UNIVERSITY PARK — Penn State Centre Stage is readying its 2017-18 season, the first under William J. Doan, as producing artistic director.

Replacing retiring artistic director Dan Carter, Doan emphasized that ” … preparing, educating and training our students for a life in the arts is at the heart of our season selection process.”

Productions are staged at either the Downtown Theater Center, or at one of the two on-campus venues: The Playhouse and The Pavilion.

As the professional arm of Penn State University’s acclaimed School of Theater, PSCS announces the following slate of productions:

• “Your Blues Ain’t Sweet Like Mine” (Sept. 8-13) — Tony Award winning Ruben Santiago-Hudson brings poignancy and humor to “one of the most potent conversations of American life.” This show, postponed from a weekend run in April, is set at a party on New York’s Upper West Side as an unlikely group passionately debate America’s relationship to race. Their argument is “We all sing the blues. But are your blues sweeter than mine?”

• “Sweet Charity” (Oct. 6-8) — Charity Hope Valentine is the optimistic dance hall hostess who pours her heart out to one undeserving man after another in the pursuit of finding true love. The music by Cy Coleman and lyrics by Dorothy Field includes “Big Spender!” and “If My Friends Could See Me Now.”

• “Argonautika” (Oct. 27-Nov. 3) — This modern take on an old tale of ambition, deception, heroism, love and unintended consequences, follows Jason in his ancient quest for the Golden Fleece. In his epic journey, the hero has confrontations with giants, nymphs, sirens, centaurs, sea monsters and one lovesick sorceress in this adaptation of “Jason and the Argonauts.”

• “Cosi Fan Tutu” (Nov. 15-16) — Billed as a comedy with a tragedy underneath, this is a combined production between Penn State’s Schools of Theater and Music. The fully produced opera, with a “dazzling score” composed by C.A. Mozart, features a full orchestra, complete sets and costuming.

• “Love In Hate Nation” (Nov. 16-24) — The first project in the new initiatives of Penn State Musical Theatre is set in a 1960 Juvenile Hall for Girls. The romance uses classic “bad girl” movies as the inspiration for a story of young people caught between the eras of a changing America and their attempt to break out of the “boxes” which society has wrapped around them.

• “Kiss Of the Spider Woman” (April 6-7) — With music and lyrics by Kander and Ebb, the 1993 Tony Award winning “Best Musical” focuses upon a homosexual window dresser in a Latin American prison. Living in a fantasy world which revolve around the movies, his dreams which come to life focus upon a fiery diva, playing a spider woman known for her deadly kisses.

For more information, call the box office at 814-0255, 800-ARTS-TIX or visit www.theatre.psu.edu.