The work's ensemble of performers includes Jessica Frances Dukes, Phillip James Brannon, Laiona Michelle, Lance Coadie Williams and Sean Meehan. O'Hara, who won a 2011 Helen Hayes Award for his play Antebellum, directs Bootycandy, which is "inspired by a series of short plays that O'Hara created for New York's Partial Comfort Productions in 2003." Bootycandy "incorporates existing material with brand new scenes to generate a metatheatrical event like nothing else."
"I'm thrilled to continue Woolly Mammoth's relationship with Robert that started with In the Continuum and Antebellum," artistic director Howard Shalwitz said in a statement. "Bootycandy represents a much more playful romp into Robert's obsessions. In a series of hilarious and provocative sketches, it ingeniously manipulates the way we perceive language, sexuality, and the labels we place on ourselves and others. We've encouraged Robert, in this newest work, to test the limits of taste and acceptability — as a final sendoff to our season entitled 'a striptease of your subconscious.'"
Expect a "kaleidoscope of sassy lessons in sex education" [that] "speaks the truth about growing up gay and African American. With outrageous humor and real heart, it tests how we talk about our bodies at home, in church, and on the corner."
The production team includes set designer Tom Kamm, costume designer Kate Turner-Walker, lighting designer Colin K. Bills, sound designer Lindsay Jones, prop designer Jennifer Sheetz and dramaturg Miriam Weisfeld.
O'Hara received 2010 Helen Hayes Award for Outstanding New Play for Antebellum and an OBIE Award for his Direction of the world premiere of the critically acclaimed In the Continuum at Primary Stages. He wrote and directed the world premiere of Insurrection: Holding History at the New York Shakespeare Festival. The piece received the Oppenheimer Award for Best New American Play and was subsequently published by both TCG and Dramatist Play Service. He rewrote The Wiz (revival at LaJolla Playhouse directed by Des McAnuff). His plays, which include Brave Brood and American Maul, have been produced around the world and he has been awarded a Rockefeller Fellowship, TCG Extended Collaboration Grant, NEA/TCG Fellowship, a Van Lier Fellow at New Dramatists, the First Mark Taper Forum's Sherwood Award, and the TANNE Award for Exceptional Body of Work. Woolly Mammoth, devoted to contemporary works, is at 641 D Street, NW (7th & D) in Washington, DC. For directions and parking information, visit www.woollymammoth.net.
