Pig Iron Theatre Company
A Period of Animate Existence. Photo by Jacques-Jean Tiziou
Pig Iron Theatre Company
Founded in 1995 as an interdisciplinary ensemble, Pig Iron Theatre Company is dedicated to the creation of new and exuberant performance works that defy easy categorization.
Over the course of 20 years, Pig Iron has created over two dozen original works and has toured to festivals and theatres in England, Scotland, Poland, Lithuania, Brazil, Ireland, Italy, Romania and Germany. The body of Pig Iron’s work is eclectic and daring. Individual works have been inspired by history and biography (Poet In New York, 1997, and Anodyne, 2001), rock music (Mission to Mercury, 2000, and James Joyce is Dead and so is Paris: The Lucia Joyce Cabaret, 2003), American kitsch culture (Cafeteria, 1997, and Welcome to Yuba City, 2009), serendipity (Dig or Fly, 1996, and The Snow Queen, 1999), and scientific research (Pay Up, 2005/2013, and Chekhov Lizardbrain, 2007). In 2001, Pig Iron collaborated with legendary theatre director Joseph Chaikin (1935-2003) to create an exploration of sleep, dreams and consciousness (Shut Eye).
In 2005, Pig Iron won an OBIE Award for Hell Meets Henry Halfway, an adaptation of Polish writer Witold Gombrowicz’s novel Possessed. In 2008, Pig Iron won a second OBIE for James Sugg’s performance in Chekhov Lizardbrain. Pig Iron’s staging of Shakespeare’s Twelfth Night was nominated for ten Barrymore Awards for Excellence in Theatre, and won four. Individual pieces are often developed in residency at other theatres and universities. The company made Philadelphia its permanent home in 1997.