Internationally renowned theatermaker Dmitry Krymov presents BIG TRIP

LA MAMA PRESENTS the KRYMOV LAB NYC ​
​Production of

BIG TRIP

Adapted, Written, and Directed by DMITRY KRYMOV
​“One of the World’s Finest Theater Makers!” - New York Times

A theatrical experience like no other

Starring

THREE-WEEK LIMITED OFF-BROADWAY ENGAGEMENT

SEPTEMBER 24 – OCTOBER 15, 2023 AT 

THE LA MAMA EXPERIMENTAL THEATRE CLUB

TICKETS ON SALE NOW AT LAMAMA.ORG

La MaMa is proud to present KRYMOV LAB NYC’s inaugural mainstage repertory, BIG TRIP, directed by Dmitry Krymov at La MaMa’s legendary Ellen Stewart Theater (66 East 4th St., NYC). A joyful and poignant expedition to the crossroads of cultures, languages, and theatrical traditions, BIG TRIP joins together adaptations of Pushkin, Hemingway and O’Neill in the full New York debut of Krymov’s unique creative vision. An internationally renowned luminary hailed by Elisabeth Vincentilli of the New York Times as “one of the world’s finest theater-makers,” Krymov and his new American company mark their arrival on the New York stage with this spectacular yet deeply personal exploration of life, love, loss, and theatre itself. ​ 

BIG TRIP will play a three-week limited engagement with performances beginning Sunday, September 24 and continuing through Sunday, October 15. Tickets are $45 ($40 students/seniors) and are available at https://www.lamama.org/shows/big-trip-2023. 

Part 1 - Pushkin ‘EUGENE ONEGIN’ In Our Own Words is a simultaneously raucous and sobering journey through the past and future of a major cultural touchstone. In it, four oddball emigrées arrive in downtown NYC to tell us the intertwined stories of the great poet Alexander Pushkin and his magnum opus, “Eugene Onegin”. At once a deeply personal meditation on loss and a caravan of absurd delights, Onegin will delight and challenge audiences of all ages with Krymov’s singular theatrical style.

Part 2 -THREE LOVE STORIES NEAR THE RAILROAD marks the very first time that Krymov has adapted the work of American writers: Hemingway’s "Hills Like White Elephants" and "A Canary for One" collide with O’Neill’s "Desire Under the Elms" in an extravagant dance across centuries. American couples grapple with indomitable spirits outside a Spanish countryside train cantina and then in a railway car across the Continent, and then too-tall men are whipped around the stage by a whirlwind woman. Krymov’s first full plunge into the depths of American literature is boisterous, daring, unforgettable—and unmissable.

La MaMa's Artistic Director Mia Yoo states, "BIG TRIP is Krymov's first production with his new US company of actors/artists after leaving his homeland of Russia with the onset of war. What does it mean to start again in a new place after turmoil and decades of work? Finding ways to support Krymov's transition to the US has been an honor for us at La MaMa. We are excited to be part of what this revolutionary artist will create as he builds a new generation of audiences and collaborators."

The production stars Natalie Battistone (ART’s world premiere of O.P.C. by V (formerly Eve Ensler)), Tim Eliot (TV: ​ Blue Bloods, The Gilded Age, The Deuce, The Plot Against America, Boardwalk Empire, and Godfather of Harlem), Shelby Flannery (TV: Hope in The 100), Annie Hägg (Krymov's The Square Root of Three Sisters (International Festival of Arts and Ideas) TV: Hunters), Kwesiu Jones (MTA Radio Plays (Rattlestick Playwrights Theater)), Jeremy Radin (TV: It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia, CSI, Criminal Minds), Erich Rausch (Mikhail Saburov’s sci-fi thriller Remember Us), Jackson Scott (Spanish punk band Mano de Dios), Elizabeth Stahlmann (Tectonic Theater Project’s world premiere of Here There Are Blueberries at La Jolla Playhouse, directed by Moisés Kaufman), and Anya Zicer (Bad Roads by Natalka Vorozhbyt at LaMaMa Experimental Theatre).

The production features dramaturgy by Shari Perkins, choreography by Baye&Asa and Rachel McMullin, scenic design by Emona Stoykova, costume and puppet design by Luna Gomberg, and lighting design by Krista Smith. Kate Marvin is the sound designer, Leah Ogawa is the puppet designer, Yana Biryukova is projection designer and Jacob Russell is the production stage manager. Publicity by Katie Rosin/Kampfire PR.

BIG TRIP plays the following schedule through Sunday, October 15: 

 Big Trip 1: Pushkin "Eugene Onegin" In Our Own Words

Sunday, September 24 at 2PM - preview and press performance
​​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ Friday, September 29 at 7PM - Opening and press performance
​​ Saturday, September 30 at 2PM and 7PM
​​ Sunday, October 1 at 2PM
​​ Friday, October 6 at 7PM
​​ Saturday, October 7 at 2PM and 7PM
​​ Sunday, October 8 at 2PM
​​ Tuesday, October 10 at 7PM - GALA PERFORMANCE
​​ Wednesday, October 11 at 7PM

Big Trip 2: Three Love Stories Near the Railroad

Tuesday, September 26 at 7PM - Preview and press performance
​​ Wednesday, September 27 at 7PM - Opening and press performance
​​ Thursday, September 28 at 7PM
​​ Tuesday, October 3 at 7PM
​​ Wednesday, October 4 at 7PM
​​ Thursday, October 5 at 7PM
​​ Thursday, October 12 at 7PM
​​ Friday, October 13 at 7PM
​​ Saturday, October 14 at 2PM and 7PM
​​ Sunday, October 15 at 2PM

Tickets are $45 or $40/student and senior ($10 for the first 10 sold) and are now available online at https://www.lamama.org/shows/big-trip-2023. Tickets may also be purchased in-person at the theater one-hour prior to performance.

Running Time: 100 minutes

Website: www.KrymovLabNYC.com

Media Kit with Photos

Photos from the workshop last December '22:

BIOGRAPHIES

DMITRY KRYMOV (Playwright/Director), known for his innovative, design-centric style, sometimes called “theatre of the artist,” theatre director, scenographer, and visual artist Dmitry Krymov is one of the most original directorial voices of his generation. He is internationally beloved for his visually stunning, richly layered reinventions of classics, where he and his company combine fine art, prose, poetry, music, and popular culture in a mercurial tapestry of original, inventive, and surprising moments. In his productions, the design goes on a journey alongside the characters; often, the actors transform their environment, using props and scenery to construct new worlds right before the audience's eyes. He has been hailed as “one of the world’s finest theatermakers” (New York Times), and has won many awards for his work including five Golden Mask awards (Russian National Theater Award), four Crystal Turandot awards (first post-Soviet Theater Award) and a Herald Angel Award (Edinburgh International Festival) 

Krymov was born in Moscow in 1954 to theatrical luminaries Anatoly Efros and Natalya Krymova. Trained in stage design from a young age, he graduated from the Moscow Art Theatre School’s scenography department in 1976. Over the next two decades, he designed over a hundred productions throughout Russia and abroad. In addition to regularly collaborating with his father, a legendary director, he worked with directors like V. Portnov, A. Tovstonogov, V. Sarkisov, M. Kiselov, Y. Arye, A. Shapiro, M. Rozovsky, and S. Arzibashev, and at institutions including the Malaya Bronnaya Theatre, the Taganka Theatre, the Moscow Art Theatre, the Central Children’s Theatre, the Stanislavsky Theatre, the Gogol Theatre, the Ermolova Theatre, the Mossoviet Theatre, and the Mayakovsky Theatre.

In the 1990s, Krymov left the theatre to focus on his fine arts practice, including painting, drawing, and installation. He took part in many group and solo exhibitions, both in Russia and abroad, and his paintings are included in the collections of The State Tretyakov Gallery (Moscow), The State Russian Museum and The State Theatre Museum (Saint-Petersburg), The Victoria and Albert Museum (London), The Vatican Museum; and in many private collections all over the world. 

In 2002, Krymov began teaching stage design at the Russian Academy of Theatre Arts (GITIS). His experiments with performance led to a new career as a director, and he launched the Dmitry Krymov Laboratory in 2004. Headquartered in Moscow, the Lab created over 20 productions including Demon. View from Above. (2006); Opus 7 (2008); A Midsummer Night’s Dream (As You Like It) (2012); and O-Y. Late Love (2014). The Lab was commissioned by institutions including the International Chekhov Theatre Festival and the Edinburgh Festival, presented work at prestigious festivals in Austria, Great Britain, Germany, Georgia, and Poland, and toured internationally to countries including ​ Brazil, the United States, Australia, New Zealand, Finland, and Estonia. Many of Krymov’s students became highly acclaimed artists in their own right, and continued to work alongside him in the Lab and beyond. In 2016, Krymov was invited to teach a master class at the Yale School of Drama (now the David Geffen School of Drama at Yale University), and worked with the graduate students there to create his first English-language production, The Square Root of Three Sisters. As Krymov became one of Russia’s most renowned and award-winning contemporary theatre directors, his work grew in scale; some of his most-loved later Russian works include Mozart. Don Juan. Dress Rehearsal (2021); We Are All Here (2021); and Kostik (2022). 

In early 2022, Krymov traveled to Philadelphia to create a new production of The Cherry Orchard with the Wilma Theatre. When the Russian government invaded Ukraine, he publicly stated his opposition to the war, knowing it meant exile, and he and his wife Inna took up residence in New York City. In the fall of 2022, he launched his new company, Krymov Lab NYC, with an Emergency Residency at La MaMa and two sold-out workshop productions: Onegin (In Our Own Words) and The Americans: 2 Hems & 1/8th O’Neill. 

Krymov Lab NYC produces design-forward theatrical presentations; develops new work and methods through rigorous improvisatory experimentation; and trains designers, directors, and actors in devised theater-making. The Lab breaks normative theater power structures, emboldening young and seasoned artists alike to create ambitious objects, characters, and moments. We aim to surprise, examine our lives, and respond to the question “What kind of art can exist in this time?”

La MaMa Experimental Theatre Club is dedicated to the artist and all aspects of the theatre. La MaMa's 62nd Radical Access Season comes on the heels of our 61st season when we re-opened our newly renovated, original theater at 74 E. 4th St. The building's $24 million makeover provides the return of the fully accessible Club, a new Community Arts Space for neighboring groups in the East Village, and an expanded public lobby and galleries. As an experimental theatre, La MaMa is always adapting to the needs of its community. In this time of deep division in our society and around the world, La MaMa felt an urgency to create a way for artists to respond. The Radical Access Initiative (RAI) was born out of this need. RAI connects local artists and audiences to people and communities around the world in shared artistic experiences to spark creativity and human understanding that wasn’t possible before.

La MaMa has been honored with 30+ Obie Awards, dozens of Drama Desk, Bessie Awards, Villager Awards, the 2018 Regional Theatre Tony Award, and most recently a 2023 New York Drama Critics’ Circle Special Citation. We are a creative home to artists and resident companies from around the world, many of whom have made lasting contributions to the arts, including Blue Man Group, Bette Midler, Ed Bullins, Ping Chong, Jackie Curtis, André De Shields, Adrienne Kennedy, Harvey Fierstein, Diane Lane, Playhouse of the Ridiculous, Tom Eyen, Pan Asian Rep, Spiderwoman Theater, Tadeusz Kantor, Marc Shaiman and Scott Wittman, Mabou Mines, Meredith Monk, Peter Brook, David and Amy Sedaris, Julie Taymor, Kazuo Ohno, Tom O'Horgan, Andrei Serban, Liz Swados, and Andy Warhol. La MaMa's vision of nurturing new artists and new work from all nations, cultures, races and identities remains as strong today as it was when Ellen Stewart first opened the doors in 1961.

La MaMa has been experimenting with digital tools for 13 years and seen how these tools can empower artists, expand access to shared artistic experiences, and facilitate the artist’s capacity to transform their communities through the arts. La MaMa’s RADICAL ACCESS INITATIVE seeks to build out this infrastructure of opportunity that supports new ways of connecting us all – on both sides of the footlights. The newly renovated 74A will be the home for much of the expanded programming for the Radical Access Initiative.

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Listings Information:
​Who: La MaMa presents KRYMOV LAB NYC
​What: BIG TRIP
​Where: La MaMa Experimental Theatre Club (Ellen Stewart Theater, 66 East 4th St NYC NY)
​When: September 24 - October 15 ​
​How: $45 at ​ https://www.lamama.org/shows/big-trip-2023

A joyful and poignant expedition to the crossroads of cultures, languages, and theatrical traditions, BIG TRIP joins together two pieces—Alexander Pushkin’s EUGENE ONEGIN in our own words and the World Premiere of THREE LOVE STORIES NEAR THE RAILROAD—for the full New York debut of Krymov’s singular creative vision.