Kushner's Homebody/ Kabul was originally slated to be part of the 2002-2003 season, but was postponed to give the playwright time to rework the play. The work, which premiered at New York Theatre Workshop in 2001, will be directed by Frank Galati (Ragtime, The Grapes of Wrath) in association with Chicago's Steppenwolf Theatre Company.
The world premiere of an untitled musical — with music by Cy Coleman (Little Me, Sweet Charity, Barnum, City of Angels), lyrics by the husband and wife team of Alan and Marilyn Bergman (Street Corner Symphony, Ballroom) and book by Larry Gelbart (...Forum, City of Angels) — will make its debut at the California stage in the coming season. Devised from a "Portraits in Jazz" concert at the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts created by Coleman and the Bergmans, the work will be a celebration of the luminaries in the art form. Taper artistic director Gordon Davidson will direct with choreography by Patricia Birch.
Parks' Pulitzer Prize-winning play Topdog/ Underdog will play at the Taper under the direction of George C. Wolfe. Stones in His Pockets by another award-winning female playwright Jones (Olivier and London Evening Standard awards) will also be featured in the new season.
Talking Cure by Christopher Hampton (Les Liasons Dangereuses) will make its American premiere at the Taper after debuting at London's National Theatre in January. The work, to be directed by Davidson, tells the tale of the relationship between Carl Jung, Sigmund Freud and a mysterious female patient of theirs.
The season will end with another world premiere, Be Bold. Commissioned by the Taper, Sybille Pearson penned the chronicle of the husband and wife — actress writer Salka and director-writer Berthold Viertel — who fled Nazi Germany and established themselves as artists in Hollywood. Davidson directs. The complete 2003-2004 season (subject to change) is as follows: