The Twilight Zone Jumping From Screen to Stage
David Gelmini
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“The Twilight Zone” will soon be making the jump from screen to stage with the new stage play set to premiere at London’s Almeida Theatre.
NEXT STOP FOR “THE TWILIGHT ZONE” – THE STAGE!
CBS CONSUMER PRODUCTS (NEW YORK) AND THE ALMEIDA THEATRE (LONDON) TODAY ANNOUNCE THE WORLD PREMIERE OF A STAGE PLAY BASED ON CLASSIC CBS SERIES THE TWILIGHT ZONE:
World Premiere
THE TWILIGHT ZONE
Based on stories by Rod Serling, Charles Beaumont and Richard Matheson
Adapted by Anne Washburn
Directed by Richard Jones
Previews from December 5th 2017
“You are about to enter another dimension, a dimension not only of sight and sound but of mind. A journey into a wondrous land of imagination. Next stop, The Twilight Zone.”
In a year when the term itself has spiked in usage to describe the world we live in today, a stage play based on one of television’s most revered and influential series receives its World Premiere at the prestigious Almeida Theatre in London.
The stage production opens in December and is adapted by Anne Washburn (Mr Burns) and directed by seven time Olivier Award-winner Richard Jones.
The Twilight Zone ran on CBS from 1959-64, winning 3 Emmy Awards during its 156 episode run. Its incisive parables explored humanity’s hopes, despairs, prides and prejudices. It remains a seminal influence on popular culture and continues to inspire those working in contemporary literature, film and TV — from Stephen King to Lin-Manuel Miranda, Breaking Bad creator Vince Gilligan to Steven Spielberg, The Simpsons to Black Mirror.
Rod Serling was first and foremost a playwright who even before his landmark TV series broke ground with original plays such as Patterns and Requiem For A Heavyweight. They were performed live over the air to national audiences using disciplines that were always close to theater.
“The Twilight Zone was an ingenious mixture of morality tales, fables and fantasy that are as relevant today as when they first aired” said Veronica Hart, Senior Vice President, CBS Consumer Products. “The play allows these powerful stories to be experienced in an entirely new way in order to reach a whole new audience.”
“Anne Washburn and Richard Jones have devised a show that honours the writing of Serling and his closest collaborators, Charles Beaumont and Richard Matheson. They have created a new journey into the heartland of the imagination – the stage.” said Producer Ron Fogelman.
The Twilight Zone is presented under license by CBS Consumer Products.
Casting to be announced.
Anne Washburn’s plays include Mr Burns: A Post Electric Play, which received its European premiere at the Almeida in 2014. Other plays include 10 out of 12 (Premiere at Soho Rep, NYC), Antlia Pneumatica (Premiere: Playwrights Horizons, NYC) The Communist Dracula Pageant (Premiere: ART, Boston) A Devil at Noon (Premiere: Actors Theater of Louisville, Kentucky), I Have Loved Strangers (Premiere: Clubbed Thumb Summerworks, NYC) The Internationalist (Premiere: 13P, NYC) The Ladies (Premiere: The Civilians, NYC), The Small (Premiere: Clubbed Thumb Summerworks, NYC) and trans adaptations of Euripides’ Orestes (Premiere: The Folger, Washington D.C.) and Iphigenia In Aulis (Premiere: Classic Stage Company, NYC). Awards include a Guggenheim, an Alpert, and a Laura Pels for an artist in mid career. Anne is an associated artist with The Civilians, Clubbed Thumb, New Georges, and is an alumna of New Dramatists and 13P.
Richard Jones (Director) has directed theatre at the at the Young Vic, the Old Vic, the National Theatre, the West End, the Royal Court/Ambassadors, the RSC, in New York at the Public Theatre and three times on Broadway. He has directed opera at the Royal Opera House, the ENO, Aix en Provence, Paris, Amsterdam, Glyndebourne, la Scala, Frankfurt, Munich, Berlin and at the Met in New York. In theatre he has been awarded Olivier awards for Too Clever by Half (Old Vic) and Into the Woods (Phoenix Theatre – West End), the Evening Standard Award as best director for The Illusion (Old Vic). He was nominated for a Tony award for La Bete on Broadway. He has been awarded 3 Olivier awards in opera – for Hansel and Gretel (WNO) Lady Macbeth of Mtsensk (ROH) and for The Mastersingers of Nuremberg (ENO) – this production was also awarded a South Bank Show Award. He was given the Evening Standard Award for outstanding artistic achievement for his production of Wagners Ring at the Royal Opera House. This year the recent Old Vic production of The Hairy Ape played at the New York Park Armory and was nominated for 6 Drama Desk nominations. He was appointed CBE in the 2015 New Year’s Honours list.
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