Gamm Theatre Presents THE HOUSE OF BLUE LEAVES, Now thru 4/5

The Sandra Feinstein-Gamm Theatre (The Gamm) continues its 30th anniversary season with American playwright John Guare's dark comedy The House of Blue Leaves. This multi-award-winning piece of comic chaos by the author of Six Degrees of Separation is the story of a family so obsessed with fame and the American Dream that its members are incapable of connecting with each other. Fred Sullivan, Jr. directs a crazy cast of characters including a zoo-keeper who aspires to be a songwriter (Tom Gleadow) and his wife who won't leave the house (Jeanine Kane) in a production that is by turns laughable, thought-provoking and deeply moving.

The House of Blue Leaves runs from tonight, March 5 through April 5 at The Gamm Theatre, 172 Exchange St., Pawtucket, RI. Tickets are $41 and $49 (depending on day/time); preview performances (March 5-8) just $30. Call 401-723-4266 or visit gammtheatre.org.

1965: Artie Shaugnessy, a zookeeper from Sunny Side, Queens, dreams of moving to Los Angeles with his mistress, Bunny, and becoming a big-time songwriter. Meanwhile his wife, Bananas, is having a mental breakdown. Artie's son, Ronnie, is AWOL from the Army, stowing a home-made bomb, and planning to blow up the Pope on his first visit to New York City. Also visiting is Artie's old school chum, Billy Einhorn, now a Hollywood producer with industry connections. But will Artie's dreams of fame be swallowed up in the chaos of his ordinary life? Guare's prescient Vietnam-era black comedy about America's obsession with celebrity, revived on Broadway in 2011, is devastatingly hilarious and never timelier than in our age of reality TV.

"Guare's play remains a strange and wonderful creation more than 40 years after it premiered. ...A testament to its acute observation of our perverse relationship with fame." -The Hollywood Reporter

Obie Award for Best American Play ? Drama Critics' Circle Award for Best Play

"This is our first John Guare production and it's long overdue," said Gamm Artistic Director Tony Estrella. "The House of Blue Leaves is a classic-a screwball family tragicomedy that's unlike anything else in the American Theatre. This prescient, zany, heartbreaking 40-year-old play is about that place where our dreams and limitations collide, and it could have been written yesterday. It's an examination of perhaps the most enduring American dream that, even if what's in front of us is falling to pieces, fame and fortune is always just a heartbeat away."