ALBANY, NY — After winning two Berkie Awards and landing on four “Best of 2025” lists, Harbinger Theatre returns with big things in 2026! As we enter our fifth full season, we’re proud to present four Capital Region premieres, fulfilling a mission the theater has championed since day one. Three of the playwrights — Emily Feldman, Steve Lawson, and Amanda Whittington — are previously unproduced in the area. The season is female centric with more roles for women than men and our two new directors are Linda Shirey and Rachel Stewart.
- NEW: Four Capital Region Premieres!
- FEMALE CENTRIC: More roles for women than men and our two new directors are Linda Shirey and Rachel Stewart
- REGION WIDE: Shows in Schenectady, Troy, Albany and Averill Park
- IMPACTFUL: Four plays that deal powerfully with community, self fulfillment, responsibility and the reasons we need to go on living gratified lives.
- AFFORDABLE: $15 Tickets and $50 Flex Subscriptions
Harbinger co-founder Patrick White said, “Time seems to have expanded and contracted since Covid. We’ve produced 19 shows! It feels like a whole life’s work, but it’s as short as an administration, and we’re just getting started. We are on fire to create impactful work.”
In April, we will open our 2026 season with A Distant Country Called Youth by Steve Lawson, directed by Linda Shirey. A play adapted by Steve Lawson from the letters of playwright Tennessee Williams, A Distant Country Called Youth is a dramatic work that utilizes Williams’s own correspondence to create a theatrical piece, which explores his life and work through his letters. Spanning the twenty-five years from boyhood to the opening of “The Glass Menagerie,” this one-man show, starring Patrick White, evokes the evolution of an American genius through his extraordinary correspondence with family, friends, lovers, and other writers. Hilarious, raunchy, and poetic in turn, the piece spotlights these fairly obscure years in William’s life. Here is a young Thomas Lanier Williams growing up, exploring, and finding his artistic voice as Tennessee Williams.
“After all the tumult of last year, offstage and in the country, I wanted to go back to the well and nourish ourselves with the reason we create theater.” Patrick White offered.
Performances of A Distant Country Called Youth will be held at The Mopco Improv Theatre in Schenectady from April 23rd to May 3rd. A Distant Country Called Youth tickets are on sale now! Ticket link: https://harbingertheatre.ludus.com/
In June, we will continue with Ladies’ Day by Amanda Whittington directed by first time director Rachel Stewart. In this comedy, we will explore rebellion, self-empowerment, friendship, and challenging societal roles. Life is one long, hard slog for the fish-filleting foursome Pearl, Jan, Shelley, and Linda. But their fortunes are set to change when they head to Ladies’ Day at the races. Factory hairnets make way for fascinators as the four friends hit the races for an unforgettable day out. Secrets are spilled with the champagne, and friendships are tested to the limit. Yet as the day unfolds and tempers fray, their accumulator bet keeps quietly winning. If their luck and their nerve hold, the ladies could hit the jackpot – and more. We are extremely proud to get the rights and present this hugely popular British show.
Performances of Ladies’ Day will be held at the James Meader Little Theatre at Russell Sage College in Troy from June 12th to the 19th.
In September, we will be presenting Downstate by Bruce Norris directed by Patrick White. In downstate Illinois, four men convicted of sex crimes against minors share a group home where they live out their lives in the shadow of the crimes they committed. A man shows up to confront his childhood abuser—but does he want closure or retribution? This gripping and provocative new play by Pulitzer Prize-winning ensemble member Bruce Norris zeroes in on the limits of our compassion as it questions what happens when society deems anyone beyond forgiveness.
Performances of Downstate will be held at the Albany Barn from September 17th to the 26th.
Closing out our season will be The Best We Could (a family tragedy) by Emily Feldman directed by Berkie Award winning Chris Foster. This play is a combination of funny, heartbreaking, and realistic look at a dysfunctional family doing their best, exploring themes of connection, integrity, and the limits of empathy. A daughter’s road trip with her father becomes a theatrical journey across more than just state lines as both of their pasts rise to the surface, revealing difficult truths.
Performances of The Best We Could (a family tragedy) will be held at the Sand Lake Center for the Arts from November 13th to the 22nd.
All Harbinger ‘26 tickets remain at $15, the most affordable ticket in the Capital Region. We want to remove any and every barrier we can that would prevent someone from attending and benefiting from these new plays.
$50 Flex Subscriptions for 4 tickets are available by emailing white.patrick1963@gmail.com or making a Venmo payment to @HarbingerTheatre.
The Flex Subscription can be used all four for a party to experience a single show or see the whole season in four plays you’ve never witnessed before!
Harbinger was founded in the pandemic and has produced 19 plays since The Christians by Lucas Hnath in December of 2021, 18 of their plays have been Capital Region premieres. They have worked with over 100 actors and introduced the work of Robert Askins, Lindsey Ferrentino, Rebecca Gilman, Josh Harmon, Ike Holter, Abe Koogler, Frances Poet, Bryna Turner and World Premieres by Brian Sheldon and Jason Odell Williams to Albany and its surrounding cities, towns and hamlets.
Every year of their existence they have been on the year-end 10 Best lists somewhere, including Berkshire On Stage, Broadway World, The Daily Gazette, The Saratogian or The Troy Record. In 2025 they won two Berkshire Theatre Critics Association Awards for Deep Blue Sound. Tony Pallone won the Berkie for Outstanding Supporting Actor in a Play and Chris Foster got his for Outstanding Director of a Play.
Harbinger’s civic outreach includes catering to students and all those looking for affordable theater with free previews and the lowest ticket price in the Capital Region and Friday Night Talkbacks for every production.
Harbinger’s mission is to produce impactful Capital Region premieres by underrepresented playwrights, creating more opportunities for all theatre lovers interested in change.
Our past productions:
The Christians, Hurricane Diane, Admissions, Destroying David, Exit Strategy, Andy and the Orphans, The Agony and the Agony, Dig, The Motherf**ker with the Hat, Custom Cuts, Mrs. Packard, In the Blood, The Squirrels, Maggie May, Into the Breeches!, At the Wedding, Between Riverside and Crazy, Deep Blue Sound, Swing State