Sigourney Weaver & Tom Wopat Honor 9/11 With THE GUYS for FDNY

To commemorate the 10th anniversary of 9/11, The Flea Theater (Jim Simpson, Artistic Director; Carol Ostrow, Producing Director) will present special performances of Anne Nelson's THE GUYS at various venues in Lower Manhattan including the Museum of Jewish Heritage (for the FDNY) and Goldman Sachs.

Director Jim Simpson and acclaimed actors Sigourney Weaver and Tom Wopat reprise their work in this moving post-9/11 piece for FDNY families, the downtown community and other guests.

"The Flea could not be more honored to once again present a work that so helped and healed when it was first presented a decade ago," notes Ostrow. "We thank the FDNY and Goldman Sachs for hosting a theatrical moment of reflection as we look back at a period that so changed us all."

THE GUYS is a dialogue between a fire captain who has lost most of his men in the September 11th attack, and an editor who helps him write the eulogies as she struggles herself to come to terms with the event. It originally played as a workshop production with Bill Murray and Sigourney Weaver, and its initial year-long run featured other notable performers including Susan Sarandon, Anthony LaPaglia, Tim Robbins, Marlo Thomas, Stephen Lang, Amy Irving, Bill Irwin, Swoosie Kurtz and Dan Lauria. A film version of THE GUYS starring Weaver and LaPaglia was also released in 2003 by Focus Features.

The piece will be performed Tuesday, September 6 at the Goldman Sachs headquarters (200 West Street in lower Manhattan) for invited guests, with a special talkback moderated by veteran television journalist Harry Smith and featuring Anne Nelson and others.

On Wednesday, September 7 the production shifts to The Museum of Jewish Heritage (36 Battery Place) for a 3pm performance for FDNY families and the public.

The Museum of Jewish Heritage will also host a special benefit performance on Thursday, September 8 for The FDNY Foundation, the official 501(c)(3) non-profit organization of the New York City Fire Department. The funds raised will assist the FDNY in its mission to prevent and respond to fires, medical emergencies, disasters and terrorist acts, protecting the lives and property of residents and visitors in New York City. The FDNY Foundation funds programs to help meet the Department's training, equipment, and education needs.

For more information on THE GUYS performances, please visit www.theflea.org. To purchase tickets for the September 8 FDNY benefit performance, please visit www.fdnyfoundation.org

Anne Nelson is an award-winning author and playwright. Her 2001 play, "The Guys," has been produced in all 50 states and at least 15 countries, often as a benefit for local fire companies and burn centers. It was published by Random House and Dramatists Play Service. The audible.com version, starring Swoosie Kurtz and Bill Irwin, won the 2003 Audie Award for best recorded play. "Savages," Nelson's anti-war play, opened off-Broadway in 2006 and was a finalist in the Humana Festival. The New Yorker called it a work of "lacerating beauty." Nelson won a Guggenheim Fellowship towards her research for "Red Orchestra," the story of an anti-Nazi resistance circle in Berlin. It was published by Random House in 2009 and named an "Editors Choice" by the New York Times. Nelson recently completed a screenplay version and is currently at work on a sequel set in wartime Poland. Nelson is a graduate of Yale University and a member of the Council of Foreign Relations. She teaches at Columbia's School of International and Public Affairs.

Academy Award nominated actress Sigourney Weaver has created a host of memorable characters, both dramatic and comic, in films ranging from Ripley in Alien to Dian Fossey in Gorillas in Mist. Over the years, she has captivated audiences and won acclaim as one of the most esteemed actresses on both stage and screen.

Tom Wopat first came to public attention in the late-1970s as the freewheeling Luke Duke on the TV series The Dukes of Hazzard. He made his Broadway debut in Cy Coleman's I Love My Wife, and went on to perform in the Tony Award-winning City of Angels and Guys and Dolls. He received a Tony nomination for creating the role of Frank Butler in the Broadway revival of Annie Get Your Gun, opposite Bernadette Peters. In 2008, Wopat returned to Broadway as Tom Hurley in A Catered Affair with Faith Prince and Harvey Fierstein. 2011 sees him again on Broadway starring as Frank Abagnale Sr. in the new adaptation of Catch Me If You Can.

Jim Simpson is the Founder and Artistic Director of The Flea Theater (2004 Drama Desk cited for Downtown Adventurous Theater). Two-time OBIE-award winner, 2002 National Board of Review Excellence in Filmmaking, and cited for artistic leadership in Downtown New York by the Lower Manhattan Cultural Council in 2002. Jim has directed over 70 works for the theater and has also directed for film and television. Venues include nine seasons at the Williamstown Theater Festival, Alley Theater, Hartford Stage, Yale Rep, Actor's Theater of Louisville, Eisenhower Theater at the Kennedy Center, Lincoln Center, Playwrights Horizons, EST, CSC, MCC, the London International Theater Festival and the Melbourne Fringe Festival. Jim was a child actor in his hometown of Honolulu, as a teenager worked with Jerzy Grotowski in Poland, and holds degrees from Boston University School for the Arts and the Yale Drama School.

The Flea Theater, under Artistic Director Jim Simpson and Producing Director Carol Ostrow, is one of New York's leading Off-Off-Broadway companies. Winner of a special Drama Desk Award for Outstanding Achievement, 3 Obie Awards and an Otto for excellence in political theater, The Flea has presented nearly 1000 live theatrical, dance and music performances since its inception in 1996. Past productions include the premieres of Anne Nelson's The Guys; six plays by A.R. Gurney (Post Mortem, O Jerusalem, Screenplay, Mrs. Farnsworth, A Light Lunch and Office Hours); Mac Wellman's Cellophane and Two September; Roger Rosenblatt's Ashley Montana Goes Ashore... and The Oldsmobiles; Elizabeth Swados' JABU and Kaspar Hauser; Karen Finley's Return of the Chocolate Smeared Woman; Adam Rapp's Bingo with the Indians; Will Eno's Oh, The Humanity and other exclamations; Dawn by Thomas Bradshaw; The Great Recession, Jonathan Reynolds' Girls in Trouble, Bathsheba Doran's Parents' Evening, and most recently the holiday hit Looking at Christmas by Steven Banks, American Sexy by Trista Baldwin, Future Anxiety by Laurel Haines and Just Cause by Zack Russell.

The Flea is located at 41 White Street between Church and Broadway, three blocks south of Canal, close to the A/C/E, N/R/Q, 6, J/M/Z and 1 subway lines. Additional information about @ The Flea can be found on The Flea's website, www.theflea.org.

Photo Credit: Linda Lenzi