“Murder is a tawdry little crime; it’s born of greed, or lust, or liquor. Adulterers and shopkeepers get murdered. But when a president gets killed, when Julius Caesar got killed . . . he was assassinated.” —John Wilkes Booth to Lee Harvey Oswald in Assassins
Tony Award and Pulitzer Prize-winning composer Stephen Sondheim and librettist John Weidman take aim at American ideals of prosperity and fortune. Illinois Theatre presents this powerful musical examination of the blood-curdling (and banal) impulses of would-be assassins who pursue their own versions of the American dream.
There will a post-performance Talkback on Thursday, February 8.
MUSIC AND LYRICS BY STEPHEN SONDHEIM
BOOK BY JOHN WEIDMAN
DIRECTED BY JW MORRISSETTE
JUSTIN M. BRAUER, MUSIC DIRECTOR
February 1, 2, 3, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11
Department of Theatre, University of Illinois at Urbana Champaign
Attending Assassins Anonymous - Smile Politely interview with the cast
Assessing Assassins - Smile Politely review by Gale Walden