the band's visit 2023

The Band's Visit

November 10 - December 17, 2023

• Photo Gallery
• Cast & Crew
• Program Interviews
• Discount Tickets
• Performance Calendar
• Seating Map

The Huntington holds performances at multiple locations. This production is taking place at The Huntington Theatre .

Music & Lyrics by David Yazbek

Book by Itamar Moses

Based on the screenplay by Eran Kolirin

Directed by Paul Daigneault

Choreography by Daniel Pelzig

Music Direction by José Delgado

A co-production with SpeakEasy Stage

THE BAND’S VISIT is presented through special arrangement with Music Theatre International (MTI). All authorized performance materials are also supplied by MTI. www.mtishows.com

The Huntington Theatre 264 Huntington Ave. Boston, MA 02115

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Approximate run time: 90 minutes with no intermission.

Content advisory: Please note this production contains theatrical haze and the smoking of cocoa shell cigarettes (100% nicotine free). Please click  here for a content advisory that addresses thematic elements.

View the Digital Program!

Notable Dates:

Opening Night: 11/15 at 7 pm

Open Caption Performance: 11/21 at 7:30 pm

ASL Performance: 12/13 at 7:30 pm

Audio Described Performance: 12/9 at 2:30 pm

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In this Tony Award-winning, feel-good musical, an Egyptian band of musicians is stranded in a small Israeli town after a transportation mix up, and with no lodgings available, the locals take them in for the night. By morning, surprising connections have been made and friendships forged over moments of shared humanity and love of music. A brief visit can have a lasting impact in this stunning musical adaptation of the acclaimed 2007 film that cast a spell over Broadway.  

“Exquisite and luminous.”

– the boston globe, “in short, it’s a wonder”, – boston.com, “gorgeous there’s just everything to love about this musical”, – jared bowen, gbh, “must-see theatre a profoundly beautiful production by two of boston’s best companies.”, – joyce kulhawik, joyceschoices.com, cast & crew, jared troilo.

Jared Troilo   The Huntington: Prayer for the French Republic . SpeakEasy Stage: Jerry Springer: The Opera, Far from Heaven, Dogfight, Significant Other, The View Upstairs, Tj Loves Sally 4 Ever, The Prom . Regional: Lyric Stage, Moonbox Productions, Wheelock Family Theatre, Reagle Music Theatre, Palace Theatre, Greater Boston Stage, Winter Park Playhouse, Shadowland Stages, Umbrella Stage, TigerLion Arts, Company Theatre, and The Barnstormers.

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Jesse Garlick

Jesse Garlick Off Broadway:  Good  (PTP/NYC) ;   Who Would Be King  (Ars Nova/Liars and Believers). Regional:  A Christmas Carol, Journey to the West, Arcadia   (Central Square Theater);  Good, Assassins   (New Rep);  A Story Beyond, Yellow Bird Chase, Who Would be King   (Liars and Believers);  Hamlet, As You Like It   (Brown Box Theatre Project);  Salome  (Bridge Rep);  Beowulf   (The Poets’ Theatre).

Fady Demian

Zelger, U/S Simon, U/S Camal

Fady Demian The Huntington: Prayer for the French Republic . SpeakEasy Stage: Wild Goose Dreams ; As You Like It (Actors’ Shakespeare Project); Rocky Relationships ( Moonbox Productions); Lorena: A Tabloid Epic and Incels & Other Myths (Boston Playwrights ’ Theatre); Walls (Playback Theatre); Hamlet (Oxford Shakespeare Company); and T he Taming of the Shrew (Prague Shakespeare Company).

Robert Saoud

Avrum, U/S Tewfiq

Robert Saoud  T he Huntington: A Midsummer Night’s Dream, Merrily We Roll Along . SpeakEasy Stage: Hello Again , Anna In the Tropics, Some Men, The New Century, XANADU, The Drowsy Chaperone, Casa Valentina . National Tour: GROUCHO: A Life in Review .

Josephine Moshiri Elwood

Josephine Moshiri Elwood The  Huntington: Prayer for the French Republic . SpeakEasy Stage: English, People, Places, & Things, Hand to God, The Whale . Regional:  Vanity Fair  (Central Square Theater) ; Onegin, Gabriel  (Greater Boston Stage Company) ; Old Money  (Commonwealth Shakespeare Company) ; Othello, God’s Ear (Actor’s Shakespeare Company) ; Long Ago and Far Away , The Cherry Orchard  (Walking the dog Theatre).

Noah Kieserman

Telephone Guy

Noah Kieserman  Broadway / National Tour:   Dear Evan Hansen .  Off Broadway:  Space Dogs   (MCC) .  TV/Film: “Law & Order” (NBC), “FBI: Most Wanted” (CBS), “The White House Plumbers” (HBO), “Lady i n The Lake” (Apple TV+). Education: University of Michigan’s BFA Musical Theatre Program. Special thanks to HCKR and Lexy at Framework. @nbkieserman  noahkieserman.com  

Brian Thomas Abraham

Brian Thomas Abraham  Broadway: Life Of Pi, Harry Potter and the Cursed Child Parts 1 & 2 . Regional: ART, Berkshire Theater Group, Mark Taper Forum, Geffen Playhouse, Milwaukee Rep, San Diego Rep, Laguna Playhouse, Ensemble Theater Company, 3D Theatricals.

Marianna Bassham

Marianna Bassham T he Huntington: Sweat, Common Ground Revisited, Romeo and Juliet, Yerma, I Was Most Alive with You, Becoming Cuba, Our Town , and The Luck of the Irish . SpeakEasy Stage:  People Places and Things, Small Mouth Sounds, Hand to God, Admissions, a Future Perfect , In the Next Room (or the Vibrator Play), Reckless, and Blackbird .

Jennifer Apple

Jennifer Apple  Broadway Tour: The Band’s Visit . Regional: Detroit ‘67, Romeo & Juliet (Chautauqua Theater Company); A Walk on the Moon, A Christmas Carol (American Conservatory Theater); title of show (Bridge Production Group); Theory of Relativity (Goodspeed Musicals); Fiddler on the Roof (Pennsylvania Shakespeare Festival & CFRT).

Kareem Elsamadicy

Kareem Elsamadicy  Off Broadway: Find the Golden Bird, Giovanni the Fearless . Regional: Light in the Piazza, La Traviata (Ars Nova). University: Man of La Mancha (NYU).

Andrew Mayer

Andrew Mayer  Broadway: Natasha, Pierre, and the Great Comet of 1812 ; A Christmas Carol. Off-Broadway: I Spy a Spy ; The Hello Girls (Prospect Theater) ; Dying for It ( Atlantic Theater) . Regional: Oliver (Goodspeed); The 12 (Denver Center); Appoggiatura (Indiana Rep); Fiddler on the Roof (Barrington Stage).

James Ra n a  Broadway: The Band’s Visit . Off Broadway: The Government Inspector (Red Bull Theatre); Serendib (Ensemble Studio Theatre); Marat/Sade, Macbeth, Mother Courage (Classical Theatre of Harlem); Shogun Macbeth (Pan Asian Rep); As You Like It (Worth Street Theatre). N ational / International : The Band’s Visit (1st National Tour – LA Critics Circle Nomination) ; Love’s Labor’s Lost (Royal Shakespeare Company) ; Macbeth (Bonn Biennial/Globe Neuss).

Emily Qualmann

Anna, U/S Iris, Dance Captain

Emily Qualmann  Broadway National Tours:  Escape to Margaritaville ,  Fiddler on the Roof . Off Broadway:  The Office!: A Musical Parody . Regional:  The Peculiar Tale…  (Goodspeed Opera House). Education: The Hartt School ‘19. Representation: The Roster Agency. @emilyqualmann emilyqualmann.com  

Zaven Ovian

Zaven Ovian  The Huntington: Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead, Romeo & Juliet . SpeakEasy Stage: English, Shakespeare in Love, Big Fish . Off Broadway: Émilie: La Marquise Du Châtelet… (Duende Productions/The Flea Theater). Regional: Selling Kabul (Premiere Stages at Kean); Water By the Spoonful, The Tale of the Allergist’s Wife (Lyric Stage). Education: BFA (Boston Conservatory ‘16). @zavenovian  

Elliot Lazar

U/S Papi, U/S Telephone Guy

Elliot Laz ar  National Tour: Fiddler on the Roof . Regional: Rent , Guys and Dolls ( with Winnipeg Symphony Orchestra ), The Little Mermaid (Rainbow Stage) ; Another Roll of the Dice (North Coast Rep) ; Parade (Opera NUOVA) ; A Little Night Music , The Addams Family (Dry Cold) ; James and the Giant Peach (Manitoba Theatre for Young People) ; The Trump Card (District Theatre Collective) ; American Idiot (Winnipeg Studio Theatre) ; You Were There: A Shadowplay (Pocket Frock) ; Way to Heaven (Winnipeg Jewish Theatre) ; Gianni Schicchi , The Magic Flute , Alcina , Cendrillon (Manitoba Underground Opera). Film/TV: Siberia (Saban Films). Education: BM in Vocal Performance (University of Manitoba ) ; MFA in Theatre ( Boston Conservatory at Berklee). @elliotlazar elliotlazar.com  

Jordana Kagan

U/S Julia, U/S Anna

Jordana Kagan  Regional: The Prom (White Plains Performing Arts Center). Film: Exuvia (Small Motor Skills). University: The Wolves (Fordham University).

Alex Poletti

U/S Haled, U/S Zelger

Alex Poletti  Regional: Ragtime: The Symphonic Concert (Boston Pops at Symphony Hall and Tanglewood); She Loves Me!, The Pirates of Penzance (College Light Opera Company). Education: BFA in Musical Theatre (Boston Conservatory) .

Sarah Corey

Sarah Corey  SpeakEasy Stage:  Caroline, or Change . Off Broadway:  A Letter to Harvey Milk, Love and Real Estate, Illyria.  International Tour:  Death for Five Voices.

Steven Goldstein

Steven Goldstein The Huntington:  I Was Most Alive With You . SpeakEasy Stage:  Big Fish.  Broadway:  Our Town.  Off Broadway:  Boys’ Life, Oh Hell, The Lights  (Lincoln Center Theater);  Romance, The Vosey Inheritance, The Water Engine, Three Sisters  (Atlantic Theater Company, founding member).

Ryan Mardesich

Passenger 1, U/S Sammy, Itzik

Ryan Mardesich  SpeakEasy Stage:  Wild Goose Dreams, Allegiance . Regional: New Repertory Theatre, North Shore Music Theatre, Barnstormers of NH, Sierra Repertory Theatre, San Francisco Playhouse, Broadway by the Bay, City Lights Theatre, and many others. Directing:  Sweeney Todd  (Moonbox Productions).

Daniel Rodriguez

Associate Conductor/Keyboard 2/Conductor Substitute/Keyboard 1 Substitute

Daniel Rodriguez T he Huntington: Sunday in the Park with George, A Little Night Music . SpeakEasy Stage: Jerry Springer: The Opera , The Mystery of Edwin Drood, Zanna Don’t! . Regional: Assassins, Preludes , The Last Five Years (Lyric Stage Company); Kinky Boots , Little Shop of Horrors (North Shore Music Theater); Oklahoma , Pippin, West Side Story (Reagle Music Theater); Caroline or Change, Cabaret, The Wild Party ( Moonbox Productions); In the Heights (Wheelock Family Theatre); The Lily’s Revenge, The Blue Flower (ART); Ain’t Misbehavin ’ (Front Porch Arts Collective) .

Her di Xha  He has taught and performed in various genres with artists throughout Central Mass, Boston, and the New York area. He has been a percussionist with the New England Philharmonic and Civic Orchestra of Boston as well as having worked as a pit musician on musicals and theatre productions throughout Massachusetts.

Mike Rivard

Acoustic and Electric Bass

Mike Rivard  The Huntington: Merrily We Roll Along . Regional: Wicked, The Lion King, Beautiful: The Carole King (Broadway in Boston), The Blue Flower (ART), and many others. He leads the award-winning world-dub-jazz collective Club d’Elf , and performs regularly with the Boston Pops Orchestra. 

Mac Ritchey

Oud, Acoustic and Electric Guitar, on stage

Mac Ri t chey  Multi-instrumentalist with a 20-year primary focus on the oud, or ‘Arabic lute’, and an immersion in the modal musical systems of the Middle East. Ritchey is also an acclaimed music producer and proprietor of Possum Hall Studios in Carlisle, MA, having recorded hundreds of albums and projects for clients over 30 years. Additionally, Mac is a guitar luthier, designing and building custom stringed instruments for fellow musicians. possumhall.com  

Joe LaRocca

Reeds, on stage

Joe LaRocca T he Huntington: The Lehman Trilogy . T our: Jesus Christ Superstar (50th Anniversary National Tour, Reed 1). Regional: The Lehman Trilogy (Repertory Theater of St Louis); Beautiful: The Carole King Musical (Ogunquit Playhouse, Reed 2); A Man of No Importance (Footlight Club, Reed 1); The Secret Garden, Matilda, Beauty and the Beast, Fun Home, Nine , and others.

Wick Simmons

Cello, on stage

Wick Simmons Broadway Tour:  The Band’s Visit . Wick Simmons has performed at Joe’s Pub, The Kennedy Center, The Dolby, MASS MoCA, Carnegie Hall, Maison l’Amérique Latine, and on NPR. On an international scale, Wick’s body of work spans the worlds of creative-technology, theater, installation art, kink, improvisation, older and newer music.

Fabio Pirozzolo

Percussion, on stage

Fabio Pirozzolo  The Huntington: Yerma . Italian drummer, multi-percussionist and singer currently based in Boston, Massachusetts. Originally from Terracina, Italy, he started his career as a folk percussionist in one of the most famous folk groups in his area, playing the Italian frame drums tamburello and tammorra .

David Yazbek

Music & Lyrics

David Yazbek A varied career as a recording artist, Emmy-winning TV and film writer, music producer and pianist has somehow led Yazbek to a career on Broadway. His four shows, The Full Monty, Dirty Rotten Scoundrels, Women on The Verge of a Nervous Breakdown , and The Band’s Visi t were all Tony nominated for Best Score. Yazbek took home the Tony for Best Score for T he Band’s Visit . The Full Monty won him the Drama Desk Award for Best Music.

Itamar Moses

Itamar Moses is the author of the full-length plays Outrage, Bach at Leipzig, Celebrity Row, The Four of Us, Yellowjackets, Back Back Back , Completeness , and The Whistleblower ; the musicals Nobody Loves You (with Gaby Alter), Fo r tress of Soli tude (with Michael Friedman) and T he Band’s Visit (with David Yazbek), and the evening of short plays Love/Stories (Or Bu t You Will Get Used To It) . His work has appeared Off-Broadway and elsewhere in New York, at regional theaters across the country and in Canada, Hong Kong, Israel, Venezuela, Turkey, and Chile, and is published by Faber & Faber and Samuel French .

Paul Daigneault

Paul Daigneault  is a New England-based freelance director, producer, and teacher .  Since founding the award-winning SpeakEasy Stage in 1992, he has produced over 150 Boston premieres. As a director, he is especially proud of his projects that have centered gay and queer stories as well as his passion for contemporary American musicals . 

Daniel Pelzig

Choreographer

Daniel Pelzig  The Huntington: Sunday in the Park with George, A Little Night Music, Company, Candide, Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Dead, Tartuffe, The Mikado, HMS Pinafore . Broadway: 33 Variations , A Year with Frog and Toad , Sweeney Todd (Kennedy Center Sondheim Festival). Off Broadway: Privates on Parade, Newyorkers , The New Moon, Valhalla .

José Delgado

Music Director/Conductor/Keyboard 1

Jo sé Delgado The Huntington: Becoming Cuba, M . SpeakEasy Stage: Dogfight, The Light in the Piazza, The Wild Party , Parade, Floyd Collins, Caroline or Change, Saturday Night . Regional: Moulin Rouge .

Wilson Chin

Co-Scenic Designer

Wilson Chin The Huntington: Clyde’s , Teenage Dick , Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead, Romeo and Juliet , Skeleton Crew , Tiger Style! . Broadway: Cost of Living , Pass Over (Drama Desk and Lortel Award nominations), Next Fall . Off Broadway: A Bright New Boise (Signature), The Thanksgiving Play (Playwrights Horizons), Space Dogs (MCC, Lortel Award nomination), Teenage Dick (Ma-Yi/Public), This Land Was Made (Vineyard).

Jimmy Stubbs

Jimmy Stubbs Off Broadway: Richard II/Henry IV (Theatre for a New Audience); Thebes ( Rattlestick Theater). University: Alcina (Yale Opera); Marisol (University of Rochester); The Juniors (Colgate University); Cabaret (Yale Dramatic Association); Fun Home (Yale School of Drama).

Miranda Kau Giurleo

Costume Designer

Miranda Kau Giurleo SpeakEasy Stage: The Scottsboro Boys (IRNE Award — Best Costume Design); School Girls; Or, The African Mean Girls Play ; Prom; Allegiance . Regional: The Royale (Merrimack Rep & Capital Rep – Albany); The Wickhams: Christmas at Pemberly, The Heath, Native Gardens, A Christmas Carol (Merrimack Rep); The Convert (Underground Railway Theater); Dancing at Lughnasa , The New Electric Ballroom , Lettice and Lovage (Gloucester Stage); Dry Land , Shockheaded Peter (Company One); Macbeth (Commonwealth Shakespeare Company’s Second Stage).

Aja M. Jackson

Lighting Designer

Aja M. Jackson The Huntington: T he Band’s Visit, The Art of Burning . Broadway: Fat Ham . Off Broadway: A Commercial Jingle for Regina Comet, Rock and Roll Man . Regional: Hear Word (A RT / The Public Theater Under the Radar Festival) ; Lost In Yonkers, The Art of Burning, Pride and Prejudice, Simona’s Search [coming soon] (Hartford Stage) ; A Doll’s House, Harvey, World Goes Round, Behold, A Negress (Everyman Theatre); Fences (Shakespeare and Company); World Goes Round (Olney Theatre); Pimpinone and Ino (Boston Early Music Festival) ; Goddess (Berkeley Rep).

Joshua Millican

Sound Designer

Joshua Millican T he Huntington: A Little Night Music . Broadway/West End: Six, Parade (Revival), Head Over Heels, The Band’s Visit, Prince of Broadway, An American in Paris, Sunday in the Park with George, The Bridges of Madison County, Big Fish . His designs have been heard across six continents and include theatre, film, radio, and museum installations. Education: Liverpool Institute for Performing Arts. joshmillican.com  

Vahdat Yeganeh

Vahdat Yeganeh SpeakEasy Stage: English . Regional: ART, Yale Repertory Theatre, the Nora, Underground Railway Theater, Boston Experimental Theatre. Film: Over There (co-producer). Teaching: Learning Lead and the director of Dialogue of Civilizations Program (ART), Theatre and Psychoanalysis (PersPsy Analytic), Theatre of Antonin Artaud and Jerzy Grotowski (New England Conservatory). Publication: Drama for dialogue of civilization (TESOL Journal).   bostonexperimenatltheatre.com      

Rosalind Bevan

Local Casting

Rosalind Bevan The Huntington:  Joy & Pandemic, Clyde’s, K-I-S-S-I-N-G, Joe Turner’s Come and Gone, Common Ground Revisited ,  Our Daughters, Like Pillars, The Bluest Eye,  (Line Producer);  Witch  (Assistant Director); Dream Boston audio plays:  Echoes  and  The 54th in ‘22  (Director).

Emily F. McMullen

Production Stage Manager

Emily F. McMullen  has stage managed over 30 shows over the past nine seasons at The Huntington, including John Proctor is the Villain, The Band’s Visit, The Lehman Trilogy, Clyde’s, The Art of Burning, Common Ground Revisited, Hurricane Diane, Sweat, Rosencrantz & Guildenstern Are Dead, Indecent, Romeo and Juliet, A Doll’s House, Part 2, Man in the Ring, The Niceties, Top Girls, Bad Dates, Tartuffe, and Merrily We Roll Along .

Lucas Bryce Dixon

Stage Manager

Lucas Dixon  The Huntington: John Proctor is the Villain, The Band’s Visit, Fat Ham, The Lehman Trilogy, Clyde’s, Joe Turner’s Come and Gone, Common Ground Revisited, The Bluest Eye, Hurricane Diane, Yerma .

Lyndsay Allyn Cox

Producing Director

Lyndsay Allyn Cox The Huntington (acting): Common Ground Revisited ; Our Daughters, Like Pillars ; Witch . Regional (directing): Chicken and Biscuits (Front Porch Arts Collective); Tiny Beautiful Things (Gloucester Stage); Splash Hatch on the E Going Down (The Nora Theatre Company). Regional (acting): Fairview , Men on Boats ( SpeakEasy Stage); Fabulation (or the Re -E ducation of Undine) , Barbecue, By The Way, Meet Vera Stark (Lyric Stage Company); Bright Half Life (Actors’ Shakespeare Project); The Three Musketeers (Greater Boston Stage Company); Winter People (Boston Playwrights’ Theatre); Caroline, Or Change ( Moonbox Productions); The Overwhelming , Leftovers (Company One).

Sondra R. Katz

General Manager

Sondra R. Katz (General Manager) is in her nineteenth season at the Huntington. She has worked on Broadway, Off Broadway, and regionally as a stage manager, company manager, production manager and general manager.

Dori A. Robinson

Assistant Director

Dori A. Robinson The Huntington:  Prayer for the French Republic .  Directing credits include  Silent Sky, The Elm Tree ,  Fully Committed, A Bright Room Called Day, Julius Caesar, The Merchant of Venice, The Lion in Winter ,  Winter of Discontent, Peter and the Starcatcher ,  A Bintel Brief, The Chelmites Capture the Moon .

Assistant to the Director

Huan Bui Regional: As You Like It, Picnic on the Battlefield, Shipwrecked! An Entertainment ! (Shakespeare Theatre of New Jersey). University: L ove’s Labour’s Lost , God of Carnage , Marisol, The Laramie Project , In the Book Of…, Tribes (UARK Theatre). Education: MFA in Theatre Directing (University of Arkansas). Huan is a Vietnamese theatre maker and a 2023-2024 Literary and Artistic Fellow at SpeakEasy Stage.  

Lee Nishri-Howitt

Voice Coach

Lee Nishri -Howitt The Huntington: Prayer for the French Republic, The Lehman Trilogy , Romeo and Juliet, The Art of Burning . Regional: Once, Allegiance ( SpeakEasy Stage); The Book of Will, A Gentleman’s Guide to Love and Murder (Lyric Stage); Oliver!, Hair, Trayf (New Rep); Little Women, James and the Giant Peach (Wheelock Family Theatre); All is Calm (Greater Boston Stage Company).

John-William Gambrell

Rehearsal Musician/Keyboard 2 Substitute

John-William Gambrell The Huntington:  The Lehman Trilogy  (copyist) .  Other copyist credits:  The Lehman Trilogy  (St. Louis Rep);  Romeo and Juliet, The Tale of Despereaux  (The Old Globe). His original musical,  Toothy’s Treasure , made its Off Broadway workshop debut at the Theater Center in NYC in 2023. A production at the Boston Center for the Arts followed that same year.

Additional Staff for The Band’s Visit

Assisstant Director………………………Dori A. Robinson

Associate Music Director………………Daniel Rodriguez

Dialect Coach……………………………Lee Nishri-Howitt

Intimacy Consultant…………………….Kayleigh Kane

Assistant to the Director………………….Huan Bui

Vocal Coach……………………….David Freeman Coleman

Skating Consultant………………………..Pandora Bassett

Production Assistants……………………………Ross Gray, Kendyl Trott

Carpenters……………………………………..Allie Zalewski Hannah Ashe, Joe Ellard, Max Rocca, Nick Robinette Steven Asaro, Amy West

Automation Run Crew……………………..Charlie Berry

Scenic Artists……………………………………Sam Galvao

Props Artisan………………………………………..Ian Thorsell

Stitcher…………………………………………Sasha Nemi Lato

Wardrobe Run…………………………………..Jennie Fuchs

Wardrobe Swing……………………Katherine Lawrence

Wig Run…………………………………………Kiara Escalera

Season Electrician………………………Violet Gayzagian

Electricians……………………………………Anna Brevetti, Jemma Kepner, Joseph Lark-Riley, Callie Moos, Nick Robinette

Follow Spot Operators……………………Kaitlin Smith, Brian Vlasak

Audio Run A1……………………………..Lexie Lankiewicz

Robb Simring……………………………….Acoustic and Electric Bass Substitute

Read the full interview: LEGENDS OF THE COSTUME SHOP

Discount tickets.

The Huntington offers many different affiliation and aged-based discounts off our ticket prices. Discounts can be applied online, in person, or over the phone. Patrons who purchase discounted tickets must pick up their tickets and provide proof of ID or eligibility at ticketing services before the show. All discounts are subject to availability.

HYPE discounts

$40 tickets are available any time for patrons age 40 years and younger as part of our HYPE program (Huntington Young Patron Events). Valid ID required. Tickets are subject to availability and some zone restrictions may apply. Use promo code DISCOUNT to access HYPE (40 Below) pricing. I nput code DISCOUNT before seat selection. Promo will apply at checkout. Learn more about HYPE .

Student discounts

$25 tickets are available to all performances for full-time students. Use promo code DISCOUNT to access Student pricing.  Valid ID required.

Active US Military

$25 tickets are available to all performances for Active US Military and their immediate family. Use promo code MILITARY to access US Military pricing.  Valid ID required.

Huntington Community Membership Initiative

$20 tickets are available to all performances for participants in the Huntington Community Membership Initiative. Use your exclusive HCMI promo code tied to your organization to redeem. Learn more about our Huntington Community Membership Initiative .

$30-$35 Tickets

In addition to our age and affiliation-based discounts, a limited number of unrestricted $30-$35 tickets are available at each performance.

Accessibility discounts

Patrons who are Deaf and/or blind/low-vision and their guests can purchase tickets to designated ASL-Interpreted or Audio Described performances for $20 each.  Learn more about accessible performances .

Limited Pay-What-You-Wish

At The Huntington, we believe price shouldn’t be a barrier for folks to enjoy world-class theatre. Because of this, we have a limited number of Pay-What-You-Wish tickets available for all Huntington performances for those who need them. Pay-What-You-Wish is not available online. For more information or to purchase tickets, visit Ticketing Services in person at either box office location or call us at 617-266-0800.

Group sales

Groups can save up to 20% off ticket prices for most productions. Student group pricing available.  Learn more about group rates .

HOW TO USE DISCOUNT CODES

Enter your promo code into the top right corner of your screen next to “View Cart”.  Available discounts will apply automatically after entering the promo code.

For questions about promo codes, please contact our ticketing team by emailing [email protected]  or calling 617-266-0800.

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The Band's Visit

The huntington theatre 264 huntington ave. boston, ma 02115.

In this Tony Award-winning, feel-good musical, an Egyptian band of musicians is stranded in a small Israeli town after a transportation mix up, and with no lodgings available, the locals take them in for the night. By morning, surprising connections have been made and friendships forged over moments of shared humanity and love of music. A brief visit can have a lasting impact in this stunning musical adaptation of the acclaimed 2007 film that cast a spell over Broadway.  

Music & Lyrics by David Yazbek

Book by Itamar Moses

Based on the screenplay by Eran Kolirin

Directed by Paul Daigneault

Choreography by Daniel Pelzig

Music Direction by José Delgado

A co-production with   SpeakEasy Stage

90 minutes with no intermission.

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The Huntington is Boston’s leading professional theatre and one of the region’s premier cultural assets. Since its founding in 1982, The Huntington has received over 150 Elliot Norton and Independent Reviewers of New England Awards, as well as the Tony Award for Outstanding Regional Theatre. In the past 36 years, The Huntington has played to an audience of 3.5 million, presented over 200 plays.

A Strange Loop

South End / Calderwood Pavilion at the BCA

Orpheus in the Overworld

Romeo & Juliet

In ‘The Band’s Visit,’ there’s harmony in human connection

When composer David Yazbek began working on “The Band’s Visit” years ago, he remembers watching the 2007 film that serves as the musical’s inspiration — about a ragtag Egyptian orchestra stranded in an Israeli hamlet for a night — and seeing an image that declared the film’s intention to leave politics and religion outside the frame. As the band sits down at a cafe, a photograph of an army tank hangs on the wall beside their table. One musician looks at it uneasily and gently places his hat over the photo.

“It’s like an announcement that the story needs to not be encumbered by surface politics to deliver its message,” says Yazbek, in a phone interview.

The story of Israeli Jews taking in and bonding with a group of Arab musicians resonated when “The Band’s Visit” premiered at the Atlantic Theatre Company in 2016 and then moved the following year to Broadway, where it would win 10 Tony Awards, including best musical. With Israel and Hamas now at war, it may seem even more painfully relevant. Yet the musical, with a book by Itamar Moses, is as gentle as a Mediterranean sea breeze and doesn’t wade into the tumultuous history of Israel and Palestine. “[The show] is about Egyptians and Israelis — so Jews and Arabs — and yet there’s never a flashback to a war scene or a big fight about politics,” Yazbek says. “It’s all on a very intimate human level, and that makes it affecting.”

Boston audiences will now get a chance to discover its charms in a Huntington and SpeakEasy Stage Company co-production that begins performances Friday.

In this disarmingly simple story, the Alexandria Ceremonial Police Orchestra — wearing bright powder-blue uniforms — find themselves stuck in a desolate Israeli town, the fictional Bet Hatikvah, after a transportation and language mix-up. With no hotels in this backwater and a bus not arriving until the next day, the townspeople bring these weary (and wary) travelers into their homes for the night. Despite the cultural and language divide, bonds are forged over a deep love of music and shared experience.

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“At a time when we feel so separate, it’s a show that’s really about connecting,” says Jennifer Apple, who plays the charismatic cafe owner Dina. “In the zeitgeist that we’re living in right now, having people from [different groups in] the Middle East sitting on a stage and coexisting, not fighting but talking and sharing joy and happiness and love and culture, that feels very political right now.”

Apple, who’s lived in Israel and has family there, was deeply affected by the Hamas massacres last month. Her cousin was one of the scores of concertgoers killed by terrorists at the Supernova music festival near Gaza. She learned the news just as she was packing to come to Boston. “I feel that responsibility to show the humanity of this Israeli woman,” Apple says of her character. “She is a part of who I am.”

In the show, Dina leads the charge to assist the musicians. She brings the reserved, straitlaced conductor Tewfiq (Brian Thomas Abraham), a widower, to her apartment to crash for the night. They eventually go out for dinner and bond over a love of Arabic music and film. Later, they confess their deepest secrets, fears, and regrets. “They’re both damaged, and this is probably the first time in a long time that there’s been a connection on the heart level for either of them,” says Yazbek.

Trumpet player Haled (Kareem Elsamadicy), a swaggering ladies man, helps anxious Israeli cafe worker Papi (Jesse Garlick), who’s hilariously petrified around women, find the confidence to talk to his crush Julia at a skating rink while revealing his own insecurities. Cafe waiter Itzik (Jared Troilo) brings violinist Camal (Andrew Mayer) and assistant conductor Simon (James Rana) to stay overnight with his family. During the awkward dinner, Itzik’s frustrated wife, Iris (Marianna Bassham), laments that Itzik refuses to grow up. Later, Simon plays his unfinished concerto for the group, and Itzik acknowledges his shortcomings. Then there’s a character known only as the Telephone Guy (Noah Kieserman), who waits obsessively by a pay phone for his girlfriend to call.

While nothing monumental happens in the show, a powerful current of emotion runs beneath the surface — from fear, pain, and regret to joy, sorrow, and longing. “It’s like the closest musical to a Chekhov play I’ve ever experienced. There’s a lot of subtext, and what’s not said is just as important as what is said,” says SpeakEasy artistic director Paul Daigneault, who’s helming the production. “People are choosing their language and words very carefully. So we want to live in the pauses and the discomfort, which sets up the rest of the play when there is connection.”

A songwriting shape-shifter, Yazbek is the composer and lyricist of the crowd-pleasing Broadway comedies “The Full Monty,” “Dirty Rotten Scoundrels,” and “Tootsie,” all based on the popular films, along with an adaptation of Pedro Almodóvar’s “Women on the Verge of a Nervous Breakdown.” “You think of musical theater as an artform that tries to pull heartstrings or chorus-kick its way into excitement as opposed to landing genuine emotions,” Yazbek says.

But with “The Band’s Visit,” Yazbek was working in a more contemplative and small-scale (yet no less acerbic) mode, one that’s more in line with his work as an artist and performer fronting various rock bands. “You’re always trying to find something of yourself in writing a song. There were only four or five songs in ‘The Full Monty’ where I could really plumb some depths. But with ‘The Band’s Visit,’ most of the songs are me really looking into myself. Almost every song in it is very personal.”

Indeed, he shows off his influences in songs like the wry “Waiting” and “Welcome to Nowhere,” with their deadpan lyrics, the ravishing ballad “Omar Sharif” that “floats in like a jasmine wind,” the Chet Baker-style torch tune “Haled’s Song About Love,” and the yearning ode to fleeting connection, “Answer Me.” The eclectic score is a stew of classical Arabic music, klezmer, jazz, pop, and more.

“It’s a type of music I’ve had under my skin for a long time, because it speaks to part of my background,” says Yazbek, a native New Yorker whose father is of Lebanese descent and whose mother was half Jewish. “I could think of certain relatives of mine and people from generations past.”

Thematically, the show also explores Yazbek’s longtime interest in Eastern spirituality, meditation, and Sufi poetry. “The thing that made it the most personal was that I felt this deep spiritual undertone to the whole piece. So I was writing in a poetic way. I felt like I was doing something two or three layers deeper than usual.”

What does Yazbek hope audiences take away? At the risk of sounding “too woo-woo,” he says with a laugh, “there’s a Sufi, Buddhist message that has to do with the truth that we’re all the same. When you meet and spend time with people and put away the labels, you’ll find more often than not that you’re basically communicating with another version of yourself. . . . We’re all the same person wearing different faces. We’re all fingers on the same hand.”

THE BAND’S VISIT

Co-production of the Huntington and SpeakEasy Stage Company. At the Huntington Theatre, 264 Huntington Ave. Nov. 10-Dec. 17. Tickets from $30. 617-266-0800, www.huntingtontheatre.org

Christopher Wallenberg can be reached at [email protected] .

Stage and Cinema

Arts and Entertainment Reviews

Theater Review: THE BAND’S VISIT (The Huntington and SpeakEasy Stage Company in Boston)

by Lynne Weiss on November 17, 2023

in Theater-Boston , Theater-Regional

AN UNEXPECTED AND BEAUTIFUL VISIT

Once, not very long ago, a group of musicians came to Israel from Egypt. You probably didn’t hear about it. It wasn’t very important. These sentences, projected on a screen, are the opening of The Band’s Visit , the musical that won 10 Tony Awards in 2018. Directed by Paul Daigneault with choreography by Daniel Pelzig , the Boston premiere of this highly-anticipated production — delayed due to COVID — is just the latest in the Huntington ’s string of triumphs under new artistic director Loretta Greco . I wondered, given current events not only in Israel-Palestine but locally at Boston’s many universities , how a show about unexpected friendship between Arabs and Jews would go over . The answer, in this case, is very well. As one Israeli sings to an Egyptian in “Something Different,” “Nothing is as beautiful as something you don’t expect.”

Based on the Israeli film of the same name, with music and lyrics by David Yazbek and book by Itamar Moses , it’s a story that starts with a misunderstanding. A group of Egyptian musicians—the Alexandria Ceremonial Police Orchestra—end up in a drab and boring desert town in Israel due to their inability to properly pronounce the name of the place they are trying to get to when buying their bus tickets.

Because there are no other buses until the next day, and because the town has no hotels, members of the band end up spending the night in the homes of three residents. Through the power of music, layers of grief and fear are peeled away in the course of this adult chamber musical.   Small miracles occur : love-starved Dina ( Jennifer Apple ) gets to reenact a brief scene from her favorite movie with band leader Tewfiq ( Brian Thomas Abraham ) taking the role of Egyptian leading man Omar Sharif ; widower Avrum ( Robert Saoud ) relives the moment of meeting his late wife; Itzik ( Jared Troilo ) recognizes his responsibilities to Iris ( Marianna Bassham ) as a husband and father; painfully shy Papi ( Jesse Garlick ) learns how to court Julia ( Josephine Moshiri Elwood ) thanks to instruction from Haled ( Kareem Elsmadicy ), a man who has never court ed a woman because he will have an arranged marriage.

The music , under the direction of José Delgado , is crucial . And fantastic. What a delight to enjoy the score, played by an 8-piece orchestra behind the screen at the back of the stage (joyously revealed at the end) as well as the terrific clarinet work by Joe LaRocca  and percussionist Fabio Pirozzolo on the traditional Egyptian d arbouka , or goblet drum ( as Simon, one of the longest running members of the band, James Rana also plays clarinet on stage) . The show includes not only Egyptian and Arab musical styles and instrumentation , but cites influences ranging from Chet Baker and George Gershwin to the Beatles and Michael Jackson . At one point, the whole audience clapp ed along with the beat of an instrumental number , but for the most part, this is a “quiet” musical. There is singing and dancing, but there are no big production numbers. Most of the songs involve only one or two people; the exception is the joyous “The Beat of Your Heart” in which Avrum , Itzik , Simon, and Camal evoke the power of romantic love . These solos and duets give the songs both tenderness and a certain dignity , exactly the emotional tone one might expect in an experience of intimacy with a stranger .

The evocative music, along with Wilson Chin and Jimmy Stubbs ’s scenic design and Miranda Kau Giurleo ’s costume design, go a long way toward placing us in the Negev Desert in 1996, a time when Egypt was actively engaged in peace efforts in the region . Nonetheless, the first women we see in this play are in Israeli military uniform s , reminding us that peace is not a given in this environment. 

At the end of the play, the Israelis and the Egyptians still speak different languages. They are still strangers, with a lot of potential for misunderstandings. Even so, they have glimpsed one another ’s shared hopes and disappointments and are able to say s halom aleichem and a laikum salaam and know that despite the differences, they mean the same thing.

photos by T. Charles Erickson

The Band’s Visit The Huntington in a co-production with SpeakEasy Stage Huntington Theatre, 264 Huntington Ave. near Symphony Hall in Boston Tues-Thurs at 7:30; Fri & Sat at 8; select Sun at 7pm matinees: select Wed at 3; select Sat and Sun at 2:30 ends on December 10. 2023 EXTENDED to December 17, 2023 for tickets, call 617.266.0800 or visit The Huntington

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Thank you so much for this wonderful production. In the present day fraught situation, it was a ray of hope for all humans.

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THE BAND’S VISIT Is Coming to Boston in a Historic First Between 2 Theatre Companies

The Band's Visit

In a historic first, two beloved Boston theatre companies are coming together to present the city’s premiere of the Tony-winning The Band’s Visit . The Huntington and SpeakEasy Stage co-produce the musical, which is set to run at the recently renovated Huntington Theatre from November 10–December 10, as part of the companies’ respective 2023-2024 seasons.

“We at SpeakEasy are thrilled to team up with our good friends at The Huntington to bring this sublime, beautiful musical to life,” says SpeakEasy Founder and Producing Artistic Director Paul Daigneault, who will direct this production. “It is also an incredible honor to be the first to direct a musical on the new Huntington Theatre stage, to invite the city’s amazing talent on this artistic journey, and to share the many wonders of this surprising and joyous show.”

‍ The Band’s Visit features music and lyrics by David Yazbek and a book by Itamar Moses, and won 10 Tony Awards in 2018, as well as the Grammy for Best Musical Theatre Album in 2019. Based on Eran Kolirin’s 2007 film of the same name, the musical first premiered at the Atlantic Theater Company Off-Broadway in 2016 before transferring to Broadway in 2017. The tour was scheduled to perform in Boston in 2020 but was canceled due to the pandemic. This production of The Band’s Visit is licensed by Music Theatre International.

It centers on an Egyptian band of musicians who become stranded in a small Israeli town after a transportation mix-up. With no lodgings available, the locals take them into their homes for the night—by morning, everyone’s life will have been changed.

Though marks the first time that SpeakEasy and the Huntington have jointly staged a production, the two companies have been longtime collaborators and worked together with Company One Theater to produce a festival of Annie Baker’s Shirley, VT, plays in 2010. They also work together closely on a regular basis at the Calderwood Pavilion at the BCA, which the Huntington built and now manages. SpeakEasy is a resident theatre company there. Both will announce their full seasons in early April. 

After 4 years in the biz, Dan swapped out theatre for sports and is now a researcher at NBC Olympics. Spectacle remains a key passion and is dedicated to building bridges between different forms of entertainment. He has worked as a writer and editor at Theatrely and Playbill, covering Broadway and beyond. In addition, he has been published in Rolling Stone, Spy, and others.

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“The Band’s Visit” highlights the struggle and importance of connection

November 16, 2023

By Kendall Claar

The band has arrived in Boston!

Premiering November 10 at The Huntington Theater, “The Band’s Visit” forges connections both on and off the stage. This particular production is co-produced with SpeakEasy Stage.

Photo courtesy of The Huntington Theater; photo by T. Charles Erickson.

Adapted from the 2007 film of the same name, the musical tells the story of an Egyptian band of musicians that become stranded in the small Israeli town of Bet Hatikvah following a transportation mix-up. With no lodgings, the locals take them in for the night, and by the next day, surprising connections have been made and new friendships formed.

In a time of heavy foreign conflicts, “The Band’s Visit” demonstrates the importance of building connections across cultures and how easy it is to find common ground in the art we consume and in shared life experiences.

The show cements itself early on as one with a lot of laughs. After the first few lines are exchanged in Arabic, a member of the band says, “Maybe we should speak English,” subtly acknowledging the audience. This is shortly followed by Haled (Kareem Elsamadicy) asking a woman he meets if she likes Chet Baker, before playing “My Funny Valentine” on his trumpet – both of which become a recurring gag.

Plenty of tender moments can be found throughout the show too. This can be seen in the tight embrace between Iris (Marianna Bassham) and Itzik (Jared Troilo) as they reconcile as a couple. It’s also on view when Simon (James Rana) says to Avrum (Robert Saoud) in Hebrew “Shalom aleichem” and Avrum replies in Arabic “Alaikum salaam.” Both phrases, common in their respective language, offer blessings of peace.

Jennifer Apple as Dina, the strong and independent female lead, gives the most outstanding performance of the show. Her vocals alone are a highlight for their clarity, strength, and sheer emotiveness. Other strong performances come from Marianna Bassam as Iris and Jesse Garlick as Papi. Although having few lines, Bassam still manages to clearly convey Iris’ exhaustion as a wife and mother. Garlick’s portrayal of Papi’s anxiety in the pursuit of romance makes him an endearing character and an audience favorite.

Ultimately, the show demonstrates the struggle for meaningful human connection. This is powerfully communicated in the final song of the show when the entire cast joins in on the refrain, asking “will you answer me?”

Despite the challenges of forming connections, the answer appears to be “yes.”

Performances of “The Band’s Visit” will run through Dec. 17.

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The Band’s Visit

A co-production with the huntington.

Performing at: The Huntington Theatre 264 Huntington Ave.

In this Tony Award-winning, feel-good musical, an Egyptian band of musicians is stranded in a small Israeli town after a transportation mix up, and with no lodgings available, the locals take them in for the night. By morning, surprising connections have been made and friendships forged over moments of shared humanity and love of music. A brief visit can have a lasting impact in this stunning musical adaptation of the acclaimed 2007 film that cast a spell over Broadway. 

Brian Thomas Abraham

Jennifer Apple

Marianna Bassham

Fady Demian

Kareem Elsamadicy

Josephine Moshiri Elwood

Jesse Garlick

Noah Kieserman

Andrew Mayer

Zaven Ovian

Emily qualmann

Robert Saoud

Jared Troilo

Sarah Corey

Steven Goldstein

Jordanna Kagan

Elliot Lazar

Ryan Mardesich

Alex Poletti

Joe LaRocca

Fabio Pirozzolo

Mac Ritchey

Mike Rivard

Daniel Rodriguez

Wick Simmons

José Delgado

Paul F DAIGNEAULT

Daniel Pelzig

Wilson Chin

Jimmy Stubbs

Miranda Kau Giurleo

Aja M. Jackson

Joshua Millican

Vahdat Yeganeh

John-William Gambrell

Dori A. Robinson

Lee Nishri-Howitt

For the press.

For Press Performances and further press inquiries, contact  Jim Torres , Director of Marketing and Communication.

BOX OFFICE 617.933.8600

Main Office 617.482.3279

Theatre: 527 Tremont St Boston, MA 02116

Mailing: 539 Tremont St Boston, MA 02116

Performing at the Stanford Calderwood Pavilion at the Boston Center for the Arts, 527 Tremont St. in the South End.

SpeakEasy Stage Company is the Stanford Calderwood Pavilion Resident Theatre Company at the Boston Center for the Arts. This program is supported in part by a grant from the Boston Cultural Council, a local agency which is funded by the Massachusetts Cultural Council, administrated by the Mayor’s Office of Arts, Tourism, and Special Events.

The Band's Visit

Where: https://www.huntingtontheatre.org/whats-on/the-bands-visit/ Huntington Theatre 264 Huntington Ave Boston , MA 02115

Admission: $30

Categories: Art, Date Idea, Good for Groups, Shows

Event website: https://www.huntingtontheatre.org/whats-on/the-bands-visit/

In this Tony Award-winning, feel-good musical, an Egyptian band of musicians is stranded in a small Israeli town after a transportation mix up, and with no lodgings available, the locals take them in for the night. By morning, surprising connections have been made and friendships forged over moments of shared humanity and love of music. A brief visit can have a lasting impact in this stunning musical adaptation of the acclaimed 2007 film that cast a spell over Broadway. 

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THE BAND'S VISIT, THE HOT WING KING & More Set for Writers Theatre 2023-24 Season

The season will also feature the return of the hit holiday favorite Manual Cinema’s Christmas Carol and more.

Writers Theatre has announced the inaugural season for Artistic Director Braden Abraham , in partnership with Executive Director Kathryn M. Lipuma , to include award winning plays and audience favorites. Abraham joined Writers Theatre in February 2023 and this marks his first full season at Writers Theatre.

The company's 2023/24 season launches with Tony and Pulitzer nominated playwright and Chicago/North Shore native Sarah Ruhl 's Eurydice, directed by Braden Abraham in his Writers Theatre directorial debut. Coming off the heels of the acclaimed and sold-out success of Once is the Tony Award winning musical The Band's Visit, in a co-production with TheatreSquared, directed by Zi Alikhan . Next Spring will usher in Hershey Felder 's tour de force performance in an original piece he wrote with Chopin's music, Monsieur Chopin, A Play with Music. Director Lili-Anne Brown will then bring her talents to Writers with Katori Hall 's Pulitzer Prize winning play The Hot Wing King.

A highlight of the season includes a subscription add-on with the return of the stunningly beautiful new holiday tradition Manual Cinema's Christmas Carol with the company's groundbreaking creativity and powerful storytelling. The 2023/24 season introduces an expansion of Writers Theatre impactful educational programs and community offerings with Theatre for Young Audiences. The program begins this fall with FORTS: Build Your Own Adventure, a collaboration with Chicago's Filament Theatre, which celebrates and amplifies the perspectives and experiences of young people through the performing arts. Details will be available at a later date.

Season Packages are available online at www.writerstheatre.org , and at the Box Office by calling 847-242-6000.

Writers Theatre Artistic Director Braden Abraham comments, "This season aims to strengthen the bonds between our community and Chicagoland artists. The plays presented this year serve as a reminder of how a chance encounter could lead to a life-altering moment, how love appears and endures in unexpected ways, and how music and language have the power to reach across the boundaries of culture, space, and time. We hope these plays will help us connect more deeply with one another through exceptional artistry within our uniquely intimate theatre spaces.

Productions will be presented in the 255-seat Alexandra C. and John D. Nichols Theatre and the intimate Gillian Theatre in the in the award-winning building at 325 Tudor Court in Glencoe, designed by Studio Gang Architects.

Writers Theatre is pleased to welcome back BMO Harris Bank as the distinguished 2023/24 Season Sponsor, marking the Bank's ninth consecutive year as season sponsor.

The Writers Theatre 2023/24 Season includes:

Written by Sarah Ruhl

Directed by Artistic Director Braden Abraham

September 21 - October 22, 2023

Opening Night: Friday, September 29, 2023

The season launches with Braden Abraham 's directorial debut at WT, and it's even more thrilling that he begins with the acclaimed play by Sarah Ruhl -who was raised practically next door to Glencoe.

The newlywed and newly dead Eurydice arrives in the underworld without memories or language and struggles to recover her humanity with the aid of the father she lost years ago. When Orpheus arrives to rescue her, Eurydice must choose between staying with her father or escaping with her husband-between life and death. Pulitzer and Tony nominated playwright and North Shore native Sarah Ruhl infuses the ancient myth with humor, poetry, and hope as this classic heroine finds her voice.

The Band's Visit

Music and Lyrics by David Yazbek

Book by Itamar Moses

Based on the screenplay by Eran Kolirin

Directed by Zi Alikhan

February 8 - March 17, 2024

Opening Night: Friday, February 16, 2024

Following the blockbuster success of Once, Writers Theatre ventures into another immersive and engaging musical production. For this co-production with TheatreSquared, Writers welcomes director Zi Alikhan , previously the Associate Director for the First National Tour of The Band's Visit and the Resident Director for the National Tour of Hamilton.

In a small Israeli desert town where every day feels the same, a lost bus arrives carrying an Egyptian Police Band. With no hotel and no buses until morning, the musicians are taken in for the night by the locals. Under the spell of the desert sky, these misplaced musicians bring everyone together in the way that only music can. Winner of ten Tony Awards, including Best Musical, The Band's Visit is a beautifully intimate show, perfectly suited for the Nichols Theatre, about the unifying power of music.

Hershey Felder as Monsieur Chopin

A Play with Music

Music of Fryderyk Chopin

Book by Hershey Felder

Directed by Joel Zwick

April 10 - May 12, 2024

Opening Night: Friday, April 12, 2024

Storyteller, musician and Chicago favorite Hershey Felder makes his Writers debut with his original script and live performance of Chopin's gorgeous masterpieces.

Days after the February 1848 revolution, Fryderyk Chopin is teaching a piano lesson in Paris. Set in the Polish pianist-composer's intimate salon, Chopin shares with his students secrets about the piano and secrets about himself-as well as playing some of his most beautiful and enduring compositions. In a tour de force performance, the beloved virtuoso actor/pianist, Hershey Felder brings to life the romantic story and music of the man once called the "Poet of the Piano."

The Hot Wing King

Written by Katori Hall

Directed by Lili-Anne Brown

June 20-July 21, 2024

Opening Night: Friday, June 28, 2024

Lili-Anne Brown , a Chicago native and a veteran of stages in Chicago and across the country, comes to Writers to direct this hot, new play by celebrated writer Katori Hall (P-Valley, Broadway's Tina: The Tina Turner Musical).

When it comes to wings, Cordell is king! Supported by his beau Dwayne and the best friends who serve as his fry crew, the group embarks on a fun night of pre-competition prep for Memphis' Annual "Hot Wang Festival." But when Dwayne's troubled nephew unexpectedly needs a place to stay, it quickly becomes a recipe for disaster. Winner of the 2021 Pulitzer Prize for Drama, The Hot Wing King is a fierce comedy about the risks and rewards of celebrating who you are.

Manual Cinema's Christmas Carol

Adapted from the Novel by Charles Dickens

Devised by Manual Cinema

Additional Writing by Nate Marshall

November 16 - December 24, 2023

Performances start November 16, 2023

An avowed holiday skeptic, Aunt Trudy has been recruited to channel her late husband Joe's Christmas cheer in a family Zoom call turned puppet show. But as Trudy becomes more absorbed in her own version of the Ebenezer Scrooge story, the puppets take on a life of their own, and the family's call transforms into a stunningly cinematic adaptation of this beloved ghost story. Named one of Chicago Tribune's Top Shows of 2022, the awe-inspiring, one-of-a-kind rendition of the Dickens classic returns this holiday season.

Subscribers will have exclusive first access to this limited run holiday performance and can purchase up to six tickets.

Theatre for Young Audiences

Writers is expanding its renowned educational programs and community offerings for young people and families-including the launch of an annual Theatre for Young Audiences production. The program begins this fall with FORTS: Build Your Own Adventure, a collaboration with Chicago's Filament Theatre, which celebrates and amplifies the perspectives and experiences of young people through the performing arts. Details will be available at a later date.

SEASON PACKAGES

This season, Writers Theatre is offering five subscriptions with an option for every theatregoer. Each subscription includes a deeply discounted ticket price for one ticket to the 4-play series, subscriber-only perks and an exclusive first purchase option for the limited run of Manual Cinema's Christmas Carol.

PREMIERE SUBSCRIPTION-$240

Reserved seats and fixed dates for Friday nights, Saturday matinees and nights, and Sunday matinees.

FLEXIBLE SUBSCRIPTION-$240

First choice of seats and dates, before tickets go on sale to the public. We'll send you reminders throughout

the season to give you the opportunity to select your dates, times and seats.

STANDARD SUBSCRIPTION-$212

Reserved seats and fixed dates for Wednesday matinees and nights, Thursday nights, and Sunday nights.

PREVIEW SUBSCRIPTION-$172

Reserved seats and fixed dates for preview performances.

NEW FLEXIBLE SAVER-$120

Claim select seats to Wednesday matinees and nights, Sunday nights, and preview performances before

tickets go on sale to the public.

Season package subscribers receive exclusive benefits including complimentary ticket exchanges by phone and mail (upgrade fees may apply), access to special play readings and lectures, special "subscriber-rate" prices on additional tickets, discounts at the bar, on Writers Theatre merchandise, event rentals, and more. For a complete list of benefits visit writerstheatre.org .

AUDIENCE ENGAGEMENT OPPORTUNITIES:

WT offers Open Captioning on select dates for each production. Please visit writerstheatre.org/accessibility for more information.

Writers Theatre is working with Erika Walker and Maylene Peña of the Walker Thomas Group on workplace culture and equity, diversity and inclusion initiatives. Additional information about this important and ongoing work can be found at writerstheatre.org/working-at-wt .

ABOUT WRITERS THEATRE

Writers Theatre boldly looks to the future as it concludes its 31st season. Having captivated audiences for years with its dedication to creating the most intimate theatrical experience possible, the theatre is now a major Chicagoland cultural destination with a national reputation for excellence, being called "America's finest regional theater company" by The Wall Street Journal.

Since 1992, Writers Theatre has stayed true to its core values: valuing the power of the written word and uplifting the artists who bring that word to life. The company has produced over 120 productions-everything from inventive interpretations of classics to groundbreaking new work. In 2016, Writers Theatre opened a new, state-of-the-art facility designed by the internationally renowned Studio Gang Architects. The new facility has allowed the Theatre to accommodate its growing audience, while maintaining its trademark intimacy.

Writers Theatre now welcomes more than 60,000 patrons each season and has helped establish the North Shore of Chicago as a premier cultural destination. Through its Literary Development Initiative, which has been responsible for the nurturing and premiering of over two dozen world premieres, the theatre has established itself as a major originator of new theatrical works. Serving as an extension of the Writers Theatre mission, WT Education programs engage an average 10,000 students each year with active learning opportunities centered around the written word.

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A Plan to Remake the Middle East

While talks for a cease-fire between israel and hamas continue, another set of negotiations is happening behind the scenes..

This transcript was created using speech recognition software. While it has been reviewed by human transcribers, it may contain errors. Please review the episode audio before quoting from this transcript and email [email protected] with any questions.

From New York Times, I’m Michael Barbaro. This is The Daily.

[MUSIC CONTINUES]

Today, if and when Israel and Hamas reach a deal for a ceasefire fire, the United States will immediately turn to a different set of negotiations over a grand diplomatic bargain that it believes could rebuild Gaza and remake the Middle East. My colleague Michael Crowley has been reporting on that plan and explains why those involved in it believe they have so little time left to get it done.

It’s Wednesday, May 8.

Michael, I want to start with what feels like a pretty dizzying set of developments in this conflict over the past few days. Just walk us through them?

Well, over the weekend, there was an intense round of negotiations in an effort, backed by the United States, to reach a ceasefire in the Gaza war.

The latest ceasefire proposal would reportedly see as many as 33 Israeli hostages released in exchange for potentially hundreds of Palestinian prisoners.

US officials were very eager to get this deal.

Pressure for a ceasefire has been building ahead of a threatened Israeli assault on Rafah.

Because Israel has been threatening a military offensive in the Southern Palestinian city of Rafah, where a huge number of people are crowded.

Fleeing the violence to the North. And now they’re packed into Rafah. Exposed and vulnerable, they need to be protected.

And the US says it would be a humanitarian catastrophe on top of the emergency that’s already underway.

Breaking news this hour — very important breaking news. An official Hamas source has told The BBC that it does accept a proposal for a ceasefire deal in Gaza.

And for a few hours on Monday, it looked like there might have been a major breakthrough when Hamas put out a statement saying that it had accepted a negotiating proposal.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu says the ceasefire proposal does not meet his country’s requirements. But Netanyahu says he will send a delegation of mediators to continue those talks. Now, the terms —

But those hopes were dashed pretty quickly when the Israelis took a look at what Hamas was saying and said that it was not a proposal that they had agreed to. It had been modified.

And overnight —

Israeli troops stormed into Rafah. Video showing tanks crashing over a sign at the entrance of the city.

— the Israelis launched a partial invasion of Rafah.

It says Hamas used the area to launch a deadly attack on Israeli troops over the weekend.

And they have now secured a border crossing at the Southern end of Gaza and are conducting targeted strikes. This is not yet the full scale invasion that President Biden has adamantly warned Israel against undertaking, but it is an escalation by Israel.

So while all that drama might suggest that these talks are in big trouble, these talks are very much still alive and ongoing and there is still a possibility of a ceasefire deal.

And the reason that’s so important is not just to stop the fighting in Gaza and relieve the suffering there, but a ceasefire also opens the door to a grand diplomatic bargain, one that involves Israel and its Arab neighbors and the Palestinians, and would have very far-reaching implications.

And what is that grand bargain. Describe what you’re talking about?

Well, it’s incredibly ambitious. It would reshape Israel’s relationship with its Arab neighbors, principally Saudi Arabia. But it’s important to understand that this is a vision that has actually been around since well before October 7. This was a diplomatic project that President Biden had been investing in and negotiating actually in a very real and tangible way long before the Hamas attacks and the Gaza war.

And President Biden was looking to build on something that President Trump had done, which was a series of agreements that the Trump administration struck in which Israel and some of its Arab neighbors agreed to have normal diplomatic relations for the first time.

Right, they’re called the Abraham Accords.

That’s right. And, you know, Biden doesn’t like a lot of things, most things that Trump did. But he actually likes this, because the idea is that they contribute to stability and economic integration in the Middle East, the US likes Israel having friends and likes having a tight-knit alliance against Iran.

President Biden agrees with the Saudis and with the Israelis, that Iran is really the top threat to everybody here. So, how can you build on this? How can you expand it? Well, the next and biggest step would be normalizing relations between Israel and Saudi Arabia.

And the Saudis have made clear that they want to do this and that they’re ready to do this. They weren’t ready to do it in the Trump years. But Mohammed bin Salman, the Crown Prince of Saudi Arabia, has made clear he wants to do it now.

So this kind of triangular deal began to take shape before October 7, in which the US, Israel, and Saudi Arabia would enter this three way agreement in which everyone would get something that they wanted.

And just walk through what each side gets in this pre-October 7th version of these negotiations?

So for Israel, you get normalized ties with its most important Arab neighbor and really the country that sets the tone for the whole Muslim world, which is Saudi Arabia of course. It makes Israel feel safer and more secure. Again, it helps to build this alliance against Iran, which Israel considers its greatest threat, and it comes with benefits like economic ties and travel and tourism. And Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has been very open, at least before October 7th, that this was his highest diplomatic and foreign policy priority.

For the Saudis, the rationale is similar when it comes to Israel. They think that it will bring stability. They like having a more explicitly close ally against Iran. There are economic and cultural benefits. Saudi Arabia is opening itself up in general, encouraging more tourism.

But I think that what’s most important to the Crown Prince, Mohammed bin Salman, is what he can get from the United States. And what he has been asking for are a couple of essential things. One is a security agreement whose details have always been a little bit vague, but I think essentially come down to reliable arms supplies from the United States that are not going to be cut off or paused on a whim, as he felt happened when President Biden stopped arms deliveries in 2021 because of how Saudi was conducting its war in Yemen. The Saudis were furious about that.

Saudi Arabia also wants to start a domestic nuclear power program. They are planning for a very long-term future, possibly a post-oil future. And they need help getting a nuclear program off the ground.

And they want that from the US?

And they want that from the US.

Now, those are big asks from the us. But from the perspective of President Biden, there are some really enticing things about this possible agreement. One is that it will hopefully produce more stability in the region. Again, the US likes having a tight-knit alliance against Iran.

The US also wants to have a strong relationship with Saudi Arabia. You know, despite the anger at Mohammed bin Salman over the murder of the Saudi dissident Jamal Khashoggi, the Biden administration recognizes that given the Saudis control over global oil production and their strategic importance in the Middle East, they need to have a good relationship with them. And the administration has been worried about the influence of China in the region and with the Saudis in particular.

So this is an opportunity for the US to draw the Saudis closer. Whatever our moral qualms might be about bin Salman and the Saudi government, this is an opportunity to bring the Saudis closer, which is something the Biden administration sees as a strategic benefit.

All three of these countries — big, disparate countries that normally don’t see eye-to-eye, this was a win-win-win on a military, economic, and strategic front.

That’s right. But there was one important actor in the region that did not see itself as winning, and that was the Palestinians.

[MUSIC PLAYING]

First, it’s important to understand that the Palestinians have always expected that the Arab countries in the Middle East would insist that Israel recognize a Palestinian state before those countries were willing to essentially make total peace and have normal relations with Israel.

So when the Abraham Accords happened in the Trump administration, the Palestinians felt like they’d been thrown under the bus because the Abraham Accords gave them virtually nothing. But the Palestinians did still hold out hope that Saudi Arabia would be their savior. And for years, Saudi Arabia has said that Israel must give the Palestinians a state if there’s going to be a normal relationship between Israel and Saudi Arabia.

Now the Palestinians see the Saudis in discussions with the US and Israel about a normalization agreement, and there appears to be very little on offer for the Palestinians. And they are feeling like they’re going to be left out in the cold here.

Right. And in the minds of the Palestinians, having already been essentially sold out by all their other Arab neighbors, the prospect that Saudi Arabia, of all countries, the most important Muslim Arab country in the region, would sell them out, had to be extremely painful.

It was a nightmare scenario for them. And in the minds of many analysts and US officials, this was a factor, one of many, in Hamas’s decision to stage the October 7th attacks.

Hamas, like other Palestinian leaders, was seeing the prospect that the Middle East was moving on and essentially, in their view, giving up on the Palestinian cause, and that Israel would be able to have friendly, normal relations with Arab countries around the region, and that it could continue with hardline policies toward the Palestinians and a refusal, as Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has said publicly, to accept a Palestinian state.

Right. So Michael, once Hamas carries out the October 7th attacks in an effort to destroy a status quo that it thinks is leaving them less and less relevant, more and more hopeless, including potentially this prospect that Saudi Arabia is going to normalize relations with Israel, what happens to these pre-October 7th negotiations between the US, Saudi Arabia, and Israel?

Well, I think there was a snap assumption that these talks were dead and buried. That they couldn’t possibly survive a cataclysm like this.

But then something surprising happened. It became clear that all the parties were still determined to pull-off the normalization.

And most surprisingly of all, perhaps, was the continued eagerness of Saudi Arabia, which publicly was professing outrage over the Israeli response to the Hamas attacks, but privately was still very much engaged in these conversations and trying to move them forward.

And in fact, what has happened is that the scope of this effort has grown substantially. October 7th didn’t kill these talks. It actually made them bigger, more complicated, and some people would argue, more important than ever.

We’ll be right back.

Michael, walk us through what exactly happens to these three-way negotiations after October 7th that ends up making them, as you just said, more complicated and more important than ever?

Well, it’s more important than ever because of the incredible need in Gaza. And it’s going to take a deal like this and the approval of Saudi Arabia to unlock the kind of massive reconstruction project required to essentially rebuild Gaza from the rubble. Saudi Arabia and its Arab friends are also going to be instrumental in figuring out how Gaza is governed, and they might even provide troops to help secure it. None of those things are going to happen without a deal like this.

Fascinating.

But this is all much more complicated now because the price for a deal like this has gone up.

And by price, you mean?

What Israel would have to give up. [MUSIC PLAYING]

From Saudi Arabia’s perspective, you have an Arab population that is furious at Israel. It now feels like a really hard time to do a normalization deal with the Israelis. It was never going to be easy, but this is about as bad a time to do it as there has been in a generation at least. And I think that President Biden and the people around him understand that the status quo between Israel and the Palestinians is intolerable and it is going to lead to chaos and violence indefinitely.

So now you have two of the three parties to this agreement, the Saudis and the Americans, basically asking a new price after October 7th, and saying to the Israelis, if we’re going to do this deal, it has to not only do something for the Palestinians, it has to do something really big. You have to commit to the creation of a Palestinian state. Now, I’ll be specific and say that what you hear the Secretary of State, Antony Blinken, say is that the agreement has to include an irreversible time-bound path to a Palestinian state.

We don’t know exactly what that looks like, but it’s some kind of a firm commitment, the likes of which the world and certainly the Israelis have not made before.

Something that was very much not present in the pre-October 7th vision of this negotiation. So much so that, as we just talked about, the Palestinians were left feeling completely out in the cold and furious at it.

That’s right. There was no sign that people were thinking that ambitiously about the Palestinians in this deal before October 7th. And the Palestinians certainly felt like they weren’t going to get much out of it. And that has completely changed now.

So, Michael, once this big new dimension after October 7th, which is the insistence by Saudi Arabia and the US that there be a Palestinian state or a path to a Palestinian state, what is the reaction specifically from Israel, which is, of course, the third major party to this entire conversation?

Well, Israel, or at least its political leadership, hates it. You know, this is just an extremely tough sell in Israel. It would have been a tough sell before October 7th. It’s even harder now.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is completely unrepentantly open in saying that there’s not going to be a Palestinian state on his watch. He won’t accept it. He says that it’s a strategic risk to his country. He says that it would, in effect, reward Hamas.

His argument is that terrorism has forced a conversation about statehood onto the table that wasn’t there before October 7th. Sure, it’s always in the background. It’s a perennial issue in global affairs, but it was not something certainly that the US and Israel’s Arab neighbors were actively pushing. Netanyahu also has — you know, he governs with the support of very right-wing members of a political coalition that he has cobbled together. And that coalition is quite likely to fall apart if he does embrace a Palestinian state or a path to a Palestinian state.

Now, he might be able to cobble together some sort of alternative, but it creates a political crisis for him.

And finally, you know, I think in any conversation about Israel, it’s worth bearing in mind something you hear from senior US officials these days, which is that although there is often finger pointing at Netanyahu and a desire to blame Netanyahu as this obstructionist who won’t agree to deals, what they say is Netanyahu is largely reflecting his population and the political establishment of his country, not just the right-wingers in his coalition who are clearly extremist.

But actually the prevailing views of the Israeli public. And the Israeli public and their political leaders across the spectrum right now with few exceptions, are not interested in talking about a Palestinian state when there are still dozens and dozens of Israeli hostages in tunnels beneath Gaza.

So it very much looks like this giant agreement that once seemed doable before October 7th might be more important to everyone involved than ever, given that it’s a plan for rebuilding Gaza and potentially preventing future October 7th’s from happening, but because of this higher price that Israel would have to pay, which is the acceptance of a Palestinian state, it seems from everything you’re saying, that this is more and more out of reach than ever before and hard to imagine happening in the immediate future. So if the people negotiating it are being honest, Michael, are they ready to acknowledge that it doesn’t look like this is going to happen?

Well, not quite yet. As time goes by, they certainly say it’s getting harder and harder, but they’re still trying, and they still think there’s a chance. But both the Saudis and the Biden administration understand that there’s very little time left to do this.

Well, what do you mean there’s very little time left? It would seem like time might benefit this negotiation in that it might give Israel distance from October 7th to think potentially differently about a Palestinian state?

Potentially. But Saudi Arabia wants to get this deal done in the Biden administration because Mohammed bin Salman has concluded this has to be done under a Democratic president.

Because Democrats in Congress are going to be very reluctant to approve a security agreement between the United States and Saudi Arabia.

It’s important to understand that if there is a security agreement, that’s something Congress is going to have to approve. And you’re just not going to get enough Democrats in Congress to support a deal with Saudi Arabia, who a lot of Democrats don’t like to begin with, because they see them as human rights abusers.

But if a Democratic president is asking them to do it, they’re much more likely to go along.

Right. So Saudi Arabia fears that if Biden loses and Trump is president, that those same Democrats would balk at this deal in a way that they wouldn’t if it were being negotiated under President Biden?

Exactly. Now, from President Biden’s perspective, politically, think about a president who’s running for re-election, who is presiding right now over chaos in the Middle East, who doesn’t seem to have good answers for the Israeli-Palestinian question, this is an opportunity for President Biden to deliver what could be at least what he would present as a diplomatic masterstroke that does multiple things at once, including creating a new pathway for Israel and the Palestinians to coexist, to break through the logjam, even as he is also improving Israel’s relations with Saudi Arabia.

So Biden and the Crown Prince hope that they can somehow persuade Bibi Netanyahu that in spite of all the reasons that he thinks this is a terrible idea, that this is a bet worth taking on Israel’s and the region’s long-term security and future?

That’s right. Now, no one has explained very clearly exactly how this is going to work, and it’s probably going to require artful diplomacy, possibly even a scenario where the Israelis would agree to something that maybe means one thing to them and means something else to other people. But Biden officials refuse to say that it’s hopeless and they refuse to essentially take Netanyahu’s preliminary no’s for an answer. And they still see some way that they can thread this incredibly narrow needle.

Michael, I’m curious about a constituency that we haven’t been talking about because they’re not at the table in these discussions that we are talking about here. And that would be Hamas. How does Hamas feel about the prospect of such a deal like this ever taking shape. Do they see it as any kind of a victory and vindication for what they did on October 7th?

So it’s hard to know exactly what Hamas’s leadership is thinking. I think they can feel two things. I think they can feel on the one hand, that they have established themselves as the champions of the Palestinian people who struck a blow against Israel and against a diplomatic process that was potentially going to leave the Palestinians out in the cold.

At the same time, Hamas has no interest in the kind of two-state solution that the US is trying to promote. They think Israel should be destroyed. They think the Palestinian state should cover the entire geography of what is now Israel, and they want to lead a state like that. And that’s not something that the US, Saudi Arabia, or anyone else is going to tolerate.

So what Hamas wants is to fight, to be the leader of the Palestinian people, and to destroy Israel. And they’re not interested in any sort of a peace process or statehood process.

It seems very clear from everything you’ve said here that neither Israel nor Hamas is ready to have the conversation about a grand bargain diplomatic program. And I wonder if that inevitably has any bearing on the ceasefire negotiations that are going on right now between the two of them that are supposed to bring this conflict to some sort of an end, even if it’s just temporary?

Because if, as you said, Michael, a ceasefire opens the door to this larger diplomatic solution, and these two players don’t necessarily want that larger diplomatic solution, doesn’t that inevitably impact their enthusiasm for even reaching a ceasefire?

Well, it certainly doesn’t help. You know, this is such a hellish problem. And of course, you first have the question of whether Israel and Hamas can make a deal on these immediate issues, including the hostages, Palestinian prisoners, and what the Israeli military is going to do, how long a ceasefire might last.

But on top of that, you have these much bigger diplomatic questions that are looming over them. And it’s not clear that either side is ready to turn and face those bigger questions.

So while for the Biden administration and for Saudi Arabia, this is a way out of this crisis, these larger diplomatic solutions, it’s not clear that it’s a conversation that the two parties that are actually at war here are prepared to start having.

Well, Michael, thank you very much. We appreciate it.

On Tuesday afternoon, under intense pressure from the US, delegations from Israel and Hamas arrived in Cairo to resume negotiations over a potential ceasefire. But in a statement, Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu made clear that even with the talks underway, his government would, quote, “continue to wage war against Hamas.”

Here’s what else you need to know today. In a dramatic day of testimony, Stormy Daniels offered explicit details about an alleged sexual encounter with Donald Trump that ultimately led to the hush money payment at the center of his trial. Daniels testified that Trump answered the door in pajamas, that he told her not to worry that he was married, and that he did not use a condom when they had sex.

That prompted lawyers for Trump to seek a mistrial based on what they called prejudicial testimony. But the judge in the case rejected that request. And,

We’ve seen a ferocious surge of anti-Semitism in America and around the world.

In a speech on Tuesday honoring victims of the Holocaust, President Biden condemned what he said was the alarming rise of anti-Semitism in the United States after the October 7th attacks on Israel. And he expressed worry that too many Americans were already forgetting the horrors of that attack.

The Jewish community, I want you to know I see your fear, your hurt, and your pain. Let me reassure you, as your president, you’re not alone. You belong. You always have and you always will.

Today’s episode was produced by Nina Feldman, Clare Toeniskoetter, and Rikki Novetsky. It was edited by Liz O. Baylen, contains original music by Marion Lozano, Elisheba Ittoop, and Dan Powell, and was engineered by Alyssa Moxley. Our theme music is by Jim Brunberg and Ben Landsverk of Wonderly.

That’s it for The Daily. I’m Michael Barbaro. See you tomorrow.

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Hosted by Michael Barbaro

Featuring Michael Crowley

Produced by Nina Feldman ,  Clare Toeniskoetter and Rikki Novetsky

Edited by Liz O. Baylen

Original music by Marion Lozano ,  Elisheba Ittoop and Dan Powell

Engineered by Alyssa Moxley

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If and when Israel and Hamas reach a deal for a cease-fire, the United States will immediately turn to a different set of negotiations over a grand diplomatic bargain that it believes could rebuild Gaza and remake the Middle East.

Michael Crowley, who covers the State Department and U.S. foreign policy for The Times, explains why those involved in this plan believe they have so little time left to get it done.

On today’s episode

Michael Crowley , a reporter covering the State Department and U.S. foreign policy for The New York Times.

Background reading :

Talks on a cease-fire in the Gaza war are once again at an uncertain stage .

Here’s how the push for a deal between Israel and Saudi Arabia looked before Oct. 7 .

From early in the war, President Biden has said that a lasting resolution requires a “real” Palestinian state .

Here’s what Israeli officials are discussing about postwar Gaza.

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The Daily is made by Rachel Quester, Lynsea Garrison, Clare Toeniskoetter, Paige Cowett, Michael Simon Johnson, Brad Fisher, Chris Wood, Jessica Cheung, Stella Tan, Alexandra Leigh Young, Lisa Chow, Eric Krupke, Marc Georges, Luke Vander Ploeg, M.J. Davis Lin, Dan Powell, Sydney Harper, Mike Benoist, Liz O. Baylen, Asthaa Chaturvedi, Rachelle Bonja, Diana Nguyen, Marion Lozano, Corey Schreppel, Rob Szypko, Elisheba Ittoop, Mooj Zadie, Patricia Willens, Rowan Niemisto, Jody Becker, Rikki Novetsky, John Ketchum, Nina Feldman, Will Reid, Carlos Prieto, Ben Calhoun, Susan Lee, Lexie Diao, Mary Wilson, Alex Stern, Dan Farrell, Sophia Lanman, Shannon Lin, Diane Wong, Devon Taylor, Alyssa Moxley, Summer Thomad, Olivia Natt, Daniel Ramirez and Brendan Klinkenberg.

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Michael Crowley covers the State Department and U.S. foreign policy for The Times. He has reported from nearly three dozen countries and often travels with the secretary of state. More about Michael Crowley

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