From January 7 through 12, 2025, Ronnie Burkett will perform his latest production, Wonderful Joe, at New York’s renowned Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts as part of the 20th Anniversary programming of the UNDER THE RADAR festival.
UNDER THE RADAR is New York City’s premier annual festival of experimental theater, featuring cutting-edge performances from around the world and across the U.S. The 20th edition of UTR will run from January 4-19, 2025 presenting over a dozen productions at various partner organizations across the city.
UNDER THE RADAR connects with the city, the nation, and the world through the voices of innovative multidisciplinary artists. The festival champions transparency, equity, and collaboration in creating new live works. It embodies global citizenship, fosters innovation, and provides a stage for new voices.
The festival has always mixed international work with national and local artists, to give a spotlight on new artists and new global developments in the field. As it continued at the Public it became a destination festival for leaders from theaters and festivals hailing from Asia, Africa, Australia, the Middle East, and Europe. It was quickly considered one of the most adventurous and significant festivals. An audience grew at the Public, expecting the festival as much as they relied on Shakespeare in the Park. Other festivals began to pop up surrounding RADAR, dealing with new opera, performance art, and experimental dance.
On June 1, 2023, the Public Theater announced that for financial reasons it could no longer produce the Under the Radar Festival, after 18 editions, 17 of them at the Public. UNDER THE RADAR was almost immediately revived in collaboration with the NYC production company ArKtype. The 2024 iteration of the Festival ran from January 5 to January 21, presenting more than 180 performances of 17 distinct productions at 11 different theaters across Brooklyn and Manhattan, along with a Symposium and an artistic pitch session. The 2024 season was a critical and commercial success, selling out the vast majority of its performances.