Mark Cortale’s acclaimed Broadway @ The Art House series and more returns to P-Town including Seth Rudetsky, Beth Malone, Claybourne Elder, Matt Doyle, Liz Callaway & Ann Hampton Callaway, Marilyn Maye, Max von Essen, Billy Stritch, Cindy Firing’s Tribute to Barbara Cook, Mandy Gonzalez, Melissa Ferrick, Nicolas King & Seth Sikes, Anne Steele, and Unitard!
Mark Cortale, the Producing Artistic Director of Provincetown’s Art House Theatre, has announced his season of music and comedy superstars for this summer of 2023 – his twelfth season leading the acclaimed Cape Cod entertainment juggernaut. Taking center stage again is his internationally acclaimed Broadway series, first launched here by Cortale in 2011 featuring Sirius XM radio star Seth Rudetsky as music director and host.
The 2023 season leaps head-first into summer on Memorial Day Weekend intent on making waves with arm-loads of award-winning P-Town favorites. Indie Rock star Melissa Ferrick returns for her own twelfth Art House anniversary season on May 28 for one show only. Jessie Mueller, Tony Award winner for her starring role as Carole King in Beautiful-The Carole King Musical, makes a Town Hall accompanied by host Seth Rudetsky.
Summer at the far end of Cape Cod only gets hotter and the gravitational pull stronger from there, as Cortale’s Provincetown Art House and Town Hall stake a claim for “More Stars Than There Are In Heaven” to rival MGM’s glory days. Summer 2023’s Town Hall series, produced by Cortale at Provincetown’s largest venue, will once again raise funds for Sandy Hook Promise and will also notably be the landing site for a stop on RuPaul’s Drag Race All Stars Season 4 champion Monét X Change in her debut P-Town performance over Fourth of July weekend on July 2, for one night only. Historic six-time Tony Award Winner Audra McDonald, star of Broadway’s The Gershwin’s Porgy and Bess, Carousel, Lady Day at Emerson’s Bar and Grill, and HBO’s The Gilded Age, will return to the Town Hall series on July 9 with Seth Rudetsky as music director and host. Jeremy Jordan, heartthrob star of B’ways Newsies, NBC’s Smash and the film adaptation of The Last 5 Years stokes the fire on August 6 with Ben Rauhala at the piano. Hot on his heels w/a thunderclap, drag phenom Alaska Thunderf*ck, winner of the second season of RuPaul’s Drag Race All Stars, returns to conquer P-Town & Town Hall on August 13 for one show only. One week later, LaChanze, Tony Award winner for Alice Walker’s The Color Purple original musical staging, star of Once On This Island and Emmy Award winner for PBS Handel’s Messiah Rocks: A Joyful Noise makes her PTown debut on August 20 with host Seth Rudetsky at the piano. Next up is Nina West who made history at the 71st Emmy Awards as the first-ever person to walk the red carpet in full drag, when season 11 of RuPaul’s Drag Race won five Primetime Emmy Awards. The most googled Drag Queen in the world when Nina was anointed America’s Sweetheart by RuPaul in 2021, she takes a break from the national tour of Hairspray as Edna Turnblad to return to P-Town on August 27 accompanied by Seth Rudetsky. Summing-up summer in historic style is 23 year-old Samara Joy, a 2-time Grammy Award winner this February 2023 for Best Jazz Vocal Album and the auspicious Best New Artist award for her Verve Records debut Linger Awhile. The Bronx-born rising star joins the likes of Sarah, Ella and Billie as that venerable record label’s next mononymous jazz singing sensation, and makes her Provincetown debut at Town Hall on the eve of Labor Day weekend, this August 31st.
The pull of P-Town is as American as apple pie…as American in its own unique way as the pull of NYC’s diversity and opportunity for invention and re-invention for over two centuries. Provincetown has been named America’s Best Beach Town, celebrated as the Best Gay Resort in America, and for over a century many of the nation’s greatest artists have called P-Town home. In that tradition of cutting-edge artistry, for this twelfth season, Cortale’s celebrated Broadway @ The Art House series will once again be home to a heavenly constellation of the New York stage’s greatest stars:
Max von Essen, the Tony and Grammy Award nominated singer and actor best known for his role as Henri in the award winning production of An American in Paris on Broadway, a year long run in the Broadway production of Anastasia and just off of a nationwide tour in Lincoln Center Theater’s revival of Falsettos, returns to the scene of his debut a year ago, this time around on June 30 & July 1st, with Billy Stritch on piano. Making her Broadway series debut this summer on a wave of rave reviews from Chicago to New York, is Cindy Firing with You & I: Cindy Firing Pays Tribute to Barbara Cook, on July 7 for one night only, with John Cook at the piano. In yet another starry P-Town debut in this summer’s Broadway@ series is Claybourne Elder, who stars as John Adams on HBO’s The Gilded Age and in Broadway’s revival of Company, is making his series bow on July 14 & 15 with Seth Rudetsky as music director and host. Also debuting in the series together this summer as a duo are Nicholas King & Seth Sikes: The New Belters, two of New York’s most popular young nightclub entertainers, who join forces to make the American Songbook Swing on July 21 & 22. Mandy Gonzalez, star of Lin-Manuel Miranda’s Broadway hits Hamilton and In The Heights, makes her anticipated debut in the series on July 28 & 29 w/host Seth Rudetsky at the piano.
As August bakes P-Town’s beaches to a beautiful bronze outside, inside the Art House Tony-nominated sisters Ann Hampton Callaway & Liz Callaway will return after last summer’s debut of Broadway the Calla-way! for Broadway @ The Art House. Liz Callaway, Tony nominee for Baby and star of Cats and Miss Saigon and her sister Ann Hampton Callaway, Tony nominated star of the hit musical Swing!, writer-singer of the theme song to TV’s The Nanny, co-star on August 2nd through 5th, with Alex Rybeck at piano. Beth Malone, Tony nominated star of Fun Home, Angels in America and most recently star of the Off-Broadway revival of The Unsinkable Molly Brown, makes her P-Town Art House series return on August 10 & 11, with Seth Rudetsky as music director and host. Marilyn Maye, Grammy nominee and living legend who has been called “The greatest white female singer in the world” by none other than Ella Fitzgerald” returns for her twelfth summer for a week-and-a-half run from August 23 through September 2, with Tedd Firth at piano, Daniel Glass on drums & Steve Doyle on bass. Putting an exclamation point on the series this summer, Matt Doyle, Tony Award winner for Broadway’s revival of Company, and star of the smash hit revival of Little Shop of Horrors off-Broadway, as well as CBS TV’s The Code and the CW’s original Gossip Girl will make his anticipated series debut on September 8 & 9 with Seth Rudetsky as pianist & host.
If that constellation of summer star-power were not already magnetic enough to feel its gravitational pull from north, south, east and west, The Art House over the past dozen years has earned an international reputation for presenting cutting-edge comedy and music talent originating out of the LGBTQ club scene, and increasingly crossing-over to mainstream success. Summer 2023 continues to build on that innovative reputation: RuPaul’s Drag Race star and self-described “women’s lifestyle brand” Miz Cracker who debuted here last summer, returns to Provincetown with her hilarious stand-up comedy for an extended stay Wednesdays to Saturdays, July 5 through September 2 at 8 PM. Ginger Minj, who treated The Art House to a sold-out run a year ago, returns by popular demand also Wednesdays to Saturdays from July 5 to September 2 at 9:30 PM. Anne Steele, is the NYC-based singer-songwriter that Curve Magazine, on hearing her EP, “Made Out Of Stars” raved “I’m convinced that Steele herself is made out of heavenly, cosmic stuff. Sporting a million-watt smile, a voice as clear and bright as a bell, and a heart of gold.” She makes her debut at The Art House with her hit new show, Where The Boys Are which celebrates all of the songs made famous by male artists and songwriters that Steele says helped shape her as an artist through the years – performing with William TN Hall at the piano, one show only on July 8. And perennial P-Town favorites UNITARD, the comedy trio that Time Out NY called “incredibly vicious and relentlessly hilarious” returns to Art House stage with Tard Core: Refreshed on August 9 for one show only.
For Tickets and information, visit www.ptownarthouse.com or call 800-838-3006.
The 2023 Art House and Town Hall season produced by Mark Cortale is sponsored by Cape Air, Anchor Inn Beach House, Brasswood Inn, Ptown Bikes, Provincetown Gym, and Fanizzi’s Restaurant.
Purchase the 2023 SEASON PASS for all shows at The Art House and Town Hall BY MAY 28th and save over $900! Buy now and cut to the front of the line with a reserved seat of your choice. Just show up 5 minutes before the performance and enjoy the show. All seats are guaranteed to be in the front of the VIP section. Seat are chosen by each patron before the season begins on a first come first serve basis. More information can be found at https://www.brownpapertickets.
