Hedgerow Theatre Company welcomes audiences across generations to “Beginners,” a wonderfully inventive play by Obie Award-winning theatre-maker Tim Crouch that explores a time of pivotal transition and the “wafer-thin divide between childhood and adulthood.”
On the surface, “Beginners” is a play about a group of friends and their families who have gathered as they do every year for a vacation in a remote town in coastal Maine. However, audiences gradually begin to sense and discover that there is much more than meets the eye. The play premiered in 2018 at the Unicorn Theatre, the UK’s leading professional theatre dedicated to producing inspiring and invigorating work for young audiences, and quickly became the hottest ticket in London.
I wrote Beginners because my children have grown up. I love the adults they’ve become but I miss the children they were. I sometimes think I see the children that they were in the adults they’ve become and that makes me inordinately happy and also inconsolably sad. – Tim Crouch
Known for not only for surprising an audience with each of his plays, Crouch considers the audience an integral part of his storytelling, making audiences absolutely vital to his work. It is a style that truly honors the unique dynamic of live theater. In “Beginners,” Crouch achieves the delicate task of inviting both adults and young people to laugh and emotionally invest in the storytelling without underestimating either audience.
Hedgerow is thrilled to produce the US Premiere of this singular work and to collaborate with Crouch in that process. “A playwright often wonders if what they’ve written will translate beyond their own imagination,” notes Crouch. “It’s a dream to think of “Beginners” meeting a US audience for the first time. It’s the play I feel most emotionally attached to and the thought of my characters being given new life in a new setting is absolutely thrilling.”
“Beginners,” a US Premiere, is directed by Hedgerow’s own Executive Artistic Director Marcie Bramucci, who has been bringing increasingly bold and exciting artistic work to Hedgerow, and performed by Emma Gibson (switching from her recent Director role of Hedgerow’s critically acclaimed The New Electric Ballroom), returning talents Philip Brown (Good Grief), Mike Thurstlic (A Christmas Carol Comedy, Tales from Poe) with new-to-Hedgerow dynamos Nicole Lawrie and Joanna Liao, and Hedgerow Theatre school youth artists Alice Webber, Olivia Seale and Theo Bramucci , alongside youth artist Jordan Sheppard, who makes his Hedgerow debut.
If You Go:
The creative team have opened the Theatre venue to include opportunities for on stage seating, an extension of the vacation house where the action of the play unfolds around them. Audiences can enjoy seating in bean bag chairs, rocking chairs, carpet squares in the first two rows and on stage, including wheelchair accessible seating options on stage and in the second row of the theatre.
“Beginners” runs April 18th to May 5th at Hedgerow. Opening Night is Saturday, April 20 at 6p.m. Tickets cost $35 for adult tickets and $20 for students and youth (under 18 years old), plus fees, and are available online at www.hedgerowtheatre.org. Hedgerow Theatre Company is located at 64 Rose Valley Rd.
Beginners has a full slate of programming around it. Sharing the spotlight, youth cast members will co-host an open mic Kids Karaoke Night following the performance on April 26. Kids in the audience ages 7+ can sign up and sing their favorite song on stage.
Hedgerow’s Pre-Show Happy Hours for the run of the show will be Family Friendly and will include kid friendly drinks with the beer and wine for patrons over 21.
Open captioning April 27 – May 4 at 2pm.
Relaxed Performance on April 27 at 7 pm, with a pre-show sensory tour at 6:15 pm.
Audio description is available on April 27 at the 7pm performance, provided by Gina Pisasale. Patrons with accessibility needs or questions are encouraged to contact the box office at 610-565-4211 or boxoffice@hedgerowtheatre.org.