‘Hadestown’ Opens at Trust’s PNC Broadway Series: Trey Anastasio at UPMC Events Center (Tues., 11/15/22)

HADESTOWN (musical) by Anaïs Mitchell, directed by Rachel Chavkin. Touring company at the Benedum. November 15 – 20.

While Orpheus tries to save her, Eurydice barely has two nickels to rub together, but she’s working on it. Pittsburghers will see Hannah Whitley as the female lead in the ‘Hadestown’ tour. Photo: T Charles Erickson

1) Our culture pays lip service to risk-taking. We applaud those who dare to do great things despite the odds. It’s seen as the very embodiment of the human spirit. Unless you fail, and then you’re a chump. Perhaps that is why the Orpheus myth, an important one to the ancient Greeks, has not been adapted much in modern American theater. Orpheus was magical. He even almost rescued his beloved Eurydice from the bowels of Hades—until he made a wrong turn and blew it. But now we have a new telling of the story that’s blowing audiences away. Hadestown, the Tony-Award-winning musical by Anaïs Mitchell, frames the entire situation differently. The underworld is not the abode of the dead; it’s a grim factory where workers are worked half to death. Eurydice is not sent to Hades by a stroke of fate; she chooses to take a job there because a poor girl’s gotta do what she gotta do. And Orpheus—well, see for yourself. Just hurry to buy tickets or try your favorite aftermarket source, as Hadestown is hot. The touring production of Hadestown visits Pittsburgh as part of the Cultural Trust’s PNC Broadway in Pittsburgh series. 7:30 p.m. Benedum Center, 237 7th St., Cultural District. (M.V.) 

2) Jam-rocker Trey Anastasio—who still fronts the popular band Phish—stops in the ‘Burgh with his band on his 2022 solo tour. Anastasio’s most recent studio album is Mercy, he composed his first solo all acoustic album which was inspired by the Covid lockdown. Anastasio is so talented he was even nominated for a Tony Award in 2013 for Best Score for the Broadway play Hands on a Hardbody. And Phish will be going out on tour later this year. 7:30 p.m. Special Guest is Goose. UPMC Events Center. 7 p.m. 6001 University Blvd., RMU, Moon Township. (R.H.)

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