Shows & Events

The Year of Magical Thinking

When

Nov 08 – Dec 10, 2023

Where

Various Locations across the region

Long Wharf Theatre is overjoyed by the positive response to performances of The Year of Magical Thinking, and is honored to share that the entire production is SOLD OUT.

We encourage you to join the waitlist by calling our box office at 203-693-1486, Monday through Friday, noon to 5pm.

Kathleen Chalfant stars in this one-woman theatrical adaptation of Joan Didion’s award-winning memoir, which examines the author’s journey of grief and healing. Didion’s wry, journalistic lens – applied here to her own life – combines with Chalfant’s virtuosic performance to create a moving theatrical journey. Performed in homes and gathering spaces throughout the New Haven area and in partnership with New York City’s Keen Company, The Year of Magical Thinking is a uniquely intimate experience.

We invite you to join us after the performance to reflect on your experience in a post-show conversation facilitated by Long Wharf Theatre staff.

Meet us in the Virtual Lobby for a curated experience featuring music, interviews, articles and more, all sure to set the ambience for The Year of Magical Thinking. See you inside.

“The Year of Magical Thinking is a fine and fierce guide to living with love and loss written by one of the best writers of American prose and it is a privilege to inhabit and share this world with the Long Wharf audience. I’m so happy to be back here.” ~Kathleen Chalfant

PERFORMANCE VENUES

Long Wharf Theatre is overjoyed by the positive response to performances of The Year of Magical Thinking, and is honored to share that the entire production is SOLD OUT.

We encourage you to join the waitlist by calling our box office at 203-693-1486, Monday through Friday, noon to 5pm.

We are planning more world-class opportunities like this one in our upcoming seasons and seeing how fast this production is selling tells us that theater matters to our region. Please join our e-mail list to be the first to know about future productions.

HOMES

Many performances take place in real living rooms in New Haven and the surrounding towns; the exact addresses for Home performances will be shared with ticket holders the morning of the performance.

SOLD OUT! – Wed 11/08 @ 7pm | A home in New Haven, CT (Westville)
SOLD OUT! – Sat 11/09 @ 7pm | A home in Woodbridge, CT
SOLD OUT! – Sun 11/12 @ 2pm | A home in New Haven, CT (Fair Haven)
SOLD OUT! – Thu 11/16 @ 7pm | A home in New Haven, CT (East Rock)
SOLD OUT! – Fri 11/17 @ 7pm | A home in Hamden, CT
SOLD OUT! – Sat 11/18 @ 7pm | A home in Madison, CT
SOLD OUT! – Wed 11/29 @ 7pm | A home in Guilford, CT
SOLD OUT! – Wed 11/30 @ 7pm, a home in New Haven (East Rock)
SOLD OUT! – Sun 12/03 @ 2pm | A home in Branford, CT
SOLD OUT! – Sat 12/09 @ 7pm, a home in New Haven (Beaver Hills)
SOLD OUT! – Sun 12/10 @ 2pm, a home in New Haven (Downtown)

All Home performances are Pay-It-Forward performances ($125 tickets), supporting the expense of bringing this production to larger venues around the region at more accessible price points.

GATHERING SPACES

The below performances take place in gathering spaces across the region.

SOLD OUT! – Thu 11/09 @ 7pm | Yale Schwarzman Center, 168 Grove Street, New Haven, CT (map)
SOLD OUT! – Fri 11/10 @ 7 pm | SCSU’s Hilton C. Buley Library, 501 Crescent Street, New Haven, CT (map)
SOLD OUT! – Wed 11/15 @ 7pm | Bregamos Community Theater, 491 Blatchley Ave, New Haven (map)
SOLD OUT! – Sun 11/19 @ 2pm | The Jewish Community Center, 360 Amity Road, Woodbridge, CT (map)
SOLD OUT! – Fri 12/01 @ 7pm | Lotta Studio, 903-911 Whalley Ave, New Haven, CT (map)
SOLD OUT!! – Sat 12/02 @ 8pm | The Lab at ConnCORP, 496 Newhall Street, Hamden (map)

LIBRARY PERFORMANCES

Long Wharf Theatre is overjoyed by the positive response to performances of The Year of Magical Thinking.

All library performances have reached full capacity, please join the waitlist by calling our box office at 203-693-1486, Monday through Friday, noon to 5pm.

In our vision to create Theatre For Everyone, and with the help of generous sponsors, Long Wharf Theatre is presenting three performances of The Year of Magical Thinking at three local libraries — free and open to the public.

To access these performances please visit one of the participating libraries in person to reserve your tickets.

We are beyond excited to marry such a beautiful show with accessibility and the community. Join us at one of the libraries below.

SOLD OUT! Wed 12/06 @ 7pm | New Haven Free Public Library, Stetson Branch, 197 Dixwell Avenue, New Haven (map)
SOLD OUT! Thu 12/07 @ 7pm | Milford Public Library, 57 New Haven Avenue, Milford (map)
SOLD OUT! Fri 12/08 @ 7pm, | Willoughby Wallace Memorial Library, 146 Thimble Island Road, Branford (map)

If the performance you wish to attend becomes sold out, please join the waitlist by calling our box office at 203-693-1486, Monday through Friday, noon to 5pm.

ALLERGEN FREE (No Pets) PERFORMANCES

Thu 11/09 @ 7pm
Fri 11/10 @ 7pm
Wed 11/15 @ 7pm
Sun 11/19 @ 2pm
Wed 11/29 @ 7pm
Fri 12/01 @ 7pm
Sat 12/02 @ 7pm
Sun 12/03 @ 2pm
Wed 12/06 @ 7pm
Thu 12/07 @ 7pm
Fri 12/08 @ 7pm

TICKETS

Tickets are now on sale.

Ticket Prices for Gathering Spaces:

$0 K-12 students
$10 College Students
$45 Regular Price
$125 Pay It Forward

Ticket Prices for Home:

All Home performances are Pay-It-Forward performances ($125 tickets), supporting the expense of bringing this production to larger venues around the region at more accessible price points.

LWT Members receive a discount on Gathering Space tickets. Become a member today!

PERFORMANCE DETAILS

Locations: Many performances take place in real living rooms in New Haven and the surrounding towns; the exact addresses for Home performances will be shared with ticket holders the morning of the performance.

Running time: 90 Minutes with No Intermission
Recommended age: 16 and up.
Content Advisory: the show contains meditations on grief, terminal illness and prolonged hospitalization.
For more detailed description please contact boxoffice@longwharf.org

Cast & Creative Team

Joan Didion

Author & Playwright

Born in California and a graduate of the University of California at Berkeley, Joan Didion (1934-2021) spent her adult life in New York and Los Angeles. Winner of the 2005 National Book Award, The Year of Magical Thinking is one of 13 books by Joan Didion. Her other books include Play It As It Lays, Democracy, Slouching Towards Bethlehem, The White Album, Salvador, Miami and Political Fictions.

With her husband, John Gregory Dunne, she wrote the screenplays for such pictures as The Panic in Needle Park with Al Pacino, True Confessions with Robert De Niro and Robert Duvall, A Star Is Born with Barbra Streisand and Up Close & Personal with Michelle Pfeiffer and Robert Redford.

She was a member of the American Academy of Arts and Letters, which awarded her its 2005 Gold Medal in nonfiction. She also received the 1996 Edward MacDowell Medal, the 1999 Columbia Journalism Award and the 2002 George Polk Book Award. She contributed to various periodicals, most frequently The New York Review of Books.

Jonathan Silverstein

Conception & Direction

Jonathan Silverstein: Artistic Director of Off Broadway’s Keen Company, where his directing credits include: The Year of Magical Thinking, This Space Between Us by Peter Gil-Sheridan, Ordinary Days, Lonely Planet, Tick, Tick…Boom!, Travels With My Aunt, John & Jen, Middle of the Night, The Old Boy, Marry Me a Little. Also with Keen as Resident Director: Lemon Sky, The Dining Room (Drama Desk Award: Outstanding Ensemble), I Never Sang For My Father, Tea and Sympathy, and The Hasty Heart. Selected Off-Broadway: The Temperamentals (Drama Desk Award: Outstanding Ensemble), Red Herring (FringeNYC; Outstanding Direction Award), Blueprint (Summer Play Festival), and The Train Play (Clubbed Thumb). Regional: Bucks County, Huntington, Old Globe, Cleveland Play House, Merrimack Rep, Dorset Theatre Festival, Cape Rep Theatre. Alumnus, The Drama League Directors Project. MFA, UCSD. Member, SDC.

Kathleen Chalfant

Starring

BROADWAY: Angels in America (Tony, Drama Desk nom.), Racing Demon, Dance With Me. ADDITIONAL THEATRE: Here There are Blueberries, Four Quartets, A Woman of the World, Wit (Drama Desk, Lucille Lortel, Outer Critics Circle, Drama League, Connecticut Critics Circle, Obie Awards), For Peter Pan on Her 70th Birthday, A Walk in the Woods (Drama Desk nom.), Talking Heads (Obie Award), Nine Armenians (Drama Desk nomination), Henry V (Callaway Award). FILM: Old, Isn’t it Delicious?, Lillian, Duplicity, The People Speak, Lackawanna Blues, Perfect Stranger, Kinsey, Laramie Project, SELECT TELEVISION: Recurring on “The Affair,” “Bull,” “The Strain,” “The Americans,” “House of Cards,” “Rescue Me,”“The Guardian,” “One Life to Live”; “Madam Secretary,” “High Maintenance,” “Georgia O’Keeffe” (Lifetime), “Voices from the White House” (PBS). AWARDS: 2004 Lortel Award – Sustained Excellence of Performance, 2015 Lifetime Achievement – League of Professional Women. 2018 OBIE Award – Lifetime Achievement. Recipient of the Drama League and Sidney Kingsley Awards and holds an honorary doctorate in Humane Letters from Cooper Union.

Keen Company

in Partnership with

Keen Company is a Drama Desk and Obie Award-winning Off-Broadway company creating theater that connects. In intimate productions of plays and musicals, we celebrate the complexities of hope and the joys of the human condition. In recent seasons, Keen has brought to the New York City stage: Crumbs from the Table of Joy by Lynn Nottage (first NY Revival), The Year of Magical Thinking by Joan Didion (first NY Revival), This Space Between Us by Peter Gil-Sheridan (World Premiere), Blues for an Alabama Sky by Pearl Cleage (NY Premiere), Molly Sweeney by Brian Friel, Surely Goodness and Mercy by Chisa Hutchinson (NY Premiere), Ordinary Days by Adam Gwon (first NY Revival, Drama League Nomination), Tick, Tick…BOOM! by Jonathan Larson (first NY Revival, Drama Desk Nomination), and a reimagined version of Marry Me a Little by Stephen Sondheim (Drama League Nomination). Keen also fosters mid-career playwrights through our Keen Playwrights Lab and mentors students from all five boroughs of NYC through our Keen Teens education program. In everything we do, Keen Company thrives through our welcoming ethos and community commitments. You’re invited to learn more at www.keencompany.org or connect @keencompany.

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The Year of Magical Thinking

When

Nov 08 – Dec 10, 2023

Where

Various Locations across the region