CINCINNATI, OH — The University of Cincinnati College-Conservatory of Music presents 11 exciting productions as part of its 2018-19 Studio Series of Acting, Dance, Musical Theatre and Opera. This annual series of performing and media arts events features CCM’s acclaimed “stars of tomorrow” in a collection of scaled-down stagings set in the Cohen Family Studio Theater and other intimate performance spaces.
The studio series opens in October with Eurydice, a reimagined take on the classic myth of Orpheus through the eyes of its heroine. October also sees the return of the 48-Hour Film Festival, which showcases eight student-created short films produced over the course of a single weekend. In November, CCM’s Musical Theatre program celebrates its 50th anniversary with Stephen Schwartz’s golden hit from the Off-Broadway season of 1971, Godspell. The fall studio series concludes with two world-premieres produced by the Opera Fusion: New Works Lab in partnership with Cincinnati Opera.
The series continues in February 2019 with two opera productions — Johann Strauss’ classic Die Fledermaus and William Bolcom’s Dinner at Eight. CCM’s popular Dance Student Choreographer’s Showcase and TRANSMIGRATION Festival of Student-Created New Works both return in March. CCM presents the Cincinnati premiere of Yeast Nation in April and the series concludes later that month with Association of Controlled Dreamers, which was commissioned during CCM’s 2017 Summer Playwrights Workshop.
The complete 2018-19 Studio Series lineup is listed below. Titles and dates are subject to change.
TICKETS AND PARKING INFORMATION
All Studio Series performances are free and open to the general public, but reservations are required and seating is limited. Reservations can be made the week of each show by visiting the CCM Box Office in UC’s Corbett Center for the Performing Arts or by calling 513-556-4183.
Unless otherwise noted, all Studio Series productions take place in CCM’s intimate and versatile “black box” performance space, the Cohen Family Studio Theater.
Parking is available in the CCM Garage (located at the base of Corry Boulevard off Jefferson Avenue) and additional garages throughout the UC campus. Please visit uc.edu/parking for more information on parking rates. For directions to CCM Village, visit ccm.uc.edu/about/directions.
CCM’s 2018-19 STUDIO SERIES
Acting, Dance, Musical Theatre, Opera
8 p.m. Thursday, Oct. 11
8 p.m. Friday, Oct. 12
2 and 8 p.m. Saturday, Oct. 13
• Studio Acting Series •
EURYDICE
Written by Sarah Ruhl
Susan Felder, director
Eurydice reimagines the classic myth of Orpheus through the eyes of its heroine. Dying too young on her wedding day, Eurydice must journey to the underworld, where she reunites with her father and struggles to remember her lost love. With contemporary characters, ingenious plot twists and breathtaking poetry, the play is a fresh look at a timeless love story. CCM and the Cincinnati opera will also present an operatic version of this play in November.
Location: Cohen Family Studio Theater
Admission: Admission is free, but reservations are required. Tickets become available at 12:30 p.m. on Monday, Oct. 8. Visit the CCM Box Office or call 513-556-4183 to reserve. Limit two tickets per order.
Acting Studio Series Sponsor: Neil Artman and Margaret Straub
7 p.m. Sunday, Oct. 28
•Studio Acting Series •
5TH ANNUAL CCM 48-HOUR FILM FESTIVAL
Richard E. Hess, producer
Join us for our annual celebration of original student film work. After random team placement, student writers, actors, directors, editors and composers have 48 hours from 7 p.m. on Friday night to 7 p.m. on Sunday night to create original short films. With more than 100 UC student participants, eight short films will be screened.
Location: MainStreet Cinema, UC’s Tangeman University Center
Admission: FREE
8 p.m. Thursday, Nov. 8
8 p.m. Friday, Nov. 9
2 p.m. and 8 p.m. Saturday, Nov. 10
• Studio Musical Theatre Series •
GODSPELL
Book by John Michael Tebelak
Music and Lyrics by Stephen Schwartz
Conceived and Originally Directed by John Michael Tebelak
Katie Johannigman, director and choreographer
Stephen Goers, musical director
Based on the gospel according to St. Matthew, Godspell is a perennial audience favorite, telling the well-known parables with comedy, improvisation and theatre games. Featuring the international hit, “Day by Day,” Godspell sports an eclectic blend of songs, ranging in style from pop to vaudeville. By turns hilarious and moving, Godspell is a solid gold hit from the Off-Broadway season of 1971.
Location: Cohen Family Studio Theater
Admission: Admission is free, but reservations are required. Tickets become available at 12:30 p.m. on Monday, Nov. 5. Visit the CCM Box Office or call 513-556-4183 to reserve. Limit two tickets per order.
7:30 p.m. Saturday, Nov. 17
• Opera Fusion: New Works Lab •
A collaboration between CCM Opera and Cincinnati Opera in partnership with LA Opera and the Metropolitan Opera/Lincoln Center Theater’s New Works Program
Co-Artistic Directors Robin Guarino and Marcus Küchle
EURYDICE
Matthew Aucoin, composer
Sarah Ruhl, librettist
Funded by a grant from The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation, CCM Opera and Cincinnati Opera present a public reading of this new, original work that reimagines the classic myth of Orpheus and Eurydice through the eyes of its heroine. CCM Acting presents the original play of Ruhl’s Eurydice in October.
Location: Wilks Studio, Cincinnati Music Hall, 1241 Elm Street
Admission: Admission is free. Reservations are required. Tickets become available at 10 a.m. on Monday, Nov. 5. Please contact the Cincinnati Opera box office for tickets at 513-241-2742 or www.cincinnatiopera.org.
7:30 p.m. Thursday, Dec. 6
• Opera Fusion: New Works Lab •
A collaboration between CCM Opera and Cincinnati Opera in partnership with Santa Fe Opera/San Francisco Opera’s “Opera for All Voices” Program
Co-Artistic Directors Robin Guarino and Marcus Küchle
POSTVILLE: HOMETOWN TO THE WORLD
Music by Laura Kaminsky
Postville: Hometown to the World is the latest piece by composer Laura Kaminsky and filmmaker Kimberly Reed, known for their partnership on the critically acclaimed opera As One, concerning the journey of a transgender person, which was featured in Cincinnati Opera’s 2018 Summer Festival. Their new work takes place in Postville, Iowa, which bills itself as the “Hometown to the World,” but which is known for a massive 2008 raid by the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement Agency at a Kosher meat-packing plant, in which over a tenth of the town’s population was arrested and deported. This new work was created for the “Opera for All Voices” program, which is led by Santa Fe Opera and San Francisco Opera, and includes the Lyric Opera of Kansas City, Minnesota Opera, Opera Theatre of Saint Louis, Sarasota Opera and Seattle Opera. It is Kaminsky and Reed’s second work to participate in Opera Fusion: New Works, following their opera Some Light Emerges, which had a short residency in September 2016.
Location: Wilks Studio, Cincinnati Music Hall, 1241 Elm Street
Admission: Admission is free. Reservations are required. Tickets become available at 10 a.m. on Monday, Nov. 5. Please contact the Cincinnati Opera box office for tickets at 513-241-2742 or www.cincinnatiopera.org.
8 p.m. Friday, Feb. 8
8 p.m. Saturday, Feb. 9
2 p.m. Sunday, Feb. 10
• CCM Opera d’arte– Undergraduate Opera Series •
DIE FLEDERMAUS
Music and libretto by Johann Strauss
Kenneth Shaw, director
Amy Johnson, co-producer
Brett Scott, music director and conductor
Matthew Worth, assistant stage director
Updated to free and frivolous 1920s Vienna, this most popular operetta returns to CCM with its captivating melodies and a few wry surprises!
Location: Cohen Family Studio Theater
Admission: Admission is free. Reservations are required. Tickets become available at 12:30 p.m. on Monday, Feb. 4. Please visit the CCM Box Office or call 513-556-4183 to reserve. Limit two tickets per order.
8 p.m. Friday, Feb. 22
8 p.m. Saturday, Feb. 23
2 p.m. Sunday, Feb. 24
• Studio Opera Series •
DINNER AT EIGHT
Music by William Bolcom
Libretto by Mark Campbell
TBA, conductor
Audrey Chait, director Dinner at Eight is a comic opera by composer William Bolcom and librettist Mark Campbell, based on the play by George S. Kaufman and Edna Ferber. It is a Depression-era comedy of manners in which the wife of a once-affluent shipping magnate plans a society dinner for an assortment of wealthy or well-born acquaintances. Eventually, the guests’ tangled and intimate connections to one another are revealed. The original play opened in 1932 on Broadway at the Music Box Theater, and inspired a star-studded film adaptation the following year.
Location: Cohen Family Studio Theater
Admission: Admission is free. Reservations are required. Tickets become available at 12:30 p.m. on Monday, Feb. 18. Please visit the CCM Box Office or call 513-556-4183 to reserve. Limit two tickets per order.
Opera Department Sponsor: Mr. & Mrs. Edward S. Rosenthal
Opera Production Sponsor: Genevieve Smith
8 p.m. Thursday, March 7
8 p.m. Friday, March 8
2 and 8 p.m. Saturday, March 9
• Studio Dance Series •
DANCE STUDENT CHOREOGRAPHERS SHOWCASE
Judith Mikita, director
Come experience the next generation of emerging choreographers as CCM dance majors take the stage with exciting and diverse new works.
Location: Cohen Family Studio Theater
Admission: Admission is free. Reservations are required. Tickets become available at 12:30 p.m. on Monday, March 4. Please visit the CCM Box Office or call 513-556-4183 to reserve. Limit two tickets per order.
7 p.m. Wednesday, March 13
7 p.m. Thursday, March 14
7 p.m. Friday, March 15
• Studio Acting Series •
TRANSMIGRATION 2019
A Festival of Student-Created New Works
Richard E. Hess and Brant Russell, producers
TRANSMIGRATION, so named for “the movement from one place to another” or “the transition from one state of being to another,” is a festival of new works created by the students in CCM Acting. Six teams of actors craft and perform five original 30-minute shows. Performed simultaneously in different locations throughout CCM Village, TRANSMIGRATION will allow the audience to sample four different new works of their choosing in one spectacular evening. “Thanks to the [Acting] program at UC’s College-Conservatory of Music, theatre fans were offer a jolt of onstage vitality,” observed CityBeat’s Rick Pender.
Location: CCM Village
Admission: Admission is free, but reservations are required. Tickets become available at 12:30 p.m. on Monday, March 11. Visit the CCM Box Office or call 513-556-4183 to reserve. Limit two tickets per order.
8 p.m. Thursday, April 4
8 p.m. Friday, April 5
2 and 8 p.m. Saturday, April 6
• Studio Musical Theatre Series •
YEAST NATION
Book and lyrics by Greg Kotis
Music and lyrics by Mark Hollmann
Vince DeGeorge, director and choreographer
Henry Lewers, musical director
In the year 3,000,458,000 B.C., the salt-eating yeasts are the only living creatures on earth, and they’re up against a food shortage, a strange new emotion called “love” and the oppression of a tyrannical king. When the king’s dreamer of a son ventures out of the known yeastiverse, the yeasts’ story – and ours – is changed forever. An area premiere from the creators of Urinetown and The Sting.
Location: Cohen Family Studio Theater
Admission: Admission is free, but reservations are required. Tickets become available at 12:30 p.m. on Monday, April 1. Visit the CCM Box Office or call 513-556-4183 to reserve. Limit two tickets per order.
8 p.m. Thursday, April 25
8 p.m. Friday, April 26
2 p.m. and 8 p.m. Saturday, April 27
• Studio Acting Series •
ASSOCIATION OF CONTROLLED DREAMERS
Written by MJ Kaufman
Brant Russell, director
A young, charismatic senator pursues policies that could have long-lasting repercussions for public education. A group of college students tries every technique available to them to change his mind, from occupying his lawn to collective lucid dreaming. What is the nature of activism? How do we hold legislators accountable? And what is the young senator’s mysterious twin up to?
Location: Cohen Family Studio Theater
Admission: Admission is free, but reservations are required. Tickets become available at 12:30 p.m. on Monday, April 22. Visit the CCM Box Office or call 513-556-4183 to reserve. Limit two tickets per order.
Acting Studio Series Sponsor: Neil Artman and Margaret Straub
A preeminent institution for the performing and media arts, the University of Cincinnati College-Conservatory of Music (CCM) is the largest single source of performing arts presentations in the state of Ohio. All event dates and programs are subject to change. For a complete calendar of events, please visit us online at http://ccm.uc.edu.
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