La Jolla Playhouse’s 2026-27 season will include four world premiere productions, as well as the West Coast premiere of Branden Jacob-Jenkins’ political family drama “Purpose,” which won both the 2025 Pulitzer Prize for Drama and the 2025 Tony Award for Best Play.
The six-show lineup, announced Tuesday, is the final season planned by 18-year Artistic Director Christopher Ashley, who will step down at the end of this year to become artistic leader of New York City’s prestigious Roundabout Theatre Company.
Particle Fever” by David Henry Hwang, Bear McCreary and Zoe Sarnak: Inspred by the 2013 film documentary of the same name by Mark Levinson and David Kaplan, this world premiere musical will tell the story of how 10,000 international scientists came together for the launch of the Large Hadron Collider near Geneva, Switzerland, and the amazing scientific discoveries it yielded in its initial round of experiments. It will feature a book by David Henry Hwang (“M. Butterfly,” “Yellow Face,” “Golden Child”) and score by film and television composer Bear McCreary (“Godzilla: King of Monsters”) and Zoe Sarnak (“The Lonely Few”). It will be directed by Leigh Silverman (“Suffs”). Ashley described it as a story about “what humankind is capable of when we work together. The world of science and theater should make for a beautiful production.”