The upcoming season for Los Angeles’s Center Theatre Group is coming together in an entirely new way as the company combines the power of its three iconic venues to bring musicals, world premieres, Broadway stars and family shows all under one programming umbrella for the first time in its history.
“I feel good about the direction we’re heading,” said Snehal Desai, the Theatre Group’s artistic director, who took the helm of the company in August. “This is just the beginning and it’s a long game and I feel like this season is a roadmap of what we’re doing, how we want to invite everyone into our spaces, how we want to offer something for every generation,” he added.
The well-known Center Theatre Group usually programs separate seasons at its three venues; the Mark Taper Forum, the Ahmanson Theatre (both at LA’s Music Center) and the Kirk Douglas Theatre in Culver City. For its 2024/25 season however the respected organization is unifying programming at all three venues under a single season dubbed One CTG. One LA.
“It’s one season we have curated together and what we’re looking at is a journey through all of our venues over one year,” said Desai, who came to CTG from East West Players, where he was artistic director for seven years.
“When we did separate seasons at each venue we wanted to make sure we had a drama, and a comedy and different types of shows, and now we’re putting it together as one collective thing,” he said.
It was also a business decision made in the aftermath of the pandemic.
“We’re not operating three independent venues now, we’re operating one company amongst three spaces,” Desai said.
Subscription package tickets went on sale May 8 for the multi-show season which opens Oct. 2 with Desai making his CTG directorial debut at the Taper with a new take on Green Day’s “American Idiot” musical. It’s going to be a milestone event not just because it’s Desai’s debut as the head of a production but because it will also mark the re-opening of the 1967 venue, which suddenly closed last year because of a budget shortfall. The production will include a partnership with Deaf West Theatre to tell the punk rock musical tale in both English and American Sign Language. It runs through Nov. 10.
Other productions at the Taper this season include the world premiere of “Fake It Until You Make It” by Los Angeles based writer Larissa FastHorse. This show, which will run Jan. 29-March 9, will mark yet another significant event at the Taper because FastHorse will be the first Native American writer to have a mainstage production on the Mark Taper Forum stage.
Other season highlights include “Stephen Sondheim’s Old Friends” with Broadway royalty Bernadette Peters making her CTG debut. It runs Feb. 8- March 9, and the Tony and Olivier Award-winning hit “Life of Pi,” which runs from May 7-June 1, 2025. Both shows are taking place at the Ahmanson.
The Kirk Douglas Theatre meanwhile will feature programming that will appeal to families and young audiences including “Cat Kid Comic Club: The Musical,” a comedy adapted from the “Cat Kid Comic Club” series of books (Nov. 22-Jan. 5) and “El Otro Oz,” a bilingual adaptation of “The Wizard of OZ.” Dates for this production have yet to be announced.
For Desai, combining the seasons was not only a way to come up with a sustainable model after the pandemic, since it gives the company more flexibility when it comes to programming, but he also hopes it will make theater more accessible to people who may not be die-hard theater fans.
“I want us to be the premier home for theater in Southern California,” he said. “I wanted there to be something for everyone every season at CTG. As the largest theater company outside of New York, as the largest on the West Coast, I want us to make sure we’re a home for theater and we’re inviting as many folks in Los Angeles and Southern California to our venues,” Desai said.
Subscription packages start at $299. For tickets go to centertheatregroup.org
