Eight people meet in a church basement and lock their phones in a box. This a capella chamber musical from Dave Malloy (Natasha, Pierre, & the Great Comet of 1812) follows an octet of people struggling with digital dependency, charting their compulsions using only the analog vibrancy of their own voices. Witty, dissonant, and lush by turns, Malloy’s score plumbs the darkest corners of the internet alongside these characters’ yearning for connection. Staged in the round in the Victor Shargai theatre, Octet asks how—in the face of the many ways to escape into our screens—we can choose to be present with each other.
Octet is generously underwritten by Sari Hornstein, Craig Pascal, and Mark Epstein and Amoretta Hoeber.
Dave Malloy is a New York-based award-winning composer, writer, performer, and orchestrator. He has written music for 18 musicals, including Three Houses; Roald Dahl’s The Witches; Moby-Dick; Octet; Preludes; Ghost Quartet; Natasha, Pierre & The Great Comet of 1812 (12 Tony nominations; six Olivier nominations); Little Bunny Foo Foo; Black Wizard / Blue Wizard; All Hands; Three Pianos; Beardo; Beowulf: A Thousand Years of Baggage; The Sewers; Sandwich; Clown Bible; and (The 99-cent) Miss Saigon. His accolades include three OBIEs, a Smithsonian Ingenuity Award, a Drama Desk Award, a Lucille Lortel Award, the Richard Rodgers Award, an ASCAP New Horizons Award, and a Jonathan Larson Grant. Upcoming: Black Swan at American Repertory Theater (A.R.T.) from May 26, 2026, through June 28, 2026.. davemalloy.com
David Muse is in his sixteenth season as Artistic Director of Studio Theatre where he has directed Downstate; Love, Love, Love; Fun Home; People, Places & Things; Cock (the in-person and digital productions); The Children; The Remains; The Effect; The Father; Constellations; Chimerica; Murder Ballad; Belleville; Tribes; The Real Thing; An Iliad; Dirt; Bachelorette; The Habit of Art; Venus in Fur; Circle Mirror Transformation; reasons to be pretty; Blackbird; Frozen; and The Intelligent Design of Jenny Chow. As Studio's Artistic Director he has overseen over 125 productions; established Studio R&D, a new work incubator that has commissioned over 40 artists; created The Cabinet, Studio's artist advisory body; and envisioned and oversaw Open Studio, a $20 million expansion and upgrade of Studio's four-theatre complex. Previously, he was Associate Artistic Director of the Shakespeare Theatre Company, where he has directed nine productions, including Richard III, Henry V, Coriolanus, and King Charles III (a co-production with American Conservatory Theater and Seattle Rep). Other directing projects include Frankie and Johnny in the Clair de Lune at Arena Stage, The Bluest Eye at Theatre Alliance, and Patrick Page's Swansong at the New York Summer Play Festival. He has helped to develop new work at numerous theatres, including New York Theatre Workshop, Geva Theatre Center, Arena Stage, New Dramatists, and The Kennedy Center. David has taught acting and directing at Georgetown, Yale, and the Shakespeare Theatre Company’s Academy of Classical Acting. Productions he has directed have received 58 Helen Hayes Award nominations, including 9 for Outstanding Direction, and he is a DC Mayor's Arts Award recipient. David is a graduate of Yale University and the Yale School of Drama.