BAM Unveils a Bold and Boundary-Breaking 2026 Fall Next Wave Season – front mezz junkies, Theater News

Frontmezzjunkies reports: Philip Glass, Tiago Rodrigues, Anne Bogart, Cynthia Oliver, and a remarkable lineup of theatre, dance, music, and multidisciplinary artists headline BAM’s newest season

By Ross

One of my favourite rituals each theatre season is opening the announcement of a new festival or company lineup and immediately beginning to map out an imaginary calendar that somehow assumes I can be in numerous cities and places at once. Brooklyn Academy of Music has once again made that exercise delightfully impossible, unveiling a 2026 Fall/Next Wave season that stretches across theatre, dance, music, opera, poetry, circus, film, and public dialogue with the kind of fearless artistic curiosity that has defined BAM for generations.

At the heart of the season sits the latest edition of the celebrated Next Wave festival, extending relationships with longtime BAM artists such as Philip Glass, Cynthia Oliver, Chuck Mee, and Anne Bogart while welcoming a new generation of creators including Holland Andrews and yuniya edi kwon. The festival also welcomes back playwright and director Tiago Rodrigues, whose North American premiere of La Distance arrives following its debut at the 2025 Avignon Festival. The timely new work imagines a daughter choosing exile on Mars while her father struggles to maintain a relationship across an impossible distance.

The season embraces history while looking firmly toward the future. BAM describes its programming as an exploration of historical legacy and Afro-futurist possibility, connecting many of its featured artists to conversations that will ultimately lead toward the institution’s landmark 50th anniversary celebration of DanceAfrica in 2027. Throughout the lineup, questions of memory, identity, community, resistance, and connection appear again and again through remarkably different artistic forms.

The theatrical offerings alone promise an ambitious autumn. The Ford/Hill Project, created by Elizabeth Marvel and Lee Sunday Evans, transforms the Senate testimony of Anita Hill and Christine Blasey Ford into documentary theatre. Anne Bogart reunites with Charles L. Mee for the outdoor performance PRELUDE, while Minor Music at the End of the World, inspired by the writings of Saidiya Hartman and W.E.B. Du Bois, explores the possibility of Black life at the end of the world. Nehprii Amenii’s puppetry-driven “HUMAN“ journeys beneath the ocean to ask what humanity might mean in a future where humans no longer exist.

Music and performance continue to blur traditional boundaries throughout the festival. Holland Andrews and yuniya edi kwon make their BAM debuts with How does it feel to look at nothing, an interdisciplinary fusion of sound, movement, and ritual, while Einstein on the Beach returns for a special 50th anniversary concert by the Philip Glass Ensemble, celebrating one of the landmark operatic achievements of the twentieth century.

Dance also occupies a central place in the season. Dorothée Munyaneza presents Toi, moi, Tituba…, using her own body as a living archive to recover suppressed voices, while Cynthia Oliver’s Turn. Turning. TURNT. responds to moments surrounding the 2020 pandemic through movement, sound, and design. Okwui Okpokwasili and Peter Born’s adaku, part 2 imagines a future where memory itself must be rediscovered through song and movement.

Beyond the stage, BAM expands the conversation through literature and public dialogue. Malcolm Gladwell joins Adam Grant for a discussion celebrating Grant’s new book Vibe, while Helga Davis curates Unworlding, NYC, a new series bringing together artists and writers to explore connection within a changing world. Hanif Abdurraqib also returns to curate I Guess It Was My Destiny To Live So Long, a poetry series honouring the legacy of June Jordan.

Families are also invited into the season through BAMboo!, the institution’s annual Halloween celebration, I’mPossible Holiday Wonders, featuring multi-abled circus artists, and screenings from the Best of BAMkids Film Festival 2026.

Looking across the entire announcement, what stands out is not simply the remarkable breadth of programming, but the way seemingly different disciplines continually intersect. Theatre becomes music, dance becomes history, poetry becomes community, and conversation itself becomes performance. It is exactly the kind of adventurous season that makes opening a new BAM announcement feel like receiving an invitation to explore artistic territory you didn’t even know existed until now.

SEASON HIGHLIGHTS

THEATER

The Ford/Hill Project

Waterwell
Created by Elizabeth Marvel and Lee Sunday Evans
Directed by Lee Sunday Evans

Sep 8—20

Next Wave favorite Lee Sunday Evans and Elizabeth Marvel transform the verbatim Senate testimony of Anita Hill and Christine Blasey Ford into a gripping, meticulously crafted evening of theater.

THEATER | MUSIC

Hewa Rwanda—Letter to the absent

Created by Dorcy Rugamba

Part of Next Wave 2026

Oct 7—11

In this self-described “hymn to life,” Dorcy Rugamba—alongside guitarist Manjun—theatrically adapts his memoir dedicated to his family killed in the Rwandan Genocide.

TALK

BAM in association with Greenlight Bookstore
Presents

Vibe: The Secrets of Strong Connections in a Lonely World Adam Grant

Tue, Oct 13 at 7:30pm

Join New York Times bestselling author Adam Grant in conversation with Malcolm Gladwell to launch his new book Vibe, a science-backed exploration into how to foster relationships in an increasingly isolating world.

THEATER

PRELUDE

En Garde Arts
Written by Charles L. Mee
Original Songs by the Lazours
Adapted and Directed by Anne Bogart

Part of Next Wave 2026

Oct 13—15

En Garde Arts reunites Anne Bogart and Charles L. Mee for a large-scale, free outdoor performance on the plaza, inviting audiences to witness fleeting encounters and moments of connection in New York City.

MUSIC | OPERA

How does it feel to look at nothing

Holland Andrews & yuniya edi kwon

Part of Next Wave 2026

Oct 21—25

Visionary composer-performers Holland Andrews and yuniya edi kwon make their BAM debuts with an electrifying interdisciplinary work that fuses sound, movement, and ritual to ponder the ineffable.

DANCE

New York Live Arts in association with BAM, L’Alliance New York | Crossing The Line and Villa Albertine
Presents

Toi, moi, Tituba…

By Dorothée Munyaneza

Part of Next Wave 2026

Oct 23 & 24

Dorothée Munyaneza uses her own body as a danced archive, making suppressed voices audible, visible, and tangible again in this solo performance.

POETRY

I Guess It Was My Destiny To Live So Long

A poetry series honoring the legacy of June Jordan

Curated by Hanif Abdurraqib

Part of Next Wave 2026

Oct 24—30

Hanif Abdurraqib returns with his vital, viral series celebrating poetry as a force for bringing people together, spotlighting powerful voices from across Africa this year alongside friends and neighbors.

KIDS | COMMUNITY

BAMboo!

Sat, Oct 31

Get your costumes on and bring your family to our frightfully fun Halloween celebration, an autumn afternoon of carnival games, arts and crafts, candy giveaways, and more happening indoors and outdoors!

DANCE

Turn. Turning. TURNT.

Choreography by Cynthia Oliver

Part of Next Wave 2026

Nov 4—7

Composed of work constructed prior to, during, and following the 2020 pandemic, Cynthia Oliver’s three-part performance employs an amalgam of sound, design, and light in response to moments in our shared history.

DANCE | THEATER

BAM in association with L’Alliance New York’s Crossing The Line Festival
Presents

adaku, part 2

Created by sweat variant—Okwui Okpokwasili and Peter Born

Part of Next Wave 2026

Nov 11—15

In a future not so far away, a young woman taught that she has no past has a spiritual awakening, rendered by Okwui Okpokwasili and Peter Born in hypnotic swells of sound, song, and movement through space.

THEATER

BAM in association with L’Alliance New York’s Crossing The Line Festival

Presents

La Distance

Festival d’Avignon
Text and Direction by Tiago Rodrigues

Part of Next Wave 2026

Nov 18–29

As humanity struggles on earth, a daughter chooses exile on Mars, leaving her father to grapple with the challenge of maintaining connections across unnavigable distances in a timely drama by Tiago Rodrigues.

MUSIC

Einstein on the Beach 50th Anniversary Concert

The Philip Glass Ensemble

The music of the opera by Philip Glass and Robert Wilson

Part of Next Wave 2026

Nov 19–21

Einstein on the Beach, the milestone opera by Philip Glass and Robert Wilson, returns to BAM in a 50th-anniversary concert by the Philip Glass Ensemble with a special artistic installation by Es Devlin.

THEATER | PUPPETRY

“HUMAN”

Written and Directed by Nehprii Amenii
Music by Martha Redbone and Aaron Whitby

Part of Next Wave 2026

Dec 2–5

This kaleidoscopic, puppetry-driven performance takes audiences to the bottom of the ocean, exploring what it means to be human in a world where humans no longer exist.

THEATER

Minor Music at the End of the World

Written by Saidiya Hartman
Directed by Sarah Benson

Part of Next Wave 2026

Dec 4–6

Inspired by two Saidiya Hartman essays and a W.E.B. Du Bois short story, this multi-disciplinary performance in three movements explores the possibility of Black life at the end of the world.

CIRCUS | KIDS | HOLIDAY

I’mPossible Holiday Wonders

Omnium Circus

Dec 10–13

Behold an extraordinary group of multi-abled artists in this joyous and heart-warming circus extravaganza where breathtaking artistry, live music, and enchanting storytelling bring the magic of the holidays to life.

FILM

Best of BAMkids Film Festival 2026

Sep 12, Nov 14 & Dec 19

Experience your favorite films from this year’s festival all over again or for the very first time as we screen some of BAMkids Film Festival’s greatest hits from 2026!

BAM in association with The Racial Imaginary Institute and Greenlight Bookstore
presents

Unworlding, NYC 

Curated by BAM Artist-in-Residence and Curator Helga Davis

Oct 14—27

This new series of public dialogues, envisioned and actualized by BAM Curator and Artist-in-Residence Helga Davis, brings together artists and writers to find connection amid a changing world.