UCLA's Center for the Art of Performance Announces 2019–20 Season

UCLA's Center for the Art of Performance (CAP UCLA) today unveiled the 2019-20 season lineup honoring "We, the People" -- as artists, performers, thought leaders, change-makers and spectators. CAP UCLA continues to bring bold programming from around the world to the Los Angeles community to advance social justice conversations through contemporary dance, music, theater, and literature.

Executive and Artistic Director Kristy Edmunds, in her eighth season leading UCLA's public performing arts program, also announced collaborations with The Theatre at Ace Hotel DTLA, The Ford Theatres, Ucross Foundation, REDCAT, UCLA's Powell Library, Fowler and Hammer Museums, UCLA Library Special Collections, UCLA School of Theater, Film and Television, Glorya Kaufman Presents Dance at The Music Center, and UCLA Stavros Niarchos Foundation Center for the Study of Hellenic Culture. The new season runs from September 19, 2019 through May 10, 2020, and offers eight special events and 61 performances, with one U.S. and two West Coast premieres.

"Our programs are designed to engage audiences wholeheartedly in the artists' exploration," Edmunds said. "Each performance is illuminating, connecting us, and disconnecting us, from the way we see history. Each time we're offered a new lens in which to examine our place in the culture of LA and in the culture of the world. Our goal is to provide experiences that allow individual reflection within a communal environment."

Recognizing unsung heroes in history, Ain Gordon weaves the largely unknown story of a courageous gay psychiatrist whose activism made a profound and lasting impact on LGBT civil rights in 217 Boxes of Dr. Henry Anonymous. Toronto's Porte Parole theater presents Seeds, a dramatic re-enactment of the seven-year legal battle between Monsanto, one of the world's most powerful biotech corporations, and a Saskatchewan farmer.

Looking back to the past, composer Jean-Baptiste Barrière and violinist Jennifer Koh have created 38thParallel, a multi-media opera uncovering the impact of displacement and identity on two contrasting Korean immigrant families. Visual artist MK Guth illustrates the power of the written word and pays homage to Powell Library which, along with Royce Hall, was one of the first buildings to be constructed on the original UCLA campus. Her Choreography for Reading Aloud installation is a kaleidoscope of facts, theories, fiction, opinions, poetry and lists culminating in a truly visceral experience. Jazz musicians Terri Lyne Carrington and Rudresh Mahanthappa celebrate the artistry and impact of legendary saxophonist Charlie Parker with Fly Higher: Charlie Parker at 100.

CAP UCLA will present the world premiere of celebrated pianist Anthony de Mare's Liasions 2020: Re-Imagining Sondheim from the Piano featuring new arrangements by some of the world's foremost contemporary composers in a tribute to the musical genius of Stephen Sondheim.

West Coast premieres include two major multi-media collaborations. THE DAY, by celebrated ballerina-turned-contemporary-dancer Wendy Whelan, "rock star" cellist Maya Beiser, legendary choreographer Lucinda Childs and esteemed contemporary composer David Lang, examines memory, aging, death and the survival of the soul. Four Quartets, in which American choreographer Pam Tanowitz, legendary Finnish composer Kaija Saariaho, American modernist painter Brice Marden and Tony Award-nominated actress Kathleen Chalfant create a thrilling performance from T.S. Eliot's meditations on past and present, time and space, movement and stillness.

Celebrating different social and cultural perspectives, artists from a diverse spectrum of global communities will share their distinct voices: BUIKA, the outspoken queen of flamenco fusion will serenade CAP audiences along with Grammy Award-winning South African a cappella group, Ladysmith Black Mambazo and Brazilian jazz legends Sergio Mendes & Babel Gilberto.

Social justice issues and politics are woven throughout many of this season's performances. Words & Ideas programs include The New York Times opinion writer Frank Bruni in conversation about the 2020 elections with Sarah Smarsh, author of the best seller Heartland: A Memoir of Working Hard and Being Broke in the Richest Country on Earth; and Piper Kerman, creator of Orange is the New Black, and Rachel Kushner, author of The Mars Room, discussing prison reform.

CAP UCLA also presents a veritable Who's Who of jazz luminaries including Chick Corea Trilogy with Christian McBride & Brian Blade; the Joshua Redman Quartet with The Bad Plus; DeJohnette/Coltrane/Garrison; Bill Frisell & Julian Lage Duo; and vocalist Gregory Porter with an homage to Nat King Cole.

Continuing a mutually beneficial relationship between CAP UCLA and The Theater at Ace Hotel for a third season, eight performances will be presented in Downtown LA, including Philip Glass and Jerry Quickley's Whistleblower, a look at what happens to life after the whistle has been blown -- in this case through the lens of Edward Snowden. Returning to CAP UCLA's 2019-20 season is filmmaker Bill Morrison with his documentary Dawson City: Frozen Time LIVE! compiled from lost film footage found in 1978 that paints a rare portrait of life in the Yukon in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Special events in the spring include Orange is the New Black's Lea DeLaria (aka 'Big Boo') performing hits from her latest album House of David: delaria+bowie=jazz and double Tony Award-winning, Golden Globe-nominated co-creator of the groundbreaking musical, Hedwig & the Angry Inch, John Cameron Mitchell, with his The Origin of Love Tour.

CAP UCLA engages in artistic development off stage through fellowships, residencies, commissions and community collaborations. CAP UCLA facilitated creative development of five of this season's productions, commissioned in part by the Center - THE DAY, Four Quartets, 38th Parallel, The WANT and Liaisons 2020. This season's artists-in-residence include Toshi Reagon whose Parable of the Sower is a genre-defying piece of political theater based on the book by Octavia Butler that will be workshopped at the Ucross Foundation over the summer and presented at Royce Hall in the spring; as well as Eiko Otake (of the celebrated Japanese contemporary dance duo Eiko and Koma), Lynette Wallworth, Constance Hockaday and Suzanne Bocanegra, all of whom are working on projects to be presented by CAP at a future date. CAP UCLA 2019-20 fellows include visual artist Ann Hamilton, jazz percussionist and composer Antonio Sanchez and contemporary visual art curator Helen Molesworth.

With a remarkable season housing 41 different programs, 21 productions will take place on the UCLA campus and eight will be staged at The Theatre at Ace Hotel DTLA. The Ford Theatres and CAP UCLA will co-present two programs again this season -- Loch na hEala (Swan Lake) from one of Ireland's foremost dance and theatre-makers, Sadler Wells' Associate Artistic Director Michael Keegan-Dolan and visual artist Hassam Hajjaj's My Rock Stars Experimental LIVE!, a musical presentation of his video installation of the same name which will be presented at the Ford Theatres.

2019-20 series subscriptions are on sale now. Choose from preselected series subscriptions and save 15% or Create-Your-Own series of five or more events and save 10%. CAP UCLA Members receive 25% off series subscriptions and 15% off Create-Your-Own packages and additional single tickets for all CAP UCLA 2019-20 performances, plus pre-sale opportunities for special performances and added sales. Purchase online at cap.ucla.edu, via Ticketmaster, by phone (310) 825-2101, and at the UCLA Central Ticket Office, M-F, 10 am - 4 pm.

Single tickets to all CAP UCLA performances at The Theatre at Ace Hotel are sold via AXS. You can purchase tickets to CAP performances at the Ace at www.acehotel.com or by calling AXS at (888) 929-7849.

Single tickets for Hassam Hajjaj's My Rock Stars Experimental - Live! at The Ford Theatres are on sale now at fordtheatres.org.

Single tickets for Adam Linder's The WANT at REDCAT will go on sale in the late summer through REDCAT. Check the REDCAT website at www.redcat.org for on sale dates.

Subscribers may add single tickets for these and any other CAP performance to their CAP UCLA subscription order.