Bridge Street Theatre in Catskill has announced its 2026 mainstage season, a six-play lineup that moves between contemporary drama, classic works, and a new play in development, continuing the companyโs focus on intimate, actor-driven storytelling.
Before its mainstage season gets underway, Bridge Street Theatre uses March to stretch out with three short-run productions that lean into the companyโs taste for smart solo work, sharp writing, and performers with serious chops. Each runs just a long weekend, creating a kind of theatrical tasting menu ahead of the spring slate.
The run begins with “Palatable Gay Robot” (March 6โ8), a fast, satirical solo piece starring Broadway veteran Stephen Brower. Brower plays Billie Bowtie, a gay robot engineered for โcrowd-friendlyโ laughs who discovers that algorithmic charm only goes so far. With a disembodied, god-like moderator voiced by Noma Dumezweni, the show skewers identity, performance, and the limits of manufactured authenticity.
Thatโs followed by Ned Averill-Snellโs “Herkimer! How My Ignorant Immigrant Ancestors Saved America and You Can Too” (March 13โ15), a history-rich one-man show that rewires the American Revolution through an overlooked upstate battle, before closing with “Archie Parishโs Parting Words” (March 20โ22), written and performed by Ernest Thompson (Academy Award-winning author ofย On Golden Pond). Part confession, part comedy, the piece wrestles with mortality, memory, and the uneasy art of saying goodbyeโmining humor and grace from lives that resist neat summation.
The mainstage season opens April 16โ26 with “BakersfieldMist” by Stephen Sachs, a comedy-drama inspired by true events. The play centers on a clash between Maude, a blunt and self-assured woman who believes she has stumbled upon a priceless painting at a thrift store, and Lionel Percy, a credentialed New York art expert brought in to assess its value. What begins as a dispute over authenticity unfolds into a broader debate about class, expertise, and conviction, with humor sharpened by moral stakes.
From May 28 to June 7, Bridge Street presents “Monsters of the American Cinema” by Christian St. Croix, directed by Tony Speciale. The play follows Remy, a Black, gay man who inherits a drive-in movie theater and becomes guardian to his late husbandโs teenage son. Bonding over classic monster films gives way to conflict when Remy learns the boy has been bullying a gay classmate, forcing both characters to confront grief, responsibility, and the consequences of moral compromise.
The summer production, “The Lisbon Traviata” by Terrence McNally, runs August 6โ16 under the direction of John Sowle. Set against the obsessive passions of opera fandom, the play traces a friendship strained by illusion, betrayal, and emotional dependency. McNallyโs script balances caustic humor with emotional precision, examining how art can both sustain and distort the lives built around it.
In September, the theater turns to Samuel Beckettโs “Happy Days” (September 3โ13), directed by Matthew Earnest. Often cited as one of Beckettโs most haunting works, the play features Winnie, a woman gradually buried in earth who persists through ritual, memory, and relentless optimism. Equal parts bleak and comic, the play offers a distilled meditation on endurance and habit in the face of inevitable decline.
October brings “Storm Still” by Gab Reisman (October 1โ11), directed by Jasmine Roth. The play reimagines “King Lear” through the lens of three sisters sorting through their late fatherโs belongings. Childhood games and Shakespearean echoes collide with adult grief, exploring inheritance, memory, and the fractures that define family life.
The season concludes November 5โ15 with “Darlinโ,” a new play by Michelle Carter, currently in development. Structured as a time-jumping exploration of mothers and daughters across generations, the work examines identity, secrecy, and the push-and-pull of familial bonds. Bridge Street will continue developing the play throughout 2026.
Subscriptions and individual tickets for all six productions are on sale now. Tickets are $25 for students, $30 for adults, and $35 at the door; subscriptions are $150. The first performance of each production is Pay What Ya Wanna. Details about the theaterโs annual Solo Fest will be announced separately.
