A Scranton native\u2019s Tony-winning play will lead off the Scranton Shakespeare Festival\u2019s winter season.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe Humans,\u201d by Stephen Karam, will be staged Nov. 28-30. The timing, the weekend after Thanksgiving, was chosen because the play is about a Scranton family visiting their daughter in New York City for the holiday.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s a time when families are visiting and people are looking for something to do and just it felt ripe for the vibes of the show,\u201d said festival artistic director Michael Bradshaw Flynn. \u201cAnd it felt like we\u2019d be able to tap into the joys and also the pains and frustrations that come with family holidays.\u201d<\/p>\n
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NEW YORK, NY \u2013 JUNE 12: Playwright Stephen Karam accepts the Tony award for Best Play for \u201cThe Humans\u201d onstage during the 70th Annual Tony Awards at The Beacon Theatre on June 12, 2016 in New York City. (Photo by Theo Wargo\/Getty Images for Tony Awards Productions)\n<\/p>\n
![\"Cate](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/10\/STT-L-PANTO-2-1019-01-01.jpg\")
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Cate McDonald as Sleeping Beauty and Kelly Jean Graham as the Evil Carabosse. (Scranton Shakespeare Festival)\n<\/p>\n
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NEW YORK, NY \u2013 JUNE 12: Playwright Stephen Karam accepts the Tony award for Best Play for \u201cThe Humans\u201d onstage during the 70th Annual Tony Awards at The Beacon Theatre on June 12, 2016 in New York City. (Photo by Theo Wargo\/Getty Images for Tony Awards Productions)\n<\/p>\n
Expand<\/a><\/p>\n The other shows will be an original holiday fairy tale farce in the British tradition; a youth ensemble alumni production of \u201cSweeney Todd: the Demon Barber of Fleet Street\u201d and an Irish play, \u201cJuno and the Paycock.\u201d <\/p>\n Karam won the 2016 Tony Award for best play<\/a> and \u201cThe Humans\u201d ran on Broadway for 393 performances. It was also nominated for the Pulitzer Prize for drama, made into a movie<\/a> starring Amy Schumer, Richard Jenkins and June Squibb, and has been staged elsewhere.<\/p>\n The plot: the Blakes, an Irish-American Scranton couple, travel to New York City\u2019s Chinatown to spend Thanksgiving with their daughter and her boyfriend in their shabby apartment. Another daughter and a grandmother are also there when mysterious things happen and family tensions rise. It is a one-act, 90-minute show.<\/p>\n Flynn hopes to get in touch with Karam before the staging. The Scranton High School graduate and Green Ridge native is the son of Albert and Marie Karam.<\/p>\n Karam could not be reached for comment.<\/p>\n The venue is Kreitler Hall at St. Luke\u2019s Episcopal Church, Scranton, which can accommodate a complex set.<\/p>\n The rest of the season returns to the festival\u2019s permanent home in the Marketplace at Steamtown, Lackawanna Avenue, Scranton.<\/p>\n The British holiday tradition of pantomime is on stage Dec. 12-14 and Dec. 19-21. Despite the name, a \u201cpanto\u201d is far from silent. The audience is encouraged to cheer and boo over-the-top characters and laugh at local references. Like many pantos, it is built around a fairy tale, in this case \u201cSleeping Beauty.\u201d Previous pantos have been a success, Flynn said.<\/p>\n College-age alumni of the festival\u2019s youth program will stage the Stephen Sondheim musical \u201cSweeney Todd: the Demon Barber of Fleet Street\u201d Jan. 2-4 and Jan. 9-11.<\/p>\n The festival picked an Irish playwriter for the final winter production, a nod to the large local Irish-American community. \u201cJuno and the Paycock,\u201dby the late Se\u00e1n O\u2019Casey, will run from March 5-8.<\/p>\n It is set in a Dublin tenement during the Irish Civil War.<\/p>\n \u201cAs most great Irish plays are, it\u2019s very, very funny until it\u2019s not,\u201d Flynn said.<\/p>\n The play is a sequel to O\u2019Casey\u2019s \u201cThe Shadow of a Gunman.\u201d It isn\u2019t necessary to have seen the first to appreciate the upcoming production, Flynn said.<\/p>\n