Foley performance: 92nd St. Y \ BBC Wales

This FREE event will be available for reservations on Sep 9 at noon.

The Poetry Center celebrates Dylan Thomas’s centenary by turning Kaufmann Concert Hall into a studio for a free reading ofUnder Milk Wood broadcast live on BBC Radio Wales. The Poetry Center presented the premiere of this “play for voices,” with Thomas himself leading the cast, in May 1953.

Michael Sheen, who will direct the reading and lead a cast of all Welsh actors (which includes Kate Burton), has said “it’s a real honor and an absolute thrill to be able to perform Under Milk Wood in this very special year and on the stage that it first found its voice. The live radio broadcast is an opportunity to celebrate him and his work in both New York—a city that became so important to Dylan—and, at the same time, in Wales, his inspiration and home.”

After the reading, patrons will have the opportunity to go next door to 92Y’s Weill Art Gallery and experience Dylan Thomas in America, an exhibition of photos, letters, drawings and manuscripts that chronicles the poet’s legendary trips to the U.S. in the 1950s.

Other DT/100 events occurring in the birthday week—Thomas was born on October 27, 1914—include a reading of Thomas’s verse at Bowery Poetry Club (evening of Oct 26); a screening of the new Dylan Thomas biopic, Set Fire to the Stars (Chelsea Hotel, Oct 27); an evening of classical music inspired by Thomas and Welsh waterways (Salmagundi Club, Oct 28); walking tours of Greenwich Village (Oct 29); and a panel discussion featuring Hannah Ellis, Thomas’s granddaughter, and former U.S. Poet Laureate Philip Levine (92Y, Oct 31).

More info on these citywide programs, which are sponsored by the British Council and the Welsh government, will follow in days to come.

Can't make it to the event? Listen to the livestream