Silverstone and Thomas Star in TIME STANDS STILL at Geffen Beginning 2/3

The lure of a world premiere play by Pulitzer winner Donald Margulies (Dinner with Friends) directed by Tony Award winner Daniel Sullivan (Proof) is enticing enough to convince actors Anna Gunn (HBO's Deadwood, AMC's Breaking Bad), Alicia Silverstone (Clueless, Miss Match), David Harbour (Quantum of Solace, Revolutionary Road, State of Play) and Robin Thomas (Damages, Murphy Brown) to temporarily forgo the screens for a stint at the Geffen Playhouse.

The second produced work in the Geffen's ongoing commission program, Time Stands Still opens February 11, 2009 on the theater's main stage.

Time Stands Still focuses around a longtime couple and journalistic team - she a photographer, he a reporter - who return to New York from an extended stint in the war-torn Middle East. Anna Gunn portrays the role of Sarah, a headstrong visionary who must negotiate re-entry into a domestic realm she no longer recognizes.

Gunn is an experienced theater actress whose stage credits include The Rehearsal on Broadway as well as Hysteria and Sir Peter Hall's production of Measure for Measure in Los Angeles. Acclaimed Broadway actor David Harbour, who starred in Tom Stoppard's Coast of Utopia trilogy and garnered a Tony nomination for his role in Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf?, plays James, a foreign correspondent whose chaotic profession threatens his personal life.

Complicating Sarah and James' re-adjustment to domestic life is the appearance of Sarah's one-time mentor and editor Richard, played by television veteran Robin Thomas, and his new, much younger, and "very hot" girlfriend, Mandy, played by Golden Globe nominee Alicia Silverstone who is returning to the Geffen stage for the third time (Boston Marriage, Speed-the-Plow).

"Casting a world premiere is a different kind of process - actors who originate a role ultimately play a part in shaping the final script, "said Margulies. "I had the benefit of hearing Alicia and Anna read their parts in workshops as the play evolved. With David and Robin, I wrote the roles and then Dan and I searched to find the right actors to help bring the characters to life. I look forward to working with this exciting ensemble."

Time Stands Still is the third premiere and fourth collaboration between Margulies and Sullivan (who directed the Broadway productions of the playwright's Brooklyn Boy and Sight Unseen), and their second collaboration at the Geffen Playhouse (Dinner with Friends in 2000). Margulies' other plays at the Geffen were Collected Stories, in 1999, and the recent Los Angeles premiere of Shipwrecked! An Entertainment.

TIME STANDS STILL (World Premiere)
By Donald Margulies
Directed by Daniel Sullivan
Previews: February 3 to February 10, 2009

Performing February 11-March 15, 2009

Tickets ($45 to $79) are on sale now at the Geffen Playhouse box office, online at GeffenPlayhouse.com, via credit card phone order at (310) 208-5454, at all Ticketmaster outlets, or by calling Ticketmaster at (213) 480-3232. Student rush tickets are available one hour prior to curtain for $15.

The Geffen Playhouse has been a hub of the Los Angeles theater scene since opening its doors in 1995. Noted for its intimacy and celebrated for its world-renowned mix of classic and contemporary plays, provocative new works and musicals, the Geffen Playhouse continues to present a body of work that has garnered national recognition. Named in honor of entertainment mogul and philanthropist David Geffen, who made the initial donation to the theater, the company is helmed by Producing Director and President of the Board Gilbert (Gil) Cates, Artistic Director Randall Arney, Managing Director Susan Barton and Chairman of the Board Frank Mancuso. Proudly associated with UCLA, the Geffen Playhouse welcomes an audience of more than 130,000 each year, and maintains an extensive education and outreach program, designed to engage young people and the community at large in the arts.

For more information, please visit GeffenPlayhouse.com.

 

 

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