Fellow Travelers

Austin Opera brings Fellow Travelers to The Long Center for two performances in February 2027. It's the Texas premiere of the opera, composed by Gregory Spears with a libretto by Greg Pierce, and it's based on Thomas Mallon's 2007 novel. Andy Acosta takes the role of Timothy Laughlin and Joseph Lattanzi plays Hawkins Fuller, with Timothy Myers leading the Austin Opera Orchestra. Kevin Newbury directs.

The story is set in 1953 Washington D.C. during the Lavender Scare, the McCarthy-era witch hunt that ousted thousands of gay and lesbian employees from the federal government. Timothy Laughlin is a recent college graduate, eager to fight communism, who meets State Department official Hawkins Fuller. What starts as a passionate, forbidden romance eventually turns on a heart-rending betrayal.

It's a work that's gained a lot of traction since it first appeared. It was developed and co-commissioned by G. Sterling Zinsmeyer and Cincinnati Opera, where Newbury directed the premiere in 2016, and it's since been staged by Seattle Opera. Over the last fifty years, it's become one of the most critically acclaimed and widely produced operas in the U.S., selling more than 25,000 tickets across 14 productions. The Austin run is part of the second year of a national tour co-produced with the Up Until Now Collective, one of the largest consortium projects ever attempted in American opera. It's paired with the Lavender Names Project, a nationwide grassroots archival research and community outreach initiative.

There are two performances at The Long Center for the Performing Arts in Dell Hall: Saturday, February 6, at 7:30 PM and Sunday, February 7, at 2:00 PM. The production contains partial nudity and atmospheric effects.