Artistic Directors Nicholas Ballas and Robert Benedetti are excited to announce NMAL’s 10th Anniversary 2024 Season featuring six compelling and thought-provoking plays by award-winning playwrights: Eleanor Burgess’ The Niceties (May 8 to June 16) in rep with David Mamet’s Oleanna (May 15 to June 16); the world premiere staged reading of Carolyn Gage’s Georgia and the Butch (August 9 to 18), Lanford Wilson’s Burn This (September 4 to 22), Will Arbery’s Heroes of the Fourth Turning (October 9 to 27); and Eden Prairie, 1971 by Mat Smart (November 13 to December 1).

Tickets are now on sale at the NMAL website, www.nmactorslab.com. 

Season tickets are $175 (six shows for the price of five).
Individual tickets are $35, with discounted tickets (see website for details) and two preview performances costing $15.

The first two plays of the season, performed in repertory style, tackle some of the thornier issues of integrity and ignorance in academia with two powerful renditions of the professor/student conference gone bad in The Niceties and Oleanna. Deep dives into racial identity and sexual harassment will draw audiences into two very different decades of social awareness.

The New York Times said of Eleanor Burgess’ The Niceties, “The parallels to David Mamet’s controversial classic Oleanna are clear: A 20-year-old undergraduate meets one-on-one with a professor who fatally underestimates her. By the end of their conversation, the professor’s career is in jeopardy, the militant student bent on its destruction. But where Mr. Mamet made his student a feminist straw woman menacing a man who doesn’t much deserve it, the likable yet merciless Zoe is the one we’re meant to root for here, against a professor who is guilty as charged.” The Niceties will be directed by Robert Benedetti and performed by Karen Ryan and Baby True; Oleanna, Mamet’s impassioned response to the Clarence Thomas hearing, will mark Suzanne Lederer’s directing debut with NMAL, and will be performed by Emily Rankin and Geoffrey Pomeroy.

The fall season will offer four plays beginning with the world premiere of Carolyn Gage’s Georgia and the Butch, directed by Robert Benedetti as a staged reading.  This dramatic adaptation uses excerpts from the letters between Maria Chabot, a young, gender-non-conforming lesbian and the renowned artist Georgia O'Keeffe, with additional narration by their mutual friend, Mary Wheelwright.

Lanford Wilson’s explosive drama, Burn This, explores the spiritual and emotional yearnings of Anna, a dancer in NYC, and her unexpected love affair with Pale, an edgy restaurateur. Their determined struggle toward emotional honesty and liberation exemplifies the strength, humor, and complexity of all Lanford Wilson's work and confirms his standing as one of America's greatest playwrights. Nicholas Ballas will direct.

Zoe Lesser returns to New Mexico Actors Lab to direct Pulitzer Prize finalist Heroes of the Fourth Turning by Will Arbery, a scrupulously hewn drama centering on four alumni of a conservative Catholic college who confront themselves and each other, clashing over theology, politics, and personal responsibility.  It’s an in-depth exploration into the hearts and minds of Christian Conservativism.

The season closes with Mat Smart’s Eden Prairie, 1971, directed by Nicholas Ballas. On the same night Apollo 15 makes its lunar landing, draft-dodger Pete steals home to Eden Prairie after a 300-mile trek from Canada risking arrest to deliver an important message to his childhood friend, Rachel. Both are caught between duty to the ones they love and their own futures. In a moment of national tension that mirrors our own, Pete must defend his choices and grapple with the sacrifices he has made. This stark, passionate drama questions our notions of bravery and responsibility and the search for love.

PERFORMANCE DETAILS

THE NICETIES:  May 8- 12, 23-24, June 1-2, 6-7, 14-16

OLEANNA:  May 15-19, 25-26, 30-31, June 8-9, 15-16

GEORGIA AND THE BUTCH:  August 9-11, 15-18

BURN THIS:  September 4-8, 12-15, 19-22

HEROES OF THE FOURTH TURNING:  October 9-13, 17-20, 24-27

EDEN PRAIRIE, 1971:  November 13-17, 21-24, 29-December 1

Performances Thursday through Saturday evenings at 7:30 p.m., Sunday matinees at 2p.m., with additional Wednesday Preview at 7:30 p.m. in the first week (limited seating). All performances at The Lab Theater, 1213 Parkway, Santa Fe - – one block from Meow Wolf.

Additional information at www.nmactorslab.com

Artistic Director, Nicholas Ballas nicob@nmactorslab.com (505) 670-1077

Associate Artistic Director, Robert Benedetti – BenedettiR@comcast.net (310) 633-3324

Managing Director, Katie Olivant kfolivant@nmactorslab.com (209) 535-7088SD