PERFECT ARRANGEMENT Launches RTP'S 24th Season

Richmond Triangle Players' launches its 24th Season of mainstage works with Atlanta playwright Topher Payne's new comedy PERFECT ARRANGEMENT. The play opens Thursday, September 29th at 8:00 pm at RTP's theater at 1300 Altamont Avenue in Richmond, after a low-priced preview on Wednesday, September 28th. The production runs through October 22, and is sponsored by Barcode.

In PERFECT ARRANGEMENT, it's 1950, and new colors are being added to the Red Scare. Two U.S. State Department employees, Bob and Norma, have been tasked with identifying sexual deviants within their ranks. There's just one problem: both Bob and Norma are gay, and have married each other's partners as a carefully constructed cover. Inspired by the true story of the earliest stirrings of the American gay rights movement, madcap "I Love Lucy"-style laughs give way to provocative drama as two "All-American" couples are forced to stare down the closet door.

Playing the two couples at the center of the play are Stevie Rice (RTP's Psycho Beach Party, The Pride and Cabaret) and Louise Ricks (RTP's Psycho Beach Party) as Bob and Millie Martindale, and Luke Newsome (RTP's The Boy from Oz and Glory Days) and Tara Callahan Carroll (RTP debut, CAT's Don't Cry for Me Margaret Mitchell) as Jim and Norma Baxter. Bob's boss at the State Department and his society-maven wife are played by Jeff Clevenger (Richmond Theatre Critics Circle award winner for Quill Theater's Hamlet) andJacqueline O'Connor (RTP's Regrets Only, RTCC Award-winner for Cadence Theatre's Good People). Playing Barbara Grant, a mysterious woman from Millie's past is Jennifer Frank (RTP's 5 Lesbians Eating a Quiche).

Playwright Topher Payne has written over a dozen plays which have been performed all over the country. PERFECT ARRANGEMENT premiered at the Source Festival in Washington DC in June 2013, and later had an acclaimed production at New York's Primary Stages. The New York Times called the play "clever canapé of a comedy" and it's author "a deft and witty writer," while theNew Yorker raved it was a "pitch-perfect comedy." TheatreMania further exclaimed, "Usually a playwright has to choose between writing a laugh-out-loud comedy and a very serious drama. Topher Payne has written both with Perfect Arrangement."

The production is directed by Amy Berlin (most recently onstage in 5 Lesbians Eating a Quiche), with set design by David Allan Ballas, costume design by Lynn West, hair and make-up design by Joel Furtick and lighting design by Andrew Bonniwell.

All performances will take place at Richmond Triangle Players' theater at 1300 Altamont Avenue, just northwest of the intersection of the Boulevard and West Broad Street. Reserved seat tickets ($30 for Fridays and Saturdays evenings at 8:00 pm, $28 forThursday evenings at 8:00 pm and Sunday matinees at 4:00 pm, with discounts for groups and students) can be purchased online at RTP's web site at www.rtriangle.org, on RTP's facebook page, or by leaving a message on the RTP Ticket hotline at 804-346-8113.

RTP's theater at 1300 Altamont Avenue is a 4000-square foot performing arts facility accommodating flexible seating arrangements for up to 90 patrons. The building features fully ADA-compliant access and comfortable restrooms, as well as a generous bar, and catering capability, and is also available for cabaret performances and private events.