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The Perelman Performing Arts Center has revealed programming for the fourth artistic season at the recently opened performing arts center at the World Trade Center site in Lower Manhattan.
Audiences will experience programming across theater, dance, music, opera, and special events. The season features world premieres, acclaimed creative talent, award-winning productions, community-building gatherings, new creative partnerships, and the return of cherished annual events like A Christmas Carol, Motion/Matter: All-Styles Dance Battle and Family Day.
GIULIA: THE POISON QUEEN OF PALERMO (Musical Theater)
World Premiere
June 28 – July 26, 2026
Written by and featuring Grammy Award winner Jennifer Nettles
Choreographed by Austin Mccormick
Directed by Tony Award winner Mary Zimmerman
The power lies in her hands, one drop at a time.
What began as a single act of self-defense ripples through Palermo, creating a cascade of casualties and inspiring a secret sisterhood. But the path to safety is never safe. Can Giulia Tofana save them all without losing herself?
Written by and featuring GRAMMY Award winner Jennifer Nettles and directed by Tony Award winner Mary Zimmerman (Metamorphoses), this world premiere musical—inspired by a true story—is laced with dangerous secrets and a soaring, soulful contemporary score.
THE NEW YORK PHILHARMONIC AND THE SOLDIERS’ CHORUS OF THE U.S. ARMY FIELD BAND: SOUNDS OF REMEMBRANCE (Music)
September 11, 2026
An iconic orchestra and powerful voices come together for a free musical salute.
The New York Philharmonic, led by incoming Tang Music & Artistic Director Gustavo Dudamel, joins the U.S. Army Field Band Soldiers’ Chorus, led by Captain Jac’kel Smalls, for a landmark concert commemorating the 25th anniversary of the September 11 attacks. Honoring the heroes who walk among us—from the families of the fallen to those inspired to serve in the years following September 11, 2001—
we celebrate their legacy and what it means to answer the call with a program that includes works by Tchaikovsky, Beethoven, Bernstein, and more.
COME FROM AWAY IN CONCERT: SOUNDS OF REMEMBRANCE (Music)
September 13, 2026
Book, Music and Lyrics by Irene Sankoff & David Hein
A free, one-time-only concert event of the Tony and Olivier Award-winning musical.
Former Broadway and national tour company members of Come From Away reunite in honor of the 25th anniversary of 9/11. This 100-minute open-air concert staging will be performed on the World Trade Center campus.
Come From Away tells the remarkable true story of 7,000 stranded passengers and the small town in Newfoundland that welcomed them. Cultures clashed and nerves ran high, but uneasiness turned into trust, music soared into the night, and gratitude grew into enduring friendships. On September 11, 2001 the world stopped. On September 12, their stories moved us all.
ICONS OF CULTURE (Event)
All Icons and dates to be announced soon.
PAC NYC continues an annual celebration of innovators, creators, and game changers who are shaping culture and influencing the way we live, work, and play. Join PAC NYC throughout the season for a series of high-profile conversations with the icons of culture who are leading the way and making a distinct mark on our society.
Presented by BNY.
A CHRISTMAS CAROL (Theater)
November 20, 2026—January 3, 2027
A version by Tony Award winner Jack Thorne
Conceived and Directed by Tony Award winner Matthew Warchus
The magic is back! The Old Vic’s acclaimed production of A Christmas Carol makes a joyous return to PAC NYC.
Two visionary Tony Award winners—playwright Jack Thorne (Harry Potter and the Cursed Child), conceiver and director Matthew Warchus (Matilda the Musical)—offer a magical interpretation of Charles Dickens’ timeless classic. Brimming with merriment, music, and holiday treats, this immersive production wraps the audience around the action, inviting the communal holiday spirit in us all.
On a bitter Christmas Eve, a cold-hearted miser is visited by four ghosts. Transported to worlds past, present, and future, Ebenezer Scrooge witnesses what a lifetime of fear and selfishness has led to and sees with fresh eyes the lonely life he has built for himself. Can Ebenezer be saved before it’s too late?
Winner of five Tony Awards, this beloved production welcomes theatergoers with dazzling staging, moving storytelling, and cherished Christmas carols, including “Joy to the World,” “Silent Night,” and “It Came Upon the Midnight Clear.”
DEMOCRACY CYCLE FESTIVAL (Event)
January 16-23, 2027
Presented by PAC NYC and Civis Foundation
This festival will feature two full productions of Democracy Cycle-commissioned pieces, as well as work in progress, showings of commissions still in development along with panels, gatherings, and networking events. Additional festival programs will be announced soon.
The Democracy Cycle is a multi-year commitment to the commissioning and development of 25 works across theater, opera, dance, and music, which asks artists to explore themes relating to the nature, practice, and experience of democracy.
BAYE & ASA’S AT THE ALTAR (Dance)
A Democracy Cycle world premiere dance commission.
By Baye & Asa
What do we worship? How do we worship? Who are the righteous, and who are blasphemers? Through propulsive movement and evocative scenic design, At the Altar reckons with the pitfalls of extreme idolatry and questions the cost of pedestalizing any one person or idea. This powerful new dance work from the acclaimed choreographic duo Baye & Asa invites audiences into a world void of absolute truth. It follows the duo in search of deliverance, and interrogates our collective struggle for freedom, survival, and salvation.
THE PUERTO RICO EXPERIMENT (Music)
By Angélica Négron
with Balún and Roomful of Teeth
A Democracy Cycle world premiere song cycle commission.
Puerto Rican-born composer Angélica Negrón and her Brooklyn-based indie electronic band Balún team up with GRAMMY-winning vocal innovators Roomful of Teeth to create a tropical song cycle exploring what it means for a territory without full political representation to be repeatedly treated as a laboratory. Created in collaboration with four Puerto Rican poets (Roque Raquel Salas Rivera, Nicole Delgado, Mara Pastor, and Ashley Pérez Garacia) each sonic vignette traces a specific incident in the island’s history as a site of experimentation—from mass sterilization campaigns and imposing English in public schools, to the U.S. Navy occupation of Vieques and UFO sightings in Lajas.
Equal parts concert, inquiry, and collective dream, The Puerto Rico Experiment creates a space for radical listening, embodied remembrance, and imagining new cultural and political possibilities.
Timothy Long’S NORTH AMERICAN INDIGENOUS SONGBOOK (Music)
January 29, 2027
Curated by pianist, conductor, and composer Timothy Long
In association with the Plimpton Foundation
A landmark initiative dedicated to commissioning, performing, and championing new works by Indigenous composers across the United States and Canada.
Following a much-lauded 2024 premiere at National Sawdust, creator Timothy Long brings the latest incarnation of the North American Indigenous Songbook to PAC NYC, expanding the scope with new commissions, composers and collaborators.
The concert features Timothy Long, Marion Newman, R. Carlos Nakai, and Martha Redbone Roots Project, and other commissioned compositions from Native American, First Nations, and Métis composers.
THE GORGEOUS NOTHINGS (Musical Theater)
February 16 – March 14, 2027
A Life Jacket Theatre Company production
Conceived & Written by Travis Lee Russ
Arrangements & Orchestrations by Dan Schlosberg
Arrangements by Alejandro Senior
Direction & Choreography by Danny Mefford
History tried to hide them, so they staged a spectacle.
Inspired by true events, The Gorgeous Nothings uncovers the long-buried story of the “Fag Ward,” a hidden wing of the Men’s Penitentiary on Welfare Island in New York City, where inmates were imprisoned in the 1930s for homosexuality. With a score drawn from the Great American Songbook, this world premiere musical weaves six inmates’ stories into high-camp numbers from the ward’s annual Christmas pageant to expose a secret, fabulous, world that was never supposed to have existed.
THE UNSINKABLE (Theater)
February 10 – March 7, 2027
By Frances Ya-Chu Cowhig
Directed by Aya Ogawa
A world premiere theatrical storm of memory, myth, and survival.
When 17-year-old Little Fong is plunged into the freezing Atlantic as the Titanic sinks, survival becomes a battle inside his own mind. The Unsinkable is a wildly inventive, darkly funny, and deeply moving odyssey inspired by the six Chinese seamen who lived—then were erased from the story of the Titanic’s survivors. From Liverpool’s engine rooms and Chinatown streets to Cuban sugarcane fields, and a Chicago nursing home in 1986, Little Fong’s memories and desires spring to life through puppetry, cross-Atlantic dance traditions, and flourishes of Chinese opera. He fights for dignity and love even as time slips and his life is largely forgotten.
VOX (Opera)
April 1, 2027
Witness bold new operas take their first breath.
Perelman Performing Arts Center (PAC NYC) joins six of New York City’s leading music institutions— American Composers Orchestra, Beth Morrison Projects, Manhattan School of Music, Mannes School of Music, MasterVoices, and The Metropolitan Opera —to showcase four grand-scale, works-in-process from artists across the country.
These book-in-hand concert presentations feature 20 to 30-minute excerpts from each opera, performed by established voices and emerging talent with full orchestra and chorus. VOX is more than a showcase, it’s a crucial steppingstone in the journey of new opera development, helping groundbreaking visions move closer to the stage and giving PAC NYC audiences the chance to see them first.
MOTION/MATTER: ALL-STYLES DANCE BATTLE (Dance)
April 3, 2027
Tickets for Motion/Matter: All-Styles Dance Battle are Pay-What-You-Wish, starting from $15. Get ready to feel the rush of adrenaline as Motion/Matter: All-Styles Dance Battle returns to PAC NYC.
Following three consecutive sold-out, smash-hit showdowns, Motion/Matter returns to electrify Lower Manhattan with a high-voltage dance debate. Top-tier dancers from NYC’s street and club scenes go head to-head in a tournament-style exhibition of skill, demonstrating locking, popping, breaking, and all the moves that define the culture. With a panel of all-star judges and a cash grand prize at stake, Motion/Matter: All-Styles Dance Battle is more than a competition—it’s a high-energy exchange where styles collide, movement matters, and street culture takes center stage.
FAMILY DAY (Event)
May 2027
A free fun-filled event for all ages!
PAC NYC brings together families and artists for another unforgettable day of indoor and outdoor workshops, performances, interactive creation stations, dance, live music, and more. Celebrate the diverse stories, voices, and cultures of New York City through engaging activities that will make you feel right at home as you explore the magic of the arts.
PAC NYC will expand their commitment to family programming beginning Summer 2026 with more to be announced soon.
LOBBY STAGE (Music)
Ongoing
As part of its mission to provide accessible programming for the community, PAC NYC offers free performances including guest DJs, up and coming artists and community programming on the Vartan and Clare Gregorian Stage in its lobby.
Additional details available here.
