by 25 percent. She also was the lead curator on the mid-career retrospective of the performance artist Anida Y. Ali that debuts in January 2024.

Recognizing that North Texas has one of the fastest-growing Asian American populations in Texas, Di Pietrantonio is excited to pursue exhibitions and programs that are topical both locally and globally to audiences of all ages and backgrounds. She also intends to bring performance art into the cultural mix at the Crow Museum.

"As the Crow Museum embarks on a new era with a second museum on the horizon, I am honored to be part of its storied history known for dynamic and innovative exhibitions and programs,” says Di Pietrantonio. “My first major goal is to learn more about the North Texas region — from UT Dallas students and museum supporters to neighborhood organizations and our increasingly diverse populations — so I can help align and tailor the museum programs for its communities.”

In 2018, Di Pietrantonio completed her Ph.D. in the history of art at Cornell University, studying under the contemporary artist Iftikhar Dadi with a focus on calligraphy and book arts. Prior to that time, she received a master’s degree in South Asian studies from Columbia University and a bachelor’s degree in art history from the University of California, Davis. It was during her years at UC Davis that a dynamic professor introduced her to Islamic art and ignited her interest.

museums

Season Announcement

Hamilton, Wicked, and more big Broadway shows are Dallas-bound in 2021

Surprise! Hamilton's coming back to Dallas.

arts news

Dallas' Crow Museum of Asian Art names new curator ahead of second outpost opening

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