Encores! announces 20th anniversary season

The 20th Anniversary season of New York City Center's Tony Award-winning Encores! series will open on 30 Jan 2013 with Fiorello!, the show that launched the series in 1994. The show features music by Jerry Bock, lyrics by Sheldon Harnick and book by Jerome Weidman and George Abbott.

"Fiorello! is the story of Mayor Fiorello LaGuarda, the man singularly responsible for saving City Center from the wrecking ball, and transforming it into Manhattan's first performing arts center," said Arlene Shuler, President & CEO of City Center. "It was the perfect show to launch the Encores! series in 1994 and a fitting way to celebrate our 20th Anniversary season in our beautifully restored theater. We are proud to have presented 57 great American musicals to an audience of almost half a million and look forward to presenting many more in the years to come."

The 20th Anniversary season will continue with It's a Bird...It's a Plane...It's Superman, music by Charles Strouse, lyrics by Lee Adams, book by David Newman and Robert Benton.

The concluding producion of the 2012 Encores! season will be On Your Toes, music by Richard Rodgers, lyrics by Lorenz Hart, book by George Abbott, Richard Rodgers and Lorenz Hart.

To mark the 20th anniversary of Encores, Tony Award nominees and Encores! alumni Rauìl Esparza (Anyone Can Whistle) and Kelli O'Hara (Bells Are Ringing) will star in a Gala Encores! at 20 Celebration on 12 Nov 2012, accompanied by Rob Berman and the Encores! orchestra. The performance will be followed by a celebratory dinner at the Plaza Hotel.

Full production details for the above shows are still to be released.

Encores! 2013 productions in season order are:

New York City Center
Gala Encores! at 20 Celebration.
On 12 Nov 2012
Starring Rauìl Esparza and Kelli O'Hara
Music by Rob Berman & the Encores! Orchestra.

Fiorello!, with music by Jerry Bock, lyrics by Sheldon Harnick, book by Jerome Weidman and George Abbott, tells the story of LaGuardia's rise from an immigrant's son to feisty congressmen whose guts and determination to fight corruption brought down the crooked Tammany Hall political machine.

The show is one of only eight musicals to win the Pulitzer Prize for Drama, and won the Tony Award for Best Musical. Fiorello! opened at the Broadhurst Theatre on 23 Nov 1959 and ran for 795 performances. It was directed by George Abbott and starred Tom Bosley, Howard Da Silva and Pat Stanley. Songs include "Little Tin Box," "Till Tomorrow" and "When Did I Fall In Love?"

Fiorello! will run from 30 Jan - 3 Feb 2013.

It's a Bird...It's a Plane...It's Superman,, based on the comic strip "Superman," has a book by David Newman and Robert Benton, music by Charles Strouse and lyrics by Lee Adams.

The musical opened at the Alvin Theatre on 29 Mar 1966 and ran for 129 performances. The score features the songs "You've Got Possibilities," "You've Got What I Need," "I'm Not Finished Yet" and "The Woman for The Man."

It's a Bird...It's a Plane...It's Superman, will be presented in Mar 2013, exact dates to be announced.

On Your Toes, music by Richard Rodgers, lyrics by Lorenz Hart, book by George Abbott, Richard Rodgers and Lorenz Hart.

On Your Toes: While teaching music at Knickerbocker University, Phil "Junior" Dolan III tries to persuade Sergei Alexandrovich, the director of the Russian Ballet, to stage the jazz ballet "Slaughter on Tenth Avenue". After becoming involved with the company's prima ballerina, Vera Barnova, Junior is forced to assume the male lead in "Slaughter". Trouble ensues when he becomes the target of two thugs hired by Vera's lover and dance partner to kill him.

The original production was staged by C. Worthington Miner and choreographed by George Balanchine, and starred Ray Bolger, Tamara Geva and Monty Woolley. It opened on 11 Apr 1936 at the Imperial Theatre and ran for 315 performances. Songs include "Glad to be Unhappy," "There's A Small Hotel" and the legendary ballet "Slaughter on Tenth Avenue.

Dates for On Your Toes are to be announced.

New York City Center Encores! (Jack Viertel, Artistic Director) has, since 1994, celebrated the rarely-heard works of America's most important composers and lyricists. Conceived as "concert versions," each Encores! season gives three scores the chance to be heard as originally intended by their creators.

Over the years, Encores! has presented the works of the Gershwins, Rodgers and Hart, Rodgers and Hammerstein, Cole Porter, Irving Berlin, Kurt Weill, Bock and Harnick, Burt Bacharach, Kander and Ebb, Comden and Green, and many more.

The program is the recipient of a special 2000 Tony Honor for Excellence in the Theatre, as well as an Outer Critics Circle Award, Lucille Lortel Award and Jujamcyn Theaters Award.