Dear Friends,

Because Lempicka begins and ends in eras of profound societal upheaval, I’ve been thinking a lot about the word “revolution.” We typically think of the word in reference to forcible, often violent governmental change. But it also describes the motion of an object around a fixed point – a planet, a vinyl record, an engine’s crankshaft. I’m fascinated that “revolution” can describe both disruptive change and coming full circle to where we started. Lempicka is a piece that beautifully encompasses both senses of the word.

The show’s path to today’s performance had its own upheaval, of course. We were weeks away from starting rehearsals when everything shut down in 2020. Yet Lempicka’s amazing co-authors, Carson Kreitzer and Matt Gould, spent their time hard at work, refining and re-shaping their musical. Two years later, here we are: full circle.

With no shortage of disruptive events in the last couple years, Lempicka’s story of a woman finding her voice in a time of extreme political turmoil is particularly resonant. Tamara de Lempicka began her career as a painter as a new arrival in Paris, having fled the Bolshevik Revolution with her husband. But as the gaiety of the 1920s corroded into the creeping fascism of the 1930s, the courage to use one’s voice and own one’s space – particularly for a woman – brought increasing danger.

In the face of Russia’s war of aggression on Ukraine, and our own domestic threats to LGBTQ+ rights and women’s control over their bodies, Lempicka isn’t just a fascinating historical character ripe for re-discovery; she’s an inspiration.

Lempicka also fulfills one of my longstanding goals: luring Rachel Chavkin, one of the most talented and inventive directors working in theatre, to the Playhouse. She is joined by the fantastic Raja Feather Kelly – fresh off choreographing the Pulitzer Prize-winning musical A Strange Loop on Broadway and a new musical at San Diego’s Diversionary Theatre – who brings a visionary’s eye and a deconstructionist’s mind to the show’s gorgeous movement.

In this moment of seismic changes to our world, the musical Lempicka does what its namesake did: create bold art that captures its time – with all of its echoes of the past and the future still to come.

CHRISTOPHER ASHLEY  
The Rich Family Artistic Director                              
of La Jolla Playhouse