Fugard Play Moves to Lyceum Stage as ‘Tommy’ Stays On

“Tommy,” the Pete Townshend/Des McAnuff rock opera that has been a record-breaking box office sensation for the La Jolla Playhouse, has had two more weeks added to its otherwise sold-out run. With this extension, the second since its opening last week at the Mandell Weiss Theatre, the show now will continue through Aug. 30.

To accommodate the extended run of “Tommy,” the Playhouse will move the American premiere of Athol Fugard’s “Playland,” which was to open Aug. 30 at the 492-seat Mandell Weiss Theatre, to the 560-seat Lyceum Stage in Horton Plaza--marking the company’s first presentation in a downtown space.

“Playland,” a co-production with the Alliance Theatre of Atlanta, will begin previews Aug. 25 and open Aug. 30. The show moves to Atlanta after it closes here Oct. 2, opening there on Oct. 21.

The rental of the Lyceum Stage by the Playhouse will not affect the upcoming season of the San Diego Repertory Theatre, which manages the Lyceum for the Center City Development Corp. The San Diego Rep season is scheduled to begin Oct. 14 with George C. Wolfe’s “Spunk” after “Playland” concludes its run.

“We will load in ‘Spunk’ within hours of ‘Playland’ loading down,” said San Diego Rep Managing Director Adrian Stewart. “There will not be a second of breathing space.”

The Rep is “thrilled” with the arrangement, Stewart said, in part because “it’s just the sort of project we would like to have in the theaters.”

The leasing arrangement will be similar to previous arrangements the Rep has made with the hundreds of organizations that have used the Lyceum Stage and adjacent Lyceum Space when it is not presenting its own shows--from Southeast Community Theatre, which will produce there in August, to Lamb’s Players Theatre, which is presenting four shows in the Lyceum Space this year.

“It’s part of the vision of the Lyceum, which is to present work by other organizations within the community, both large and small,” Stewart said.

Terrence Dwyer, the Playhouse’s managing director, say the arrangement both allows for the extension of “Tommy,” and offers the La Jolla-based Playhouse a “long-wished-for opportunity to go downtown.”

“We wanted to reach downtown audiences, and this is an opportunity to do it,” Dwyer said.

It also seems a fortuitous match of play and venue. The San Diego Rep has long emphasized multicultural programming. Its audience is just the kind of audience that would be interested in the latest by Fugard, a South African writer of international importance, who has often been referred to as the conscience of his white countrymen.

“Playland,” a two-character play, focuses on a black man and a white man in a South African amusement park. The subject, as Fugard has said in interviews, is the troubled dynamic between the races in South Africa today. Fugard, also a noted director and actor, will direct.

“Tommy” has been selling out ever since previews began June 30. Ticket prices, which were raised for the initial extension week of Aug. 11-16 to $29-$36, will continue at the higher rates through Aug. 30. Tickets for the originally announced run, which was to conclude Aug. 9, were $26.75-$32.75.

While Dwyer made clear that extensions of “Tommy” will be made very conservatively (so far, just one week at a time), the next scheduled show in the Mandell Weiss Theatre does not open until Oct. 20, when the company opens “Much Ado About Nothing,” directed by McAnuff.