(RED BANK, NJ) -- Two River Theater presents August Wilson's The Piano Lesson from September 12 to October 4, 2026. Directed by Francois Battiste, this epic Pulitzer Prize-winning play pits brother against sister as the Charles family fights over the fate of their prized heirloom - a hand-carved piano.
It is 1936, and Boy Willie arrives in Pittsburgh from the South in a battered truck loaded with watermelons to sell. He has an opportunity to buy some land down home, but he has to come up with the money right quick. He wants to sell a piano that has great importance to his family, but he shares ownership with his sister Berniece, and the piano sits in her living room. Berniece has already rejected several offers, because the antique piano is covered with beautiful carvings detailing the family’s rise from slavery. Boy Willie argues that the past is past, but Berniece proves to be more formidable than he anticipated.
The cast includes Elaán Battiste (Maretha), J. Bernard Calloway (Wining Boy), Arden Carethers (Grace), Brian D. Coats (Avery), Joshua Echebiri (Lymon), Brandon Micheal Hall (Boy Willie), Keith Randolph Smith (Doaker), and Danielle Moné Truitt (Berniece).
Tickets are available for purchase online. Two River Theater is located at 21 Bridge Avenue in Red Bank, New Jersey.
After premiering at the Yale Repertory Theatre in November 1987, August Wilson’s The Piano Lesson opened on Broadway at the Walter Kerr Theatre on April 16, 1990. Directed by Lloyd Richards, the production featured S. Epatha Merkerson, Carl Gordon and Charles S. Dutton. The play returned to Broadway in a 2022 revival directed by LaTanya Richardson Jackson, starring Danielle Brooks, Samuel L. Jackson and John David Washington.
August Wilson (April 27, 1945 - October 2, 2005) authored Gem of the Ocean, Joe Turner’s Come and Gone, Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom, The Piano Lesson, Seven Guitars, Fences, Two Trains Running, Jitney, King Hedley II and Radio Golf. These works explore the heritage and experience of the descendants of Africans in North America, decade by decade, over the course of the twentieth century, forming the compilation entitled The American Century Cycle. His plays have been produced on Broadway, at regional theaters across the country and all over the world.
In 2003, Mr. Wilson made his professional stage debut in his one-man show, How I Learned What I Learned, currently touring and featuring Eugene Lee reprising Mr. Wilson's role. Mr. Wilson’s works garnered many awards including: the Pulitzer Prize for Fences (1987) and for The Piano Lesson (1990); a Tony Award for Fences; Great Britain’s Olivier Award for Jitney; and seven New York Drama Critics Circle Awards for Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom, Fences, Joe Turner’s Come and Gone, The Piano Lesson, Two Trains Running, Seven Guitars and Jitney. Additionally, the cast recording of Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom received a 1985 Grammy Award, and Mr. Wilson received a 1995 Emmy Award nomination for his screenplay adaptation of The Piano Lesson.
Mr. Wilson’s early works included the one-act plays The Janitor, Recycle, The Coldest Day of the Year, Malcolm X, The Homecoming and the musical satire Black Bart and the Sacred Hills.
Mr. Wilson received many fellowships and awards, including the Rockefeller and Guggenheim Fellowships in Playwriting, the Whiting Writers Award and the 2003 Heinz Award. He was awarded a 1999 National Humanities Medal by President Bill Clinton and received numerous honorary degrees from colleges and universities, as well as the only high school diploma ever issued by the Carnegie Library of Pittsburgh. He was an alumnus of New Dramatists, a member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, a 1995 inductee into the American Academy of Arts and Letters, and on October 16, 2005, Broadway renamed the theatre located at 245 West 52nd Street “The August Wilson Theatre.”
Award-winning Two River Theater, located in Red Bank, New Jersey, is where bold stories inspire imagination and connection. Each season, the theater produces a mix of new plays, reimagined classics, and musicals, along with new work development, education programs for young people, and community engagement events that bring people of all ages together. Across its 80,000-square-foot campus, more than 20,000 students, families, and theater lovers experience Two River's acclaimed productions each year on its two stages: the 343-seat Joan and Robert Rechnitz Theater and the flexible 110-seat Marion Huber Theater. The theater also houses state-of-the-art scenic, costume, and property shops.
Two River has launched productions that have reached international audiences, including Be More Chill by Tony Award® nominees Joe Iconis and Joe Tracz—the theater's first Broadway production—which went on to play in London's West End and Japan. Recognized by USA TODAY as one of the "10 Great Places to See a Play," Two River Theater is led by Artistic Director Justin Waldman and Managing Director Nora DeVeau- Rosen.
