LAKE FOREST, IL - Citadel’s 2022-23 season will continue when Lucas Hnath’s thought-provoking and Obie Award winning play THE CHRISTIANS begins performances on February 8. The drama, set in a mega church, is neither an endorsement nor an indictment of organized religion in general, nor of Christianity specifically, but Hnath raises philosophical and theological questions that he trusts audiences to answer for themselves. What if there is no Hell? What if we all are welcomed into Heaven by a loving God who forgives all – even humanity’s worst? The pastor who poses these questions in a sermon finds that his congregants are not all ready to give up the promise of eternal damnation for those whose sins they find to be unforgiveable. THE GUARDIAN said in its review of the play’s New York City production, “Whether or not you believe in God, you should believe in Lucas Hnath.” THE CHRISTIANS will open to the press on Friday, February 10, 2023, at 7:30 pm, following previews on February 8 and 9. It will play through March 12, 2023.

To create the setting of an elaborate megachurch, Citadel’s production will employ a grid of some 90 two-foot square state of the art digital video monitors to depict the church’s expansive interior and a choir. The monitors, provided by Pangea Technology, are of a level of sophistication that is normally found only in big-budget productions like Disney’s Star Wars series THE MANDALORIAN, or TV shows like AMERICAN IDOL or THE VOICE. The monitors will allow the production to achieve an epic scope not normally feasible in an intimate venue like Citadel’s 125-seat theatre, located inside Lake Forest High School’s West Campus. At the same time, the intimacy of Citadel’s performance space will bring the audience close to the characters in what is, in spite of the play’s setting in a huge and grand church, a very personal drama of Pastor Paul’s journey.