The Alliance Theatre is pleased to announce its world premiere production of Tiger Style! From Mike Lew, the award-winning playwright of Bike America, comes a hilarious new play about family influence and finding personal success without an academic framework. The Alliance’s production, directed by Tony Award nominee Moritz von Stuelpnagel, runs on the Alliance Stage from September 30 – October 18, 2015. This production marks the first time that a past winner of the Alliance/Kendeda National Graduate Playwriting Competition has returned for a world premiere on the main stage.
In Tiger Style!, star students and squabbling siblings Albert and Jennifer Chen were once the pinnacle of adolescent achievement. But when it comes to adulthood, they’re epic failures. Albert’s just been passed up for promotion and Jennifer’s been dumped by her loser boyfriend. So they do what any reasonable egghead brother and sister would do and go on an Asian Freedom Tour! Travelling from California to China, Tiger Style! embraces the inner slacker and the outer tiger parent in all of us.
“Tiger Style! is a comedy that gauges three generations of U.S. acculturation within a Chinese-American family,” says playwright Mike Lew. “It’s a deeply personal play about “Asian tiger parenting” from someone who’s actually been there. It’s a play about race relations and cultural values that tries to push past old tropes about race to arrive at something more honest, urgent, and multifaceted.”
Leading the cast as Albert and Jennifer Chen are Jon Norman Schneider (Awake and Sing!) and Ruibo Qian (Regional: Water by the Spoonful). The cast also includes Obie Award winner Francis Jue (The World of Extreme Happiness) as Dad, stage and television actress Emily Kuroda (TV: The Gilmore Girls, Theater: Straight as a Line) as Mom, and Bobby Labartino (Alliance: In Love and Warcraft) as Russ the Bus.
Members of the Tiger Style! creative team include Scenic Designer Wilson Chin (Next Fall); Costume Designer Amy Clark (A Night with Janis Joplin); Sound Designer Palmer Hefferan (The Call); Projection Designer Alex Koch(Irena’s Vow), and Lighting Designer Ken Yunker (Alliance: One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest).
Regular performances of Tiger Style! are as follows:
Tuesday through Thursday at 7:30 p.m.
Fridays at 8:00 p.m.
Saturdays at 2:30 p.m. and 8:00 p.m.
Sundays at 2:30 p.m. and 7:30 p.m.
September 30 – October 18, 2015. There will be no 2:30 p.m. performance on Saturday, October 3. Opening Night is Wednesday, October 7 at 7:30 p.m.
Tickets start at $15 and are available at the Woodruff Arts Center Box Office in person or by calling 404.733.5000. Tickets are also available online at www.alliancetheatre.org/tigerstyle. Discounted rates for groups of 10 or more are available by calling 404.733.4690. Discounted rates are also available for members of the military, seniors, and students. A special morning performance is also available for school field trips on Thursday, October 15. Learn more by calling 404.733.4661.