Performance

Les Misérables

Book by Alain Boublil and Claude-Michel Schönberg, music by Claude-Michel Schönberg and lyrics by Herbert Kretzmer.  Based on the novel by Victor Hugo.

Location: Ted Paul Theatre
Sponsored by HickoryTech Corporation

In 19th century France, Jean Valjean is released from 19 years of unjust imprisonment, but finds nothing in store for him but mistrust and mistreatment.  He breaks his parole in hopes of starting a new life, initiating a life-long struggle for redemption as he is relentlessly pursued by police inspector Javert, who refuses to believe Valjean can change his ways.  During the Paris student uprising of 1832, Javert must confront his ideals after Valjean spares his life and saves that of the student revolutionary who has captured the heart of Valjean's adopted daughter.  The winner of nine Tony Awards in 1987, it became the second longest-running musical in Broadway history.  The 2012 movie musical was nominated for eight Academy Awards, including Best Picture.  This is its Minnesota State Mankato debut.

Individual tickets for Les Misérables are $22.00 regular, $19.00 for senior citizens, youth 16 and under and groups of 15 or more, $15.00 for current Minnesota State students. Get more information about tickets.

Blithe Spirit

By Noel Coward

Location: Andreas Theatre

The smash comedy hit of the London and Broadway stages, this much-revived classic is from the playwright of Private Lives.  It offers up fussy, cantakerous novelist Charles Condomine, re-married but haunted (literally) by the ghost of his late first wife, the clever and insistent Elvira who is called up by a visiting “happy medium,” one Madame Arcati.  The play was first seen in the West End of London in 1941, creating a new long-run record for non-musical British plays of 1,997 performances.  It also did well on Broadway later that year, running for 657 performances.  Minnesota State Mankato presented Blithe Spirit in 1956 and summer of 1988.

Individual tickets for Blithe Spirit are $16.00 regular, $14.00 for senior citizens, youth 16 and under and groups of 15 or more, $11.00 for current Minnesota State students. Get more information about tickets.

Crumbs from the Table of Joy

By Lynn Nottage

Location: Ted Paul Theatre

Recently widowed Godfrey and his daughters Ernestine and Ermina move from Florida to Brooklyn for a better life.  Not knowing how to parent, Godfrey turns to religion, and especially to Father Divine, for answers.  The girls absorb their new surroundings, but not necessarily religion.  As the racial and social issues of the late 1950s escalate, personal issues between Godfrey and Lily, his sister-in-law, explode.  Nottage is an American playwright whose work often deals with the lives of women of African descent and she won the Pulitzer Prize for Drama in 2009 for Ruined.  This show is being directed by Lou Bellamy, Minnesota State Mankato alum, and founder and long-time artistic director at the nationally recognized Penumbra Theater.  This is its Minnesota State Mankato debut.

Individual tickets for Crumbs from the Table of Joy are $16.00 regular, $14.00 for senior citizens, youth 16 and under and groups of 15 or more, $11.00 for current Minnesota State students. Get more information about tickets. 

Kiss of the Spider Woman

Book by Terrence McNally, music by John Kander and lyrics by Fred Ebb. Based on the novel by Manuel Puig.

Location: Andreas Theatre

Winner of multiple Tony Awards, including Best Musical, Kiss of the Spider Woman transforms a harrowing tale of persecution into a dazzling spectacle that juxtaposes gritty realities with liberating fantasies.  Cell mates in a Latin American prison, Valentin is a tough revolutionary undergoing torture and Molina is an unabashed homosexual serving eight years for deviant behavior.  Molina shares his fantasies about an actress, Aurora (originated on Broadway by Chita Rivera) with Valentin.  One of her roles is a Spider Woman who kills with a kiss.  Kander and Ebb is the team behind Chicago and Cabaret.  This is its Minnesota State Mankato debut.

Individual tickets for Kiss of the Spider Woman are $22.00 regular, $19.00 for senior citizens, youth 16 and under and groups of 15 or more, $15.00 for current Minnesota State students. Get more information about tickets.

As You Like It

By William Shakespeare

Location: Ted Paul Theatre

Rosalind, the daughter of a banished duke, falls in love with Orlando, the disinherited son of one of the duke’s friends.  When she is banished from the court by her usurping uncle, Duke Frederick, Rosalind takes on the appearance of a boy calling herself Ganymede.  She travels with her cousin Celia and the jester Touchstone to the Forest of Arden, where her father and his friends live in exile.  Themes about life and love, including aging, the natural world and death are included in the play.  New friends are made and families are reunited.  Minnesota State Mankato presented As You Like It in 1974.

Individual tickets for As You Like It are $16.00 regular, $14.00 for senior citizens, youth 16 and under and groups of 15 or more, $11.00 for current Minnesota State students. Get more information about tickets.

The Drowsy Chaperone

Music and lyrics by Lisa Lambert and Greg Morrison, book by Bob Martin and Don McKellar.
Sponsored by Community Bank Mankato, Mankato Ford and Radio Mankato

Location: Ted Paul Theatre

A rare combination of unprecedented originality and blinding talent, The Drowsy Chaperone boldly addresses a great unspoken desire in all of our hearts: to be entertained.  If you've ever sat in a dark theatre and thought, “Dear Lord in heaven, please let it be good,” this is the show for you!  It all begins when a die-hard musical-theater fan plays his favorite cast album on his turntable, and the musical literally bursts to life in his living room, telling the rambunctious tale of a brazen Broadway starlet trying to find, and keep, her true love.  This is its Minnesota State Mankato debut.

Individual tickets for The Drowsy Chaperone are $22.00 regular, $19.00 for senior citizens, youth 16 and under and groups of 15 or more, $15.00 for current Minnesota State students. Get more information about tickets.

Sky Girls

by Jenny Laird

Location: Andreas Theatre

This historical drama follows five fictional World War II female fliers, united in their hope of becoming WASPs (Women Air Force Service Pilots) for the United States.  Set in 1944 at Avenger Field, an Army Air Force base in the dusty, weather-beaten town of Sweetwater, TX, the final class of trainees for the WASPs struggles to earn their wings as they battle internal sabotage, media frenzy, misguided public concern and a crucial pending Congressional vote to militarize the once-lauded program—or disband it altogether.  This is its Minnesota State Mankato debut.

Individual tickets for Sky Girls are $10.00 regular, $9.00 for senior citizens, youth 16 and under and groups of 15 or more, $8.00 for current Minnesota State students. Get more information about tickets.

Betrayal

By Harold Pinter

Location: Andreas Theatre

The play begins in the present, with the meeting of Emma and Jerry, whose adulterous affair of seven years ended two years earlier.  Emma's marriage to Robert, Jerry's best friend, is now breaking up and she needs someone to talk to.  Thereafter, in a series of contiguous scenes, the play moves backward in time, from the end of the Emma-Jerry affair to its beginning, throwing into relief the little lies and oblique remarks that, in this time-reverse, reveal more than direct statements, or overt actions, ever could.  This is its Minnesota State Mankato debut.

Individual tickets for Betrayal are $10.00 regular, $9.00 for senior citizens, youth 16 and under and groups of 15 or more, $8.00 for current Minnesota State students. Get more information about tickets.

Trust

By Stephen Dietz

Location: Andreas Theatre

A hot young musician, Cody, has recently made the cover of “Rolling Stone” magazine.  He is engaged to Becca, a publisher’s assistant; however, he is also interested in an older musician, Leah, who has become rather cynical about the business.  They get tangled up with Gretchen, a dressmaker who once harbored a crush for Leah, Holly, a young bohemian who is interested in Cody, and Roy, a DJ who is interested in Holly.  Romantic craziness ensues.  This is its Minnesota State Mankato debut.

Individual tickets for Trust are $10.00 regular, $9.00 for senior citizens, youth 16 and under and groups of 15 or more, $8.00 for current Minnesota State students. Get more information about tickets.

Play to be determined

Author to be determined

Location: Andreas Theatre

Individual tickets for this show are $10.00 regular, $9.00 for senior citizens, youth 16 and under and groups of 15 or more, $8.00 for current Minnesota State students. Get more information about tickets.

Fall

December

Location: Ted Paul Theatre

Individual tickets for Dance Concerts are $10.00 regular, $9.00 for senior citizens, youth 16 and under and groups of 15 or more, $8.00 for current Minnesota State students. Get more information about tickets.

Carmina Burana, Spring Dance Concert

May

A large, extraordinary collection of medieval poetry came to light in 1803 at the southern Bavarian monastery of Benediktbeuern.  This collection of 320 poems, known as Carmina Burana or “Songs of Benediktbeuern,”dates back to about AD 1230.  The Carmina Burana collection owes its present popularity to the German composer Carl Orff (1895-1982), who wrote his famous opus of the same name in 1935-6 using 24 of the original texts.  In this performance, the Minnesota State Mankato Departments of Theatre & Dance and Music come together to present the poems in song and dance on the Ted Paul Theatre stage.

Individual tickets for Dance Concerts are $10.00 regular, $9.00 for senior citizens, youth 16 and under and groups of 15 or more, $8.00 for current Minnesota State students. Get more information about tickets.

The 39 Steps

By Patrick Barlow and John Buchan

Location: Andreas Theatre
Sponsored by the General Mills Gift Matching Program

Mix a Hitchcock masterpiece with a juicy spy novel, add a dash of Monty Python and you have The 39 Steps, a fast-paced whodunit for anyone who loves the magic of theatre! This 2-time Tony and Drama Desk Award-winning treat is packed with nonstop laughs, over 150 zany characters (played by a ridiculously talented cast of 4), an on-stage plane crash, handcuffs, missing fingers and some good old-fashioned romance!  The 39 Steps was Broadway’s longest running comedy, and played its 500th performance on Broadway on May 19, 2009.  This is its Minnesota State Mankato debut!

A Grand Night For Singing

Music by Richard Rodgers, lyrics by Oscar Hammerstein II, musical arrangements by Fred Wells, conceived by Walter Bobbie

Location: Ted Paul Theatre

Taste and imagination, the two key ingredients for a first-rate revue, abound in this fresh take on the Rodgers & Hammerstein canon conceived by Tony Award winner Walter Bobbie. Over three decades after the duo's final collaboration, The Sound of Music, took the Great White Way by storm, it was in fact this new R&H musical that opened the 1994 Broadway season with flair and distinction, garnering wildly enthusiastic notices as well as earning two Tony nominations, including Best Musical.  It includes innovative musical arrangements including a sultry Andrews Sisters-esque “I'm Gonna Wash That Man Right Out-a My Hair,” a swingin' “Honeybun” worthy of the Modernaires and a jazzy “Kansas City” that leaves no question about how terrifically up to date the remarkable songs of R&H remain.

I Ought To Be in Pictures

By Neil Simon

Location: Andreas Theatre
Sponsored by MSU TRIO Programs

Herb, a Hollywood scriptwriter currently “at liberty” is surprised when his forgotten past reappears in the form of Libby, a teenage daughter who's trekked from Brooklyn with dreams of movie stardom.  With Steffy, his sometime paramour at his side, Herb decides to take another stab at fatherhood and hopefully this time, get it right.  One of Neil Simon’s lesser-known comedies, I Ought To Be in Pictures was made into a 1982 film starring Walter Matthau, Ann-Margret and Dinah Manoff.  Minnesota State Mankato presented I Ought To Be in Pictures in 1982.

Monty Python's Spamalot

Book & lyrics by Eric Idle, music by John Du Prez & Eric Idle.
A musical lovingly ripped from the motion picture “Monty Python and the Holy Grail,” from the original screenplay by Graham Chapman, John Cleese, Terry Gilliam, Eric Idle, Terry Jones and Michael Palin.

Location: Ted Paul Theatre
Sponsored by Orthopaedic & Fracture Clinic, PA, Eide Bailly LLP and Farrish Johnson Law Office, Chtd.

Spamalot tells the legendary tale of King Arthur’s quest to find the Holy Grail.  However, diverting a bit from the true story, this hilarious musical features such oddities as a line of beautiful dancing girls, a flatulent Frenchmen and killer rabbits.  Outside there is plague with a 50 percent chance of pestilence and famine.  Throughout the show Arthur, traveling with his servant Patsy, recruits several knights to accompany him on his quest, including Sir Bedevere, Sir Robin, Sir Lancelot and Sir Galahad.  Besides the rabbits and farting Frenchman, they meet such characters as the Lady of the Lake, Prince Herbert, Tim the Enchanter, Not Dead Fred, the Black Knight and the Knights who say Ni.  This is Spamalot’s Minnesota State Mankato debut.