Guthrie Theater announces 2010-2011 season

The Guthrie Theater's 2010-2011 season features seven productions, beginning on the Wurtele Thrust Stage with the world premiere of The Master Butchers Singing Club by Pulitzer Prize-winning playwright Marsha Norman, adapted from the novel by Minnesota author Louise Erdrich.

The McGuire Proscenium Stage will open with The 39 Steps, a comedic take on Hitchcock's 1935 classic thriller, under the direction of local talent Joel Sass.

The season continues with Shakespeare's The Winter's Tale on the Thrust, under the direction of the Royal Shakespeare Company's Jonathan Munby.

George Bernard Shaw's Arms and the Man follows next on the proscenium stage, while Joe Dowling stages the classic American comedy Arsenic and Old Lace on the thrust stage to mark the 70th anniversary of the play's first production.

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Looking on into the summer of 2011, John Miller-Stephany is set to direct Yasmina Reza's God of Carnage on the proscenium, while Joe Dowling directs Gilbert & Sullivan's H.M.S. Pinafore.

After 35 years, the Guthrie has commissioned a new version of Charles Dickens' A Christmas Carol by British playwright Crispin Whittell. Joe Dowling will direct this holiday classic for the first time in his tenure as Artistic Director.

Outside of the seven play subscription season, the McGuire Proscenium State will offer several additional presentations, including the previously announced WorldStage Series presentation of Tricycle Theatre's theatrical event The Great Game: Afghanistan. The Guthrie continues its partnership with The Acting Company with The Comedy of Errors and Romeo and Juliet. Finally, it will host the third presentation of the work of Penumbra Theatre Company on a Guthrie stage with August Wilson's Ma Rainey's Black Bottom .

The Dowling Studio productions will be announced at a later date.