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Prolific TheatreWorks Silicon Valley performer Hershey Felder is back at the theater company this month for a production people have been asking him to do for years: a look into his own personal life.
The actor, pianist and writer will debut “Hershey Felder: The Piano and Me” at TheatreWorks. The show, making its world premiere at the company, follows his upbringing by Polish and Hungarian immigrants in Montreal, and discovering the piano, an experience which opened him up to “adventure, heartbreak and connection.”
Unlike Felder’s previous plays, in which he portrays one composer, such as Frédéric Chopin or George Gershwin, and performs their works, this production will feature him portraying about a dozen composers, including Bach, Mozart, Beethoven, Chopin, Liszt, Rachmaninoff and Bartók, and performing their music. He also plays himself in the show.
“I’ve been asked for years to tell my own story,” said Felder, who started working on the show 10 months ago. “I avoided it for many years; I don’t think it’s remotely interesting. People kept on pestering me. … It’s a story I know.”
To create the two-hour show, Felder carefully chose elements of his story that would resonate with audience members. It, in part, follows his journey to the United States at age 16 to study as a private student under Jerome Lowenthal, a pianist and professor in the Juilliard School’s Department of Music in New York City.
“There are a lot of fun stories I could tell, but they don’t advance the story,” he said. He declined to share the overall theme of the work, noting that people will have to come and see it to find out. “I hope people find it interesting. I’m telling an honest story. The music is good because it’s by the greatest composers.”
Felder, who has performed for 11 years at TheatreWorks, plays himself as well as the people he’s met during his life as an artist.
Felder holds TheatreWorks’ top box office record for highest total ticket sales of all-time and is an audience favorite, according to the theater company.
His past productions include: “Hershey Felder: Rachmaninoff and the Tsar;” “Hershey Felder as George Gershwin Alone;” “Hershey Felder: Chopin in Paris;” and “Our Great Tchaikovsky.” According to TheatreWorks, he has played 16 musical protagonists, given 6,000 live performances, made 18 musical films, and created 30 hours of musical repertoire.
Felder generally starts building a show around the music and said that if the music is “exciting and interesting” the public wants to hear it.
Outside of visits to the Bay Area and tours elsewhere, Felder divides his time between Los Angeles and Italy.
Felder, who is fluent in Italian, is the artistic director of FirenzeOnStage, directing the Teatro Niccolini and Teatro Nazzionale/Della Signoria, both in Florence, Italy. He opened the 2024-25 season with Emmy- and Oscar-nominated actor Jeff Goldblum performing jazz piano. For the 2025-26 season, he premiered “Caligula: The Ultimate Cut” in Italy. He followed up the show with an audience discussion with actors Malcolm McDowell and Helen Mirren.
Mountain View Center for the Performing Arts, 500 Castro St., Mountain View. Jan. 17-Feb. 8. Tickets: $34-$115. theatreworks.org.
