The landmark 75th Anniversary Season pays tribute to the institution’s past and celebrates its dynamic role in the arts today.

75th Anniversary Season Sponsors

75h Anniversary Season Sponsors
Stacey and Eric Mindich

15th Fall for Dance Festival
Oct 1 – 13, 2018

Twenty acclaimed international dance companies and artists in five unique programs, featuring six world premiere commissions from Gemma Bond, Annabelle Lopez Ochoa, Justin Peck, Sonya Tayeh, Caleb Teicher, and Jennifer Weber all perform in the 15th anniversary of this beloved celebration of dance.

Balanchine: The City Center Years
Oct 31 – Nov 4, 2018

An unprecedented celebration of George Balanchine’s choreography in six distinct programs by eight of the world’s greatest ballet companies—American Ballet Theatre, Joffrey Ballet, Mariinsky Ballet, New York City Ballet, Paris Opera Ballet, The Royal Ballet, and San Francisco Ballet.

Annual Gala Presentation
A Chorus Line
Nov 14 – 18, 2018

The ultimate musical tribute to the life of the Broadway dancer. Funds raised at all seven performances will allow City Center to make the performing arts accessible to the widest possible audience by subsidizing affordable tickets throughout the year.

Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater
Nov 28 – Dec 30, 2018

New York City Center’s Principal Dance Company will present a dynamic program over five weeks, including a special program on December 11 in honor of City Center’s opening performance in 1943.

Nederlands Dans Theater 2 (NDT 2)
Jan 16 – 19, 2019

Founded to develop young talent for Nederlands Dance Theater, this second division of the company kicks off their US tour at City Center with an exciting program including two US premieres.

Encores!
Call Me Madam
Feb 6 – 10, 2019

Call Me Madam was the highlight of the second season of Encores! (1995) and the show that put the series on the map. With a memorable score by Irving Berlin, and a book by Howard Lindsay and Russel Crouse, Call Me Madam centers around a brassy ambassador to the fictional European nation of Lichtenberg.

Ballet Flamenco Sara Baras
Presented by New York City Center and Flamenco Festival
Mar 7 – 10, 2019

Flamenco superstar Sara Baras returns to City Center with her company, this time to showcase her trademark take on La Farruca—traditionally danced by male flamenco dancers.

Encores!
Rodgers & Hart’s
I Married an Angel
Mar 20 – 24, 2019

Rodgers and Hart’s third major collaboration with choreographer George Balanchine will be directed and choreographed by Joshua Bergasse for his soon-to-be wife, New York City Ballet principal dancer, Sara Mearns.

Dorrance Dance
Mar 28 – 30, 2019

A highlight of many past Fall for Dance Festivals, the company returns to City Center for the 75th Anniversary Season with world premieres by Michelle Dorrance and Bill Irwin, commissioned by New York City Center, and the revival of SOUNDspace.

Natalia Osipova's Pure Dance with David Hallberg
Apr 3 – 6, 2019

Natalia Osipova reunites with David Hallberg in a US premiere by Alexei Ratmansky. The legendary partners are joined by Jonathan Goddard and Jason Kittelberger for a repertory program including commissioned works by Ivan Péréz, Anthony Tudor, and Roy Assaf.

Dance Theatre of Harlem
Apr 10 – 13, 2019

Dance Theatre of Harlem is a company of diverse artists who perform an eclectic, demanding repertoire that defines the range of classical ballet. The company will celebrate its 50th anniversary during its City Center engagement.

MasterVoices
Lady in the Dark
Apr 25 – 27, 2019

MasterVoices will celebrate Encores! and City Center's rich musical theater history with a special concert performance of Kurt Weill and Ira Gershwin’s Lady in the Dark. Starring the inimitable Victoria Clark (Gigi, Cinderella), supported by the 100 plus voice MasterVoices chorus, Doug Varone and Dancers, and Orchestra of St. Luke’s, Lady in the Dark has not been seen in New York since it was presented as part of the inaugural Encores! season in 1994.

Encores!
High Button Shoes
May 8 – 12, 2019

The rarely seen High Button Shoes is the adventure of a traveling con-man caught up with rural, small town New Jersey and features, among other treasures, Jerome Robbins’ Mack Sennett-style ballet, set to the Jule Styne-Sammy Cahn song “On a Sunday by the Sea.”

Ardani Artists presents
Eifman Ballet of St. Petersburg
Pygmalion Effect (NY Premiere)
Jun 7 – 9, 2019
Tickets on sale now

In Boris Eifman’s productions, the costumes are sumptuous, the dancing is exquisite, and the drama is riveting—here, the company dances a brand-new ballet inspired by the Greek myth Pygmalion, set to a score by Johan Strauss, Jr.

Cherry Orchard Festival Presents
Vakhtangov State Academic Theatre of Russia
Masquerade
Jun 13 – 16, 2019
Tickets on sale now

Visionary Lithuanian director Rimas Tuminas created a furor amidst the theatergoing public with his dazzling production of Uncle Vanya, presented by the Cherry Orchard Festival in 2017. Now he makes a triumphant return to City Center with the ruthless and ribald Masquerade, based on the verse drama by Mikhail Lermontov and featuring a star-studded cast of Russia’s most acclaimed actors.

Encores! Off-Center
Working: A Musical
June 26 – 29 

Adapted by Stephen Schwartz and Nina Faso and based on the best-selling Studs Terkel book of the same name, Working: A Musical evokes the unsung nobility of American workers, with songs by Craig Carnelia, Micki Grant, Lin-Manuel Miranda, Mary Rodgers and Susan Birkenhead, and James Taylor.

Encores! Off-Center
Promenade
July 10 & 11

Promenade is a zany anti-adventure written by the “mother of avant-garde theater,” Maria Irene Fornes, and featuring an eclectic musical blend by Al Carmines, promising lighthearted fun while exposing the ever-present chasm between the rich and the poor.

Encores! Off-Center
Road Show
July 24 – 27 

Stephen Sondheim and John Weidman’s Road Show is a larger-than-life account of the Mizner brothers during the Alaskan gold rush and the Florida real estate boom of the early 1900s. Loosely based on a true story, follow Addison and Wilson Mizner on their ambitious and, ultimately, ill-fated quest for gold.

VISUAL ART COMMISSIONS

Architect and Artist Jorge Otero-Pailos
Otero-Pailos created an immersive installation for The Harkness Studio at City Center. His piece evokes concepts of history, memory, and impermanence through the fabrication of latex casts of the studio's surfaces, which are illuminated by light boxes placed throughout the large rehearsal room. The latex casts lifted the dust and other residue left on the surfaces of the studio by those who use it as a creative space. The accompanying sound score is a collage of Merce Cunningham’s voice, recorded during the final weeks of the choreographer’s life, overlaid with the sounds of a restaging of Cunningham’s Roaratorio. 
On view to the public in the City Center Harkness Studio at 130 W 56th St from 10am to 6pm during the following dates:  
April 29 – May 5, 2019

Photographer Nina Robinson
Robinson captured theater and dance artists throughout the historic building and in the spaces in which they live and create. The life-size photographs are on view to the general public in the through-block passage adjacent to City Center (between 55th and 56th streets) inviting our community to appreciate Robinson’s work free of charge.
On view through May 5, 2019

Conceptual Artist Lawrence Weiner
Weiner’s language-based work is his response to the City Center building and installed in the east and west stair landings connecting the main auditorium’s Orchestra-level and Grand Tier lobbies. The work is on view to all who enter the theater. Notepads that incorporate the design will be distributed free of charge to audiences throughout the season.
Now on view to ticket holders at all City Center performances

ADDITIONAL EVENTS

The 75th Anniversary Season also includes a full slate of studio events including expanded programming for Studio 5 and the intimate master class series Front & Center. The Museum of the City of New York will host Encores! Behind the Curtain, a series of talks curated by and featuring Encores! Artistic Director Jack Viertel. Additionally, two striking archival exhibitions will be mounted, one at the New York Library for the Performing Arts and the other at New York City Center. City Center will also embark on City Center on the Move, a two-week tour of the five boroughs bringing the extraordinary artists from the stage directly to New Yorkers in their neighborhoods.