Lynn Nottage’s follow-up to her Pulitzer Prize-winning and Tony-nominated play “Sweat” will bow in 2018. Per the New York Times, “Mlima’s Tale” will premiere Off Broadway at the Public Theater and run from March 27 to May 20, 2018.
“Mlima’s Tale” revolves around the titular character, an elephant “caught in the world’s black market for ivory.” Nottage’s new play explores “a trail of greed and desire as old as trade itself,” the Public summarizes.
Nottage is the first woman to win the Pulitzer Prize for Drama twice. She won this year for her Broadway debut, “Sweat,” a play about factory workers facing layoffs in Reading, Pennsylvania. She also won in 2009 for “Ruined,” which focuses on “ruined” women — rape survivors and sex workers — in civil war-torn Congo. Her other plays include “Crumbs from the Table of Joy,” “Fabulation,” “Intimate Apparel,” and “By the Way, Meet Vera Stark.” “Sweat” previously won the Blackburn Prize in 2016.
If you’re interested in “Mlima’s Tale,” consider checking out Kate Brooks’ “The Last Animals” and “Trophy,” co-directed by Christina Clusiau. The upcoming docs, which premiered this year at Tribeca and Sundance, respectively, also examine human carelessness and greed — and the dire effects they have on wildlife.
Among the other women-penned projects set for the Public’s 2017–18 season are Sarah Burgess’ political satire “Kings,” Nia Vardalos’ “Tiny Beautiful Things,” which is an adaptation of Cheryl Strayed’s book, Julia Cho’s college classroom-set “Office Hour,” Rinne Groff’s post-Superstorm Sandy meditation “Fire in Dreamland,” and Judy Collins’ cabaret “A Love Letter to Stephen Sondheim.”
The Public Theater will celebrate its 50th anniversary and commemorate its first production, “Hair,” this upcoming season. Visit the Public’s website for more information.
