Season Announcement

Dallas' Uptown Players welcomes old friends and new for 2018-19 season

Garret Storms and Walter Lee in Angels in America: Millenium Approaches.

Photo by Mike Morgan

A lot of favorites are returning this year for Uptown Players. Not only will audiences get their yearly fix of Broadway Our Way, but they'll enjoy some much-anticipated angelic closure and receive a holiday visit from Judy Garland.

As was previously promised, the entire original cast of 2016's Millennium Approaches is returning for Perestroika, the conclusion of Tony Kushner's Pulitzer Prize-winning, two-part play Angels in America. The second part picks up right where the first left off, giving audiences the epic conclusion of the fate of two couples, in which one partner has abandoned the other and God has abandoned Heaven. Considered one of the most important modern American plays, it explores gay culture, race, political injustice, inequality, and the future of America through the lens of the AIDS crisis of the 1980s. Not part of the regular season, this special add-on is being presented September 28-October 7, 2018, during Gay History Month.

Slipping back into Judy Garland's beaded shift dresses for Uptown Players is Janelle Lutz, starring in A Very Judy Christmas. Local jack-of-all-trades B.J. Cleveland is writing and directing the show, which pays tribute to 1960s TV specials. In this world premiere, Garland invites us into her home to share the holiday with her and her celebrity friends, including Ethel Merman and Liza Minnelli. See what other surprise guests pop in December 1-16, 2018.

The first of the season's shows not to be performed at the Kalita Humphreys Theater is Spring Awakening, the Duncan Sheik and Steven Slater musical about teenagers discovering their sexuality, independence, and morality in late 19th century Germany. It's a limited engagement of only four performances, January 31-February 3, 2019, and will run at the Moody Performance Hall.

Nearly 100 years later, New York A-listers are just trying to survive in Disaster!, a goofy homage to the iconic disaster movies of the 1970s. The musical comedy from Seth Rudetsky and Jack Plotnick sets the action on a floating discotheque and then throws in earthquakes; tidal waves; infernos; and disco hits such as "Knock on Wood," "Hooked on a Feeling," I Am Woman," and "Hot Stuff." It runs March 22-April 7, 2019.

The Uptown Players divas return for another entertaining weekend of Broadway music performed with a twist, but due to ticket demand the annual fundraiser, Broadway Our Way is moving this year to the Moody Performance Hall. The oh-so-busy B.J. Cleveland writes and directs for the eighth straight year. Performance dates are May 10-12, 2019.

A provocative new musical by Max Vernon called The View Upstairs pulls you inside the UpStairs Lounge, a vibrant '70s gay bar in the French Quarter of New Orleans. The forgotten community comes to life when a young fashion designer from 2017 buys the abandoned space, setting off an exhilarating journey of seduction and self-exploration. It runs June 22-July 7, 2019.

The season's lone play is Bekka Brunstetter's comedy The Cake. The timely regional premiere by one of the writers of the TV drama This Is Us is set in a North Carolina bakery, where a sweet-natured Christian named Della is asked to make the wedding cake for her best friend's daughter, who's newly returned from New York. When Della learns that there's not one bride, but two, she is forced to re-examine her deeply held beliefs — and her own marriage. It closes out the season August 9-25, 2019.

Individual ticket prices for all shows range from $25 to $60. Season ticket "flex packages" for four, five, or six shows are available and can be purchased online at www.uptownplayers.org or by calling 214-219-2718.

theater

Museum News

2 Dallas museums partner on landmark Roy Lichtenstein acquisition

Courtesy

Roy Lichtenstein

The Dallas Museum of Art (DMA) and the Nasher Sculpture Center will present works from the joint acquisition of more than 50 artworks generously gifted by the Roy Lichtenstein Foundation in 2024, showing prints, drawings, and sculptures by the groundbreaking American artist at the two neighboring institutions in the Dallas Arts District.

According to a release, the installations will be on view from January 31 to August 16, 2026 at the Nasher and from January 1 to July 5, 2026 at the DMA.

The joint gift made by the Roy Lichtenstein Foundation to the DMA and the Nasher in Celebration of the Centennial of Roy Lichtenstein is comprised of a selection of prints, drawings, maquettes, and sculptures by Roy Lichtenstein (1923–1997), a leading figure in twentieth-century American art and a pioneer of the Pop Art movement.

The works were specifically selected by the curatorial staff of both institutions and relate to objects already in their respective collections including sculptures, works on paper, and maquettes, along with tools and study objects.

Organized by the Nasher Sculpture Center’s Senior Curator Dr. Catherine Craft, The Nancy and Tim Hanley Assistant Curator of Contemporary Art at the DMA Ade Omotosho, and The Allen and Kelli Questrom Assistant Curator of Prints and Drawings at the DMA Dr. Emily Friedman, the presentation is divided according to each institution’s strengths and will be shown in combination with objects by Lichtenstein already in their respective permanent collections.

At the Nasher, works relating to three sculptures from the Raymond and Patsy Nasher Collection—Head with Blue Shadow, Peace through Chemistry, and Double Glass—will be accompanied by a selection from the Foundation's gift of more than two dozen drawings and maquettes associated with Lichtenstein’s Brushstroke sculptures.

At the Dallas Museum of Art, the presentation features a set of Brushstroke sculptures carved from wood alongside various prints and studies that reveal the artist’s eclectic imagery.

Events
In addition to the exhibition, the DMA and the Nasher will co-host a Study Day focused on the artist on March 28, 2026, sponsored by the Roy Lichtenstein Foundation. This scholarly event will bring together a variety of curators, academics, and conservators to discuss Lichtenstein’s studio practice and the fabrication and conservation of his sculptures.

Concluding the Study Day will be a public conversation held at the DMA between Nasher Director Carlos Basualdo and artist Alex Da Corte, regarding Da Corte’s work on the forthcoming Lichtenstein retrospective at the Whitney Museum of American Art.

“In bestowing this generous gift, the Roy Lichtenstein Foundation established Dallas as a center for the study and display of Lichtenstein’s work,” Basualdo says in a statement. “This collaborative presentation of the gift and the corresponding programming is an important step in the direction of pursuing that goal, deepening the understanding of an artist who remains immensely influential to contemporary art and its relationship with mass media and today’s culture.”

Roy Lichtenstein is made possible by support from the Roy Lichtenstein Foundation and the Dallas Tourism Public Improvement District (DTPID).

openings museums