Promenade
by Maria Irene Fornes, Al Carmines

Off-Broadway
Promenade Book Cover
Promenade Cover

Highlights

120 mins 1960s Role(s) for Black Actor(s) Unit Set/Multiple Settings Period Costumes

Awards & Recognition

Obie Award

Winner! 1970 Obie Award for Best Musical

Synopsis

This absurdist delight – a groundbreaking off-Broadway hit – follows the Candide -like travails of two escaped prisoners, known only by their numbers, as they make their way into and through The City, where the poor and homeless mingle with the Idle Rich.

The messages range from “Live with your own truth (whether you like it or not)” to “Riches make you dumb.”

Al Carmines’ music is a magical blend that takes the audience from rock to blues, from Puccini to Noël Coward.

Thrilling numbers such as “Capricious and Fickle,” “The Clothes Make the Man,” and “Listen, I Feel” pepper this abstract fantasia of song and dance.

Press Reviews

"Bizarre and sneakily thrilling... A piece of experimental theater that started as a one-act at Judson Memorial Church in Greenwich Village in 1965, then expanded to become an unlikely off-Broadway hit in 1969, Promenade is zany. It is lumpy. It is also gorgeous."

— The New York Times, 2019

Characters

Character
105
106
JAILER
SERVANT
MISS I
MISS O
MISS U
MR. R
MR. S
MR. T
WAITER
ROSITA
DISHWASHER
MAYOR
MOTHER SOLDIER I / DRIVERSOLDIER II / INJURED MAN

Videos

Promenade – New York City Center Encores! Trailer

Publication

ISBN-13 9780573698453
ISBN-10 0573698457

Promenade is a play written by Maria Irene Fornes and published by Concord Theatricals .

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Performance Rights

Available for Licensing
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