2011 - 2012 Season
A Midsummer Night's Dream
A Magical Romantic Comedy by William Shakespeare; directed by: Tim Bohn
Written in late 1594 or early 1595, The Dream, as referred to in theatrical shorthand suggests that Shakespeare was interested in "oer-hasty marriages" and the consequences of falling in love too quickly. Typical of Shakespeare's comedies, it is a romantic tale, with five love stories unfolding simultaneously as the sophisticated comedy encourages audiences to "glance from heaven to earth, from earth to heaven."
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Private Lives
A Comedy by Noel Coward; directed by: Lisa Bohn
One of the most flippant plays ever written. Elyot and Amanda, once married and now honeymooning with new spouses at the same hotel, meet by chance, reignite the old spark and impulsively elope. After days of being reunited, they again find their fiery romance alternating between passions of love and anger.
"Gorgeous, dazzling, fantastically, funny." - N.Y. Times
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Pierre and Marie
Docudrama Adapted by Ron Clark from the French play by Jean-Noel Fenwich; directed by: Molly Simpson
In a small laboratory in Paris in the 1800's, Pierre and Marie Currie discover uranium, radium, and their love. This intelligent comedy is equal parts of science, history, and riotously charming comedy
"An amazing , amusing, and educational account of Pierre and Marie Curie's personal and professional lives... Laugh out loud funny."
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I Love You, You're Perfect, Now Change
A Musical Comedy; Book & Lyrics by Joe DiPietro; Music by Jimmy Rogers; directed by: Tim Bohn
This celebration of the mating game takes on the truths and myths behind that contemporary conundrum know as "the relationship." Act I explores the journey from dating and waiting to love and marriage, while Act II reveals the agonies and triumphs of in-laws and newborns, trips in the car and pick-up techniques of the geriactric set. This hilarious revue pays tribute to those who have loved and lost, to those who have fallen on their face at the portal of romance, to those who have dared to ask, "Say, what are you doing Saturday night?"
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2010 - 2011 Season
Wonder of the World
A comedy by David Lindsey-Abaire; directed by: Tim Bohn
Nothing will prepare you for the dirty little secret Cass discovers in her husband’s sweater drawer. It is so shocking that our heroine has no choice but to flee to the honeymoon capital of the world in a frantic search for the life she thinks she missed out on. It’s a wild ride over Niagara Falls in a barrel of laughs as Cass embarks on a journey of self discovery that has her crossing paths with a blithely suicidal alcoholic, a lonely tour-boat captain, a pair of bickering private detectives and a strange caper involving a gargantuan jar of peanut butter, all of which pushes her perilously close to the water’s edge.
“Full frontal lunacy is on display. A most assuredly fresh and hilarious tragicomedy of marital discord run amok. Lindsay-Abaire’s flare for the absurd combines nicely with an ability to pull laughs out of any situation. Absolutely hysterical. “ - Variety
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Nice People Dancing to Good Country Music
A comedy by Lee Blessing; directed by: Bob Simpson
A sharply drawn and very funny play about the personal heartaches and public eccentricities of two women living over a good-ole-boy bar in Houston Texas. Eve Wilfong, who lives over the “Nice People Dancing to Good Country Music Bar” is paid a visit by her niece Catherine Empanger, a novice nun who’s been asked to leave her convent. It seems Catherine suffers from a curious compulsion to yell obscenities at the wrong moment and even bark like a dog. Eve feels she should give her niece the benefit of her experiences with men before allowing her to venture back into the mad modern country world. What follows is simply comic and well-observed, but romantic and affecting as well.
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The Butler Did It
A comedy/thriller by Walter Marks and Peter Marks; directed by: Molly Simpson
A deft and diabolically clever thriller mingles laughter and chills as it skillfully unwinds its twisted tale of murder and mayhem in the glittering world of the theatre. The scene is set where Anthony J. Lefcourt, writer and director, is rehearsing his new play, a “classic whodunit” (in which all the characters are named Butler) with which he hopes to regain the success that has eluded him in recent seasons. Desperately eager to stimulate his cast to their best efforts, he has deliberately withheld the final scene of the play from them.
“…ample opportunity here for laughs and double-whammy thrills” –The New York Times, “…a genuinely amusing burlesque of those good old ‘30s movie thrillers in which the killer is unmasked in the final moments.” – The New York Daily News
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The Visit
A tragicomedy by Friedrich Durrenmatt; adapted by Maurice Valency; directed by: Tim Bohn
A consummate, alarming Durrenmatt blend of hilarity, horror, and vertigo. The play takes place “somewhere in Central Europe” and tells of an elderly millionaires who, merely on the promise of her millions, swiftly turns a depressed area into a boom town. But the condition attached to her largesse, which the locals learn of only after they are enmeshed, is murder. Durrenmatt has fashioned a macabre and entertaining parable that is a scathing indictment of the power of greed.
“Durrenmatt has wicked sense of the ridiculous…He combines laughter with a moralist’s outrage at the evil of money and power. He combines a poetic sense of irony with abrasive Brechtian social criticism.” – The Record
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2009-2010 Season
Bound
an original drama by Tim Bohn; directed by: Tim Bohn
An accident leaves a brother and sister without parents and suddenly responsible for the family farm and the care of their autistic brother. Their plan to take turns attending college is shaken when the older brother graduates and sees what his life will become when his sister leaves for her turn. Both are bound by duty to their family and pulled by their need for a life outside their small town farm. Written by ASU Assistant Professor, Tim Bohn.
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Little Shop of Horrors
Book and Lyrics by Howard Ashman, Music by Alan Menken, Based on the film by Roger Corman, Screenplay by Charles Griffith; directed by : Molly Simpson
A down-and out skid row floral assistant becomes an overnight sensation when he discovers an exotic plant with a mysterious craving for fresh blood. Soon "Audrey II" grows into an ill-tempered, R & B-singing carnivore who offers him fame and fortune in exchange for feeding its growing appetite.
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The Burial at Thebes: A Version of Sophocles' Antigone
by Seamus Heaney; directed by: Tim Bohn
Antigone, the daughter of Oedipus, is faced with a terrible choice when her brothers slay each other in battle. Her uncle, Creon has declared that one brother be honored and buried, and the other be left unburied. Defying his edict, she buries her brother. Creon condemns her death and she is walled up in a tomb. Eventually, Creon reconsiders his death sentence, but it is too late. Antigone has taken her own life.
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The Foreigner
a comedy by Larry Shue; directed by: Stacy Alley
A painfully shy man pretending to speak "No English," unwittingly uncovers secret plots and gossip among the denizens of a small rural fishing lodge in Georgia. His discoveries lead to a wildly funny chain of events where everything goes uproariously awry. The Village Voice calls this comedy by Larry Shue "an invitation to relax and laugh at the foolishness of life."
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2008-2009 Season
Dancing at Lughnasa
a Drama by Brian Friel; directed by: Stacy Alley
This extraordinary play is the story of five unmarried sisters eking out their lives in a small village in Ireland in 1936. We meet them at a time of the festival of Lughnasa, which celebrates the pagan god of the harvest with the drunken revelry and dancing. Their sparce existence is interrupted by brief, colorful bursts of music from the radio, their only link to romance and hope of the world at large.
"This play does exactly what theatre was born to do, carry its characters and audience aloft on those waves of distant music and ecstatic release that, in defiance of all language and logic, let us dance and dream just before night must fall." - The New York Times
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The Rimers of Eldritch
a Drama by Lanford Wilson; directed by: Bob Simpson
The mystery is: Who is he, who murdered him and what were the circumstances? And to solve it, Wilson looks at the outsides and insides of his tiny, Midwestern town. He looks at a middle-aged woman who falls in love with the young man who comes to town to work in her cafe. He looks at a coarse, nasty woman mistreating her senile mother, who is obsessed with visions of Eldritch being evil and headed for blood spilling. He looks at a tender relationship between a young man and a dreamy crippled girl. But Wilson sees far more than this. He is grasping the very fabric of Bible Belt America with its catchword morality ("virgin," "God-fearing") and its capability for the vicious.
"...This reviewer liked Rimers for its fluidity, for its language, for its almost musical sense of pattern." - The New York Times
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Talk Radio
A Comedy by Eric Bogosian; Created by Eric Bogosian and Tad Savinar; directed by: Molly Simpson
Barry Champlian, Cleveland's controversial radio host is on the air doing what he does best: insulting the pathetic souls who call in the middle of the night to sound off. Tomorrow, Barry's show is going into national syndication and his producer is afraid Barry will say something that will offend the sponsors. This, of course, makes Barry even more audacious. Funny and moving, off beat, outrageous and totally entrancing.
"...a compelling show that makes the call-in talk show a metaphor for America's lost souls." - N. Y. Newsday
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Lovers and Executioners
A Comedy by John Strand; directed by: Tim Bohn
This "startling modern" tale about attempted murder and a woman's revenge concerns a husband who discovers evidence that his wife has been unfaithful. He abandons her on a desert isle, expecting her to die. Strand's adaptation of Montfleury's 17th century poetry into 20th century verse has been called "funny, grim, and superb."
" You can't ask for more than an evening in which you laugh like mad, then sit on the edge of your seat wondering how the tale will turn out." - Washington Post
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2007-2008 Season
Wait Until Dark
by Frederick Knott, directed by: Bob Simpson
A Broadway hit, this claustrophobic suspense thriller plays upon everyone’s worst fear of being alone in the dark with a maniacal killer.
“… a first rate shocker…the suspense drama we’ve long awaited eagerly.” – The New York Post.
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Beautiful Bodies
by Laura Shaine Cunningham; directed by: Molly Simpson
Manhattan -- six best friends rush to attend a celebration. Tonight's the night of nights -- to rejoice in a new lover, leave an unfaithful husband, or decide to have a baby on one's own. These "six in the city" professional women fight for their female choices. Sparks and zingers fly....Love lives, secrets, and friendships go up in candle flame. Here is our urban "friends-as-family" generation -- a dazzling contemporary comedy of manners.
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Proof
by David Auburn; directed by: Molly Simpson
Winner of the 2001 Pulitzer Prize and Tony Award, Proof combines elements of mystery and surprise with old-fashioned storytelling to provide a compelling evening of theatre.
"Proof is a smart and compassionate play about ideas." -NY Daily News
Proof surprises us with its aliveness... Mr. Auburn takes pleasure in knowledge...at the same time, he is unshowily fresh and humane." -NY Observer
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The Great American Trailer Park Musical
Book by Betsy Kelso; Music and Lyrics by David Nehls; directed by: Stacy Alley
A new show about agoraphobia, adultery, 80's nostalgia, spray cheese, road kill, hysterical pregnancy, a broken electric chair, kleptomania, strippers, and disco...It's everything a musical should be.
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2006 - 2007 Season
The God of Hell
by Sam Shepard; directed by: Bob Simpson
A Dark Comedy of subversive government plutonium testing described by Pulitzer Prize winning playwright, Sam Shepard as "a takeoff on Republican fascism."
"Startling...apocalyptic...a confident and unsettling scenario of surreal doom." - The New Yorker
"Deliriously entertaining and deeply scary...a shivering work of existential mystery." - NY Newsday
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The Diviners
a drama by James Leonard Jr.; directed by: Stacy Alley
A play about love, friendship, family and community, and a time in our nation's history when such things were hard to find, and even harder to hold onto. While the rest of the country lays divided and demoralized by the Great Depression, the people of this story manage to weather the storm.
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The House of Yes
a dark comedy by Wendy Macleod; directed by: Molly Simpson
The life of a dysfunctional Virginia family is paralleled to that of the Kennedys in this outrageous, edgy comedy. Celebrating Thanksgiving brings on a whole new meaning when the Jackie-O obsessed daughter and her twin brother reveal their family secret.
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Twelfth Night
a comedy by William Shakespeare; directed by: John O'Connell
A fantastic Shakespearean twist on the old comic plot line of the madcap events surrounding the mixed-up and mistaken identities of twins, only this time he even mixes up the gender. Often considered "the greatest of Shakespeare's romantic comedies."
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2005 - 2006 Season
After Juliet
by Sharman MacDonald; directed by: Jeff McLaughlin
Set during the tense aftermath of the deaths of Romeo and Juliet, the Capulets and Montagues continue to feud, though the families are commanded to respect a truce. Romeo's best friend, Benvolio is in love with Juliet's revenge bent cousin, Rosaline. Will they choose war or peace?
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The Importance of Being Earnest
"A Trivial Comedy for Serious People" by Oscar Wilde; directed by: Molly Simpson
Oscar Wilde's hilarious and most cherished play focuses on Jack and Algernon, two young men in love with women both determined to marry someone named Earnest. A classic masterpiece of elegant wit and humor that appears to make the trivial important.
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Sideman
A Drama by Warren Leight; directed by: Stacy Alley
Winner of the 1999 Tony Award, Sideman is a lovely and poignant memory play which unfolds through the eyes of Clifford, the only son of Gene, a jazz trumpet player, and Terry, his alcoholic mother. Alternating between their New York City apartment and a smoke-filled music club, Clifford narrates the story of his broken family and the decline of jazz.
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The Boys From Syracuse
Music by Richard Rodgers; Lyrics by Lorenz Hart; Book by George Abbott; directed by: John O'Connell
"Twins! More twins! Women - chased and chaste! The first musical ever adapted from Shakespeare remains the most MADCAP MUSICAL farce ever to animate the stage. Perplexed wives, disgruntled courtesans, mistaken twins and outraged constables make up the cast of this AWARD WINNING Rodgers and Hart classic."
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2004 - 2005 Season
One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest
by Dale Wasserman; adapted from the novel by Ken Kesey; directed by: John O'Connell
This comedy-drama is the engaging story of a power struggle between a charming rogue patient and the disciplined orderly head nurse in a mental institution in the 1960s. This particular institution is filled with a cast of colorful characters who are delightfully sympathetic yet suffer from real emotional distress, causing laughter and tears at the same time.
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Five Women Wearing the Same Dress
by Alan Ball; directed by: Stacy Alley
Five reluctant and badly dressed bridesmaids hide out in an upstairs bedroom, each with their own reason for avoiding the festivities below. In the midst of wedding bells and clouds of tulle, five bridesmaids share their thoughts and experiences, laughs and tears, as one summer afternoon forces them to re/deconstruct for the nineties the same old question, "What do Women Want?
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Crimes of the Heart
by Beth Henley; directed by: Molly Simpson
This Pulitzer prize winning play reunites three sisters in a small Mississippi town as they await the outcome of their ailing grandfather. Running the gamut from comedy to tragedy, the story is so touching and hilarious that it will linger in the mind long after the curtain has descended.
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Anything Goes
Music & Lyrics by Cole Porter; Book by Guy Bolton & P.G. Wodehouse; directed by: John O'Connell
An American Musical classic of the great music of Cole Porter. Join us on the "Ocean Greyhound" luxury liner bound for England in 1930 for madcap cops and robbers, tap dancing and young lovers destined to find true love. Whether they are singing It's De-Lovely, I Get a Kick Out of You, Blow Gabriel Blow or tap dancing to Anything Goes, this fun filled crew will keep you tapping in your seat.
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2003 - 2004 Season
Waiting for Godot
directed by: John O'Connell
At the turn of the millennium, American Theatre Magazine subscribers picked "Godot" as the most important play of the 20th century. This is Samuel Beckett's most significant and often produced absurdist tragicomedy.
"...at once pathetic and hilarious." -- NY World-Telegram
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The Shape of Things
directed by: Molly Simpson
How far would you go for love? For art? Which price might you pay? Such are the painful questions explored by Neil Labute. A young student drifts into an ever-changing relationship with an art major while his best friend's engagement crumbles, so unleashing a drama that peels back the skin of two modern-day relationships; exposing the raw meat and gristle that lie beneath.
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I Hate Hamlet
directed by: Robert Hypes
Thr greatest Hamlet of his time, John Barrymore, returns as a ghost to coach hot, young, television actor, Andrew Rally, in his attempt at the greatest role of all time. The laughs are nonstop as Andrew wrestles with his conscience, Barrymore, his sword, and his failure as Hamlet in Central Park.
"unapologetically silly...hilarious...affectionately amusing about the theatre." -- New York Times
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The Laramie Project
directed by: John O'Connell
A docudrama detailing the life as well as the horrific murder of gay University of Wyoming student, Mathew Shepard in October of 1998. This story made national headlines due to the shocking details of his murder and the shocking reaction of the radical right to the ensuring memorials and trial. The production will be a photojournalist narrative retelling of a brave, young man's life.
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2002 - 2003 Season
The Fantasticks
Book Lyrics by Tom Jones; Music by Harvey Schmidt; directed by: Molly Simpson
The longest running musical in the world is a timeless fable of love that manages to be nostalgic and universal at the same time. "Try to Remember" when this pure and simple musical wasn't a favorite of audiences.
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The Elephant Man
by Bernard Pomerance; directed by: John O'Connell
This moving drama tells the TRUE story of John Merrick,
a man whose body is hideously deformed, but within this body we find a remarkably sensitive and intelligent spirit. His condition is exploited by all levels of society in early 20th century.
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Two Rooms
by Lee Blessing; directed by: Bob Simpson
Provocative and compelling with a subject much in the mind of today's society - the taking of innocent lives by terrorists. This timely play is a powerful exploration of terrorism in Beirut performed in an intimate arena format in the Black Box Theatre.
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The Beaux' Stratagem
by George Farquhar; directed by: John O'Connell
A gem of 18th century comedy, this delightful play has two young rogues pretending to be men of money in order to win the hearts of the young and wealthy women they fancy. This clever story depicts all the funny, silly twists men are willing to endure to succeed in one of the oldest con games in English storytelling.
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2001 - 2002 Season
Never The Sinner
directed by: Molly Simpson
Few trial transcripts are likely to be as emotionally engaging as that of the 1924 trial of Leopold and Loeb for the death of 14-year old Bobby Franks. Decades after Clarence Darrow delivered his 12-hour long plea to save his young clients' lives, his moving summation stands as the most eloquent attack on the death penalty ever unveiled in this powerful and compelling play.
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Hamlet
directed by: Joe Falocco
"There's something rotten in the state of Denmark!" Hamlet, The Prince of Denmark, William Shakespeare's famous revenge tragedy, continues to entertain audiences worldwide with numerous popular elements, including supernatural appearances, comic characters, swordplay, and intrigue.
