Theatre For a New Audience and Pericles

Jeanbry Torres and Hampton Brown

Top of Form

The Theater

The Theatre for a New Audience has a rich history of performing plays since 1979. They have been at the Polonsky Shakespeare Center since 2013, providing quality performance to patrons who travel to Fort Greene, Brooklyn. For years, the Theatre for a New Audience was on a building hopping campaign as they sought out available space in Manhattan. With the establishment of a physical building, they not only contribute to the theater community but also add to the cultural hub that Fort Greene has become.

Their commitment to providing a full experience all can enjoy starts in the lobby. The all glass lobby, allows a patron to enjoy a well lit room with the option to purchase books and refreshments during intermission or while waiting for their show to start. After enjoying this refreshing entrance, patrons enter the auditorium. The auditorium is a combination of an Elizabethan courtyard and modern technology that bridge the ages. Not only does the stage change shape to accommodate the needs of the play, the seating plans can be changed from 180 to 299, as required. The three tiers top at 35 feet in height and because of the little space for seating, the intimacy between patrons and the stage is increased; the audience becomes part of the production. Since the seating arrangement varies, the auditorium can be shifted for productions that require a proscenium, thrust, run-way or in-the-round.

With their emphasis on maintaining a connection with the community around them, an education program that works with local high schools allows for students to work with the theatre community on their main stage at the Polonsky center.

Some of last year’s productions included The Two Gentleman of Verona and Tamburlaine the Great. In 2012, their production of Cymbeline earned the company the Off-Broadway Alliance Award for “Best Revival of a Play”.

Amongst their board members, the most notable to novice playgoers, is John Turturro and his wife Katherine Borowitz.

 

 

     This gift to New York is thanks to the efforts of founder Jeffery Horowitz. A graduate from University of California, with a bachelor of Fine Arts (Cum Laude) and a trained actor from the London Academy of Music and Dramatic Art, Horowitz was combined his skillset to establish the Theatre for a New Audience. Under his leadership, the Theatre for a New Audience has performed 60 plays and won a series of awards to include several OBIE and Lucille Lortel awards and a Tony award.

The Production: Pericles

Pericles is a Shakespearean play involving tragic misunderstandings that lead the characters into compromising situations that test their moral compass. Since February 25^th, Trevor Nunn’s first production of Pericles, along with his first appearance on the American stage with a Shakespearean play, becomes a New York Times Critic’s pick and leaves Charles Isherwood ‘entranced by the final scenes’. Isherwood’s review, promotes this play and how Nunn has employed his own amendments to perfect the play.  Some of the scenes are eliminated along with dialogue broken up or turned into songs.