Picnic, William Inge’s play, directed by David Cromer, expected on Broadway in fall of 2010

David Cromer

Producer Darren Bagert has announced a new production of William Inge’s Picnic, directed by David Cromer, will arrive on Broadway in the 2010-2011 season.

Cromer first directed a production of Picnic in 2008 for the Writers’ Theatre in Chicago. Reviewing the production, Terry Teachout, Wall Street Journal, wrote, “Directed by David Cromer, it is one of the best performances of anything – and I mean anything, not just plays – that I've seen in my life... This is a destination show, worth traveling any distance to see.”

Director David Cromer made his reputation in Chicago where he helmed many shows, often in smal venues to critical acclaim. He first came to notice in New York for hid work on the Off-Broadway musical "Adding Machine," for which he won both an Obie Award and Lucille Lortel Award. Cromer's work is currently represented on Broadway (The Neil Simon Plays) and Off-Broadway (Our Town).

Picnic: When a charismatic young drifter arrives in a small Kansas town on the eve of a Labor Day picnic, the simmering repressions of its residents come rapidly to a boil. Frequently hilarious and profoundly moving, Inge’s masterpiece chronicles the hopes and despairs that lie between the realization of adulthood and the eternal optimism of youth.

Picnic originally opened in 1953, winning the Pulitzer Prize for Drama and was later adapted into an Academy Award-winning motion picture in 1955.

The play is aiming to open in the fall of 2010 at a theatre to be announced.