Unicorn Theatre announces an eclectic collection of productions for 2015-2016 season

The Unicorn Theatre has unveiled a 2015-2016 season representing plays and musicals that will be new to Kansas City audiences and several young playwrights whose work has never been produced here before.

This season, at least on paper, appears to be one of the strongest the Unicorn has presented in recent years.

Here’s the lineup:

▪ “The Oldest Boy” by Sarah Ruhl, Aug. 26-Sept. 20 on the Levin Stage. Ruhl (“The Clean House,” “Eurydice”) creates a fable in which Tibetan monks believe they’ve discovered a Buddhist lama reincarnated as a young American boy, represented by a puppet (to be created by Paul Mesner).

One reviewer described the play as “a thought-provoking meditation on motherhood, culture and cutting ties.”

▪ “The Brothers Size” by Tarell Alvin McCraney, Oct. 14-Nov. 8 on the Jerome Stage. This play is part of a trilogy by a young playwright whose work has been staged on both sides of the Atlantic. In this piece, McCraney explores West African mythology in a Louisiana-set story about a man who, after his release from prison, tries to rebuild his life with the help of his younger brother.

A reviewer for the Hollywood Reporter wrote of McCraney: “He sounds like no one else, his cadences hearty and beautiful. I am in love with his voice, and in all likelihood you will feel the same way.”

▪ “Mr. Burns, a Post-Electric Play” by Anne Washburn, Dec. 2-27 on the Levin Stage. Washburn’s comedy envisions a post-apocalyptic world in which humans struggle to re-create pop culture after a total meltdown of the grid. Gathered around a campfire, characters struggle to recall episodes of “The Simpsons” in a foreshadowing of the world to come.

Ben Brantley of the New York Times called it “downright brilliant.” This show is a co-production with UMKC Theatre.

▪ “Buyer & Cellar” by Jonathan Tolins, Dec. 9-27 on the Jerome Stage. In this off-Broadway hit, a struggling L.A. actor takes a job in a private mall in Barbra Streisand’s basement at her home in Malibu.

Inspired by Streisand’s book visually documenting her Malibu compound, this piece was described by the New York Times as a “featherweight but irresistible play about celebrity false bonding, the solitude of uber-fame and the seductive allure of expensive chintz.”

▪ “How to Steal a Picasso” by William Missouri Downs, Jan. 27-Feb. 14, 2016, on the Levin Stage. This is a world premiere, described by the Unicorn as a comedy about a family of artists in Detroit struggling to find purpose in the world where art can be a commercial enterprise or a political act.

Downs wrote “Women Playing Hamlet,” which the Unicorn staged last month.

▪ “The Whale” by Samuel D. Hunter, March 2-27, 2016, on the Jerome Stage. Hunter’s play tells the story of a 600-pound man in Idaho desperate to contact his estranged teenage daughter but confined to his apartment, where he compulsively consumes food.

The Chicago Tribune described the play as a “beautifully devastating drama.” Hunter, for what it’s worth, last year won a “genius grant” from the MacArthur Foundation.

▪ “The Ghosts of Lote Bravo” by Hilary Bettis, April 20-May 8, 2016, on the Levin Stage. The historical backdrop for this play is the disturbing series of disappearances and murders of young women in northern Mexico documented by journalists in recent years. Bettis’ drama depicts how the mother of one of the disappeared girls learns of her hopes, dreams and courage through a series of visions.

The play is a so-called “rolling world premiere” under the banner of the National New Play Network.

▪ “Heathers, the Musical” by composer Laurence O’Keefe (“Bat Boy: The Musical”) and book-writer Kevin Murphy (“Reefer Madness”), June 1-26, 2016, on the Levin Stage. Based on the 1988 cult movie about lethal high-school politics, this show ran off-Broadway in 2014.

For ticket information, call 816-531-7529 or go to UnicornTheatre.org.

This story was originally published April 21, 2015 at 9:52 PM with the headline "Unicorn Theatre announces an eclectic collection of productions for 2015-2016 season."