written and directed by mary zimmerman
adapted from the book of the thousand nights and one night
translated by powys mathers
special presentation | thrust stage
december 11–30, 2010—only 24 performances!
Running time: 2 hours and 35 minutes,
including one 15 minute intermission
the play
Two seasons ago, Arabian Nights inspired nightly standing ovations and whoops and hollers from Berkeley Rep audience members. Now the show returns for a special, ultra-limited holiday engagement December 11–30. Director Mary Zimmerman, the remarkable Tony Award-winning creator of Argonautika and Metamorphoses, once again breathes new life into the legend of the 1,001 nights. To save her life, a beautiful bride must spin hypnotic tales of genies, jesters, thieves and kings—winning her freedom by eventually winning her husband’s heart. He falls under Scheherazade’s spell, and Zimmerman enchants the audience as well with her signature style that transforms simplicity into the sublime. Amid a thousand tales of honor, revenge and humor, only love emerges victorious. Calling Arabian Nights one of 2008’s best shows, Robert Hurwitt raved in the San Francisco Chronicle, “Zimmerman and her cast transport the audience through hilarious and poignant tales of greed, sex and revenge, each tale opening into another and another, to a lingering, redemptive and provocative end.”
the calendar
free tastings
Join us for complimentary tastings! Sample wine, beer, chocolate, champagne, vodka, organic produce or other delights before select Friday 8pm, Saturday 8pm and Sunday 7pm performances. New tasting events are being added all the time, so be sure to check back often!
- Sunday, December 12: INNA Jam / 6pm
- Friday, December 17: Semifreddi’s / 7pm
- Saturday, December 18: Artesa Vineyards & Winery / 7pm
the player
Mary Zimmerman is the recipient of the 2002 Tony Award for Best Director and a 1998 MacArthur Fellowship. At Berkeley Rep, audiences embraced her acclaimed productions of Argonautika, Journey to the West, Metamorphoses, The Notebooks of Leonardo da Vinci and The Secret in the Wings. These plays—and others that she’s adapted and directed such as Eleven Rooms of Proust, The Odyssey, Silk and S/M—have enjoyed celebrated runs at About Face Theatre, Brooklyn Academy of Music, Goodman Theatre, the Huntington Theatre Company. Based in Chicago, Zimmerman has won 10 Joseph Jefferson Awards—the city’s top theatrical honors—including prizes for best production and direction. She is the Manilow Resident Director at the Goodman, a member of Lookingglass, an artistic associate at Seattle Rep and a professor of performance studies at Northwestern University. She also directed classics such as All’s Well That Ends Well, Pericles and The Trojan Women at the Goodman; Henry VII and Measure for Measure at the New York Shakespeare Festival; A Midsummer Night’s Dream at the Huntington; and Pericles at The Shakespeare Theatre. In 2002, Mary created a new opera with Philip Glass called Galilelo Galilei, which was presented at the Goodman, BAM and the Barbican in London. In the last three years, she has staged Armida, Lucia de Lammermoor and La Sonnambula for the Metropolitan Opera in New York.
the buzz
“Zimmerman and her cast transport the audience through hilarious and poignant tales of greed, sex and revenge, each tale opening into another and another, to a lingering, redemptive and provocative end.”—San Francisco Chronicle
“A spectacular retelling of the old ‘1,001 nights’ tales staged so wonderfully well that you feel better off just to have been in the theater that night. This rare and breathtaking piece of theater made it into my all-time Top 10 list maybe 15 minutes after it started, and it just kept climbing the chart as its 2 1/2-hour production flew along.”—Contra Costa Times
“If you want theatre at its most unpretentiously poetic, most fetchingly stylish, as humane as it is elegant, I commend to you The Arabian Nights.”—New York magazine
multimedia
Watch a clip from The Arabian Nights.
press photos
specialty cocktail
Sea Breeze
Set yourself adrift with a traditional mixture of vodka and cranberry juice. ($8)
