Although Aurora Theatre won’t say good-bye to its current season until the farce Don’t Dress for Dinner closes this weekend, its 2014-15 season is just weeks away. The Lawrenceville playhouse turns the stage lights back on July 17 with the musical Mary Poppins. The lineup for Aurora’s 19th season includes four musicals and two plays.
Aurora performs in downtown Lawrenceville at 128 E. Pike St. Season tickets are $95.04-$158.64. 678-226-6222, www.auroratheatre.com. The season:
MARY POPPINS. July 17-Aug. 31. Associate artistic director Justin Anderson (Les Miserables) directs the family musical about kite-flying, chimney sweeps and a nanny who’s practically perfect in every way. The show, which differs somewhat from the famous movie, recently finished a 6.5-year run on Broadway and has played the Fox Theatre twice.
CLYBOURNE PARK. Oct. 2-26: This 2011 Pulitzer Prize winner by Bruce Norris, a prequel and sequel of sorts to Lorraine Hansberry’s A Raisin in the Sun, is about race and real estate in Chicago. The Broadway company, which featured one-time Atlantan Crystal A. Dickinson, won the 2012 Tony Award for best play.
CHRISTMAS CANTEEN 2014. Nov. 20-Dec. 21. Aurora’s holiday tradition in a variety show, anything goes format.
LES MISERABLES. Jan. 15-March 1, 2015. This musical, which won five 2013 Suzi Bass Awards as the best musical produced by a professional metro Atlanta company, sees one day more, returning with most of the original Aurora cast intact.
THE EXPLORERS CLUB. March 26-April 19. This 19th-century feminist British farce by Nell Benjamin was staged last summer by Manhattan Theatre Club.
HANDS ON A HARDBODY. May 7-31, 2015. This rockabilly musical set in truck-obsessed Texas had a monthlong run on Broadway last winter with Keith Carradine and Hunter Foster (one of the creators of Aurora’s world premiere musical Clyde ‘n Bonnie: A Folktale a few seasons back). Hardbody is based on a film documentary of the same name. Ten contestants vie for a “hardbody” truck in Longview, Texas. The last contestant with his or her hands on the truck wins it. The lives of each contestant, along with the car dealer and a radio announcer, are revealed A Chorus Line-style during the contest.
