World Premiere!

August 20 - September 12, 2021

Directed by Katie Hipol Garcia

This play, about a bride-to-be who must manage the affections of both her mother and her stepmother while planning the wedding, began as a 10- minute piece receiving widespread acclaim in the 2019 Pear Slices, was developed into a full-length piece with input from other members of the Pear Playwrights Guild, and fine-tuned with audience input after being presented as a staged reading in that year's Fresh Produce Festival. Now ready to see a fully staged production, Mothers of the Bride celebrates the talent of a Bay Area playwright as well as our own ability to choose our family.

This show will be presented as a hybrid — audience can choose to watch virtually or live in the theatre — and, for subscribers, will be offered as a bonus show (not counting against the total subscription price).

October 1 - October 24, 2021

Co-Production with Perspective Theatre Company

The Tempest Directed by Melinda Marks

Somewhere Directed by John R. Lewis

Our first set of Pear Pairings!

Reschedule from last season, the West Coast Premiere of Somewhere by Marisela Treviño Orta is a beautiful new piece that explores the consequences of our neglect of the environment. With almost all the insects gone, the world is beginning to fall apart as crops fail and people struggle to hold on to their ways of life. Cassandra and her brother Alexander are tracking the last monarch butterflies in the world as they head to the west coast. Their path intersects with a truffle farm where a small group of people are hunkering down for the on-coming collapse of society.

Paired with The Tempest, one of Pear Theatre's most successful previous productions from its 12th season, in repertory with many of the same cast. This production will feature a new adaptation of Shakespeare's classic, of magical happenings on a desert island and long-awaited justice delivered.

November 19 - December 12, 2021

Directed by Michael Champlin

Pear Theatre continues its tradition of less-than-typical holiday shows: with a Pear Pairing of The Thanksgiving Play by Larissa FastHorse and Eight Nights by Jennifer Maisel. An unlikely pairing of two shows with different tones, both exploring important issues of our time.

Eight Nights, winner of the 2021 Ovation Award For Best Playwriting, is a warm and moving piece set during eight nights of Chanukah over eight decades, from 1949 to 2016. Holocaust survivor Rebecca Blum arrives in America at 19 and observes the holidays in the same apartment each year with her father, husband, friends, daughter, and granddaughter, as she tries to vanquish the past that still haunts her.

In the spirit of last season's Fairfield, The Thanksgiving Play is a biting satire in which three “woke” white thespians endeavor to devise an elementary school pageant about the first Thanksgiving while avoiding any culturally appropriative missteps. A roast of the politics of entertainment and well-meaning political correctness alike, The Thanksgiving Play puts the American origin story itself in the comedy-crosshairs. These dramatically different "holiday" shows will be performed by one cast, and performed in repertory over four weeks.

RESCHEDULED:

February 3 - February 20, 2022

Directed by Sinjin Jones

The New Year joins with Black History Month for The Mountaintop by Katori Hall, playing in repertory with a powerful play, new to Pear audiences, which will be announced in the first part of the season.

The Mountaintop creatively imagines the last night in the life of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr, set in Memphis in April, 1968. King meets the attractive, spunky motel maid Camae, who arrives to provide room service — but we soon discover she is no ordinary chambermaid. Winner of the 2010 Olivier Award Winner for Best Play, The Mountaintop received audience applause and critical praise in its 2016 production at Pear Theatre.

With Sunset Baby, Dominique Morisseau looks at the world of an activist long after his days in the headlines have vanished. Kenyatta Shakur is alone. His wife has died, and now, this former Black Revolutionary and political prisoner, is desperate to reconnect with his estranged daughter Nina. If Kenyatta truly wants to reconcile his past, he must first conquer his most challenging revolution of all – fatherhood. Sunset Baby is an energized, vibrant and witty look at the point where the personal and political collide.

March 25 - April 10, 2022

in Co-production with dragon Productions

Directed by Giulio Perrone

Mary Zimmerman's adaptation of Ovid's Metamorphoses, performed by Pear Theatre in its 7th season. Based on ancient myths, Metamorphoses suggests that human beings haven't fundamentally changed nearly two thousand years later. As Zimmerman has said, “These myths have a redemptive power in that they are so ancient. There's a comfort in the familiarity of the human condition.”

Called by "Time" the "theater event of the year," Mary Zimmerman's "Metamorphoses" brings Ovid's tales to stunning visual life. Set in and around a large pool of water onstage, "Metamorphoses" juxtaposes the ancient and the contemporary in both language and image to reflect the variety and persistence of narrative in the face of inevitable change. Nominated for three 2002 Tony Awards, including "Best Play," "Metamorphoses" earned Zimmerman a Tony for "Best Direction of a Play."

Pear Slices

Directed by Troy Johnson and Tessa Corrie

May 20 - May 29, 2022

The popular annual short-play showcase featuring original, short plays from the members of the Pear Playwrights Guild, returns in the spring. Audiences have grown to love this annual short-play foray, with a new story taking the stage every 10-15 minutes, all performed by a single, versatile cast of local actors.

Fresh Produce

October 29 - 31, 2021

Capitalizing on our long-standing tradition, these evenings of developmental play readings allow members of the pear Playwrights Guild to hear their work out loud and allow the audience to give their perspective!

June 24 - July 17, 2022

Directed by reed flores

Three Tall Women won the 1994 Pulitzer Prize for Drama as well as the New York Drama Critics' Circle Award for Best Play, and the Outer Critics Circle Award for Best Play. The Wall Street Journal called it “Electrifying and heartrending ... Three Tall Women blazes as bright as a midsummer day. ”

In Cho's The Piano Teacher, a lonely widow reflects wistfully on her life — but the visits of two former students will require her to face the unvarnished truth about her life. Mrs. K is an elderly widow who lives by herself in a small suburban town. She whiles away her time reminiscing about her late husband and the children she taught long ago as a piano instructor. One day, she finds herself compelled to call her old students, but is it out of loneliness or some other, darker need? As Mrs. K discovers, it may not be what we cannot know that troubles us the most; it may be what we cannot bear to know