White Noise

NYU Skirball will present the U.S.  premiere of Tony Award winner Daniel Fish’s White Noise, freely inspired by

the novel by Don DeLillo, running Friday,  September 20 – Sunday, September 22 , 2019 at NYU Skirball.

Daniel Fish, Tony Award nominated director for his  revival of  Oklahoma! on Broadway, brings a new work freely inspired by Don DeLillo’s novel, White Noise,  to NYU Skirball. The 70-minute performance extracts its text entirely from the novel's teeming lists, creating an obsessive reduction of its prescient themes: rampant consumerism, environmental disaster, guns, media saturation, underground conspiracy, fear of death and the disintegration of the nuclear family.

Originally staged in 2018  by Theater Freiburg and Ruhrfestspiele Recklingshausen in Germany, White Noise is performed by actor Bruce Mackenzie, with live accompaniment by composer/drummer Bobby Previte.

Jim Findlay’s video design is projected on Andrew Leiberman’s monumental set which encapsulates Mackenzie in the center of the image.

This U.S. premiere is a collaboration between Fish, Mackenzie, Findlay, Lieberman, Doey Lüthi (costumes), Previte, Alexandra Caffal (associative director) and Stacey Derosier (lighting). White Noise may be most appropriate for ages 11 and up, but all are welcome.

Daniel Fish is a New York-based director who makes work across the boundaries of theater, film, and opera. He draws on a broad range of forms and subject matter including plays, film scripts, contemporary fiction, essays and found audio. Recent work includes  the Tony Award-winning Oklahoma! (Broadway and St. Ann’s Warehouse), Michael Gordon’s opera Acquanetta (Prototype Festival, Bard Summerscape), Don’t Look Back (The Chocolate Factory), Leonard Bernstein’s A Quiet Place (Curtis Opera), Who Left This Fork Here (Baryshnikov Arts Center, Onassis Center), Ted Hearne’s The Source (BAM NEXT WAVE, L.A. Opera, San Francisco Opera), and Eternal. His work has been seen at theaters and festivals throughout the U.S. and Europe, and his residencies and commissions include The MacDowell Colony, Baryshnikov Arts Center,  Mass MOCA, The Chocolate Factory and The Bushwick Starr.  He is the recipient of the 2017 Herb Alpert Award in the Arts for the Theater. danielfish.net  

NYU SKIRBALL

NYU Skirball, located in the heart of Greenwich Village, is one of New York City’s major presenters of international work, and has been the premier venue for cultural and performing arts events in lower Manhattan since 2003. The 800-seat theater, led by Director Jay Wegman, provides a home for internationally renowned artists, innovators and thinkers. NYU Skirball hosts over 300 events annually, from re-inventions of the classics to cutting-edge premieres, in genres ranging from dance, theater and performance arts to comedy, music and  film.

NYU Skirball’s unique partnership with New York University enables it to draw on the University’s intellectual riches and resources to enhance its programming with dialogues, public forums and conversations with artists, philosophers, scientists, Nobel Laureates and journalists. www.nyuskirball.org.

Tickets and Schedule

White Noise will play Friday, September 20 and Saturday, September 21 at 7:30 pm; and  Sunday, September 22 at 3:00 pm. Tickets begin at $55 and can be purchased online at www.nyuskirball.org, by phone at 212.998.4941, or in person at the Box Office, 566 LaGuardia Place at Washington Square: Tuesday-Saturday, 12:00–6:00 P.M. NYU Skirball is located at 566 LaGuardia Place at Washington Square, New York, New York 10012. www.nyuskirball.org