About the Play:

Kiss of the Spider Woman is a full-length musical drama with book by Terrence McNally, music by John Kander, Lyrics by Fred Ebb, based on the novel by Manuel Puig. This Tony Award-winning musical, with a brilliant book by Terrence McNally and a dynamic score by John Kander and Fred Ebb, presents a harrowing tale of persecution juxtaposed against a dazzling spectacle of liberating fantasy.

Kiss of the Spider Woman revamps a harrowing tale of persecution into a dazzling spectacle that juxtaposes gritty reality with liberating fantasy. Two cellmates in a Latin American prison, Valentin and Molina immediately clash. Valentin is a political activist enduring torture and Molina is a gay window dresser serving eight years for deviant behaviour. Over time, the men begin to connect as Molina shares his fantasies about an actress, Aurora, who famously portrayed a Spider Woman who can kill with a kiss.

Kiss of the Spider Woman premiered in 1993 at the Broadhurst Theatre on Broadway in New York City.

Cast: 3 female, 15 male

What people say:

"Compelling, beautiful, funny and moving... [Has] a cinematic fluidity and a poetic charge." — New York Daily News

"Thrilling." — New York Times

"Creates an entire world out of a prison cell... Dazzling." — Newsweek

"Capture[s] the magic musicals were meant for." — Wall Street Journal

"[A] show with a wild heart and a fresh eye." — New York Newsday

About the Playwright:

Terrence McNally (1938-2020) was an American playwright whose career has spanned six decades. Initially active in the burgeoning Off-Broadway theatre movement in the 1960s, he is one of the few playwrights of his generation to have successfully made the transition to Broadway, and, in the process, passed from avant-garde to mainstream acclaim. In addition to four Tony Awards for his plays, he received two Guggenheim Fellowships, a Rockefeller grant, and was a recipient of the Dramatists Guild Lifetime Achievement Award, the Lucille Lortel Lifetime Achievement Award, and the Tony Awards' Lifetime Achievement in the Theatre Honor. He is considered one of America's great playwrights.