ACT Announces Their 2011 Mainstage Season

ACT -A Contemporary Theatre announces its 2011 Mainstage season, featuring six plays that range from playful to powerful, romantic to dramatic, musical to murderous -including two World Premieres!

ACT's 2011 Mainstage season opens with the first production of its exciting new partnership with The 5th Avenue Theatre, Vanities: A New Musical, a funny and poignant musical adaptation of Jack Heifner's acclaimed comedy-drama with music and lyrics by David Kirshenbaum (April 1-May 1). Next is Neil Simon's comic portrait of urban angst, The Prisoner of Second Avenue (April 29-May 29), followed by the World Premiere of the quirky romantic comedy Pilgrims Musa and Sheri in the New World by local playwright Yussef El Guindi (June 17-July 17); Sarah Ruhl's titillating comedy In the Next Room, or the vibrator play (July 29-August 28); and Peter Oswald's smash hit adaptation of Mary Stuart by Friedrich Schiller (September 9-October 9). Concluding the season is the thrilling World Premiere of Double Indemnity, from the crime novel by James M. Cain and masterfully adapted by two of ACT's best-loved actors, David Pichette and R. Hamilton Wright (October 21-November 20).

"2011 promises to be one of ACT's most entertaining and ambitious seasons to date," said ACT Artistic Director Kurt Beattie. "ACT's season resonates to and reflects on the issues that most concern us today-money, relationships, politics, power, work, and of course, love-in a multiplicity of voices and visions sure to keep the discussion going long after the play is over."

The 2011 Mainstage Season:
Vanities: A New Musical
Book by Jack Heifner
Music and lyrics by David Kirshenbaum
Directed by David Armstrong
Co-produced by ACT and The 5th Avenue Theatre
April 1-May 1 | NORTHWEST PREMIERE!
Three women. Three decades. One friendship.

Set off on a life-affirming journey through the turbulent '60s to the late '80s and discover how three friends face life's defining moments: growing up, getting older and getting over it. Vanities is a funny and poignant look at three women who discover that, even in 30 years of rapidly changing times, the one thing they can rely on is each other.

The Prisoner of Second Avenue
by Neil Simon
Directed by Warner Shook
April 29-May 29
A comic portrait of urban angst spiked with Simon's trademark zingers.
Heat waves. Garbage strikes. Noisy neighbors. Burglars. No place dishes it out quite like New York City, and with his job hanging by a thread, Mel Edison is in no mood to grin and bear it. Sparkling with Simon's usual wit and fueled by a still-resonant anger at the dehumanizing effects of modern city life, this comedy classic pits Mel and his steadfast wife Edna against an assault by 1970s Manhattan-and it's anybody's guess who'll win.

Pilgrims Musa and Sheri in the New World
by Yussef El Guindi
Directed by TBD
June 17-July 17 | WORLD PREMIERE!
A quirky modern romantic comedy celebrating the pilgrim in all of us.
When Musa, an Egyptian cab driver who's been in America less than a year, falls for Sheri, a sassy American waitress, his life takes unexpected and delightfully complicated turns. This brand-new comedy by Seattle playwright Yussef El Guindi is full of unabashed sweetness and goofy charm, and reminds us that we are all "immigrants" with far more connecting than separating us.

In the Next Room, or the vibrator play
by Sarah Ruhl
Directed by Kurt Beattie
July 29-August 28
A stimulating comedy sure to create a buzz.
In a prim upper class Victorian home, a gentleman doctor has innocently invented a most extraordinary and mysterious device for treating "hysteria." When his increasingly despondent wife overhears the strange sounds emanating from the operating theatre and sees patients leaving in the pink of health, she is compelled to investigate-even if it means throwing over domesticity for desire. Ranging from the tender to the farcical, this smart comedy ponders marriage and intimacy, and how electricity came along to fuse them.

Mary Stuart
by Friedrich Schiller
Adapted by Peter Oswald
Directed by Victor Pappas
September 9-October 9
Legendary monarchs clash in a London and Broadway smash hit.
Astonishingly relevant today, Mary Stuart probes themes of religious fanaticism and political corruption as it dramatizes the struggle of Mary, Queen of Scots, for her freedom from Queen Elizabeth I. Amidst espionage, attempted assassinations, and prison breaks, a tragic crisis confronts both women with impossibly difficult decisions. Will Mary renounce her claim to the throne? Can Elizabeth Free Mary without jeopardizing her throne? It's a thrilling episode from the past that strikes at the core of our contemporary selves.

Double Indemnity
From the novel by James M. Cain
Adapted by David Pichette and R. Hamilton Wright
Directed by Kurt Beattie
October 21-November 20 | WORLD PREMIERE!
A nail-biting take on the famous novel probes the shadowy human soul.
Lust, intrigue, and cliffhanging twists amp up this much-loved crime tale, which Billy Wilder also adapted for his classic noir film. In the dusty, amoral Los Angeles of the 1930s, discontented insurance agent Walter Huff encounters temptations too great to resist and embarks on a dark journey to escape his life. Double Indemnity is a suspenseful and profound consideration of the materialistic and sexual cravings of Depression-era America, rendered in a delicious new voice by R. Hamilton Wright and David Pichette.

Following the 2011 Mainstage season, ACT will stage its 36th annual production of the Seattle holiday favorite, A Christmas Carol by Charles Dickens, adapted by Gregory A. Falls, November 25-December 24, 2011.
Rounding out the Mainstage season is year-round programming presented by The Central Heating Lab at ACT (CHL), including Scripto Incognito by Ian Bell, Mother in Another Language by ReACT and Prawidhwani, The Variety Show by Seattle Dance Project and Spectrum Dance Theatre, In the Cards cabaret with Jayne Muirhead and John Engerman, plus the return of CHL favorites, New Voices, 14/48, You Really Got a Hold of Me by The Hansberry Project, Pinter Fortnightly, Hedgebrook Women's Playwright Festival, The Love Markets, Icicle Creek Theatre Festival, InterACTions lecture series, Short Stories Live! at Town Hall, and many, many more!
Subscription Memberships (season packages) and ACTPass Monthly Memberships (all you can see for only $25 a month) are on sale now through the ACT Ticket Office, (206) 292-7676 or 700 Union Street in downtown Seattle, and online at www.acttheatre.org.
Subscription Memberships range from $60 (students with ID/25 and under) to $300, and include a special $177.50 senior matinee package.
Single tickets/non-membership tickets go on sale mid-March and range $15/$20 (for students with ID/25 and under) to $65.

**Titles, dates and venues subject to change.

About ACT - A Contemporary Theatre
Located in the heart of downtown Seattle and serving a population of curious, open-minded, and brave audiences, ACT - A Contemporary Theatre is the only local theatre in Seattle dedicated to producing contemporary work with promising playwrights and local performing artists since 1965. A theatre of new ideas, ACT serves as a cultural engine that makes plays, dance, music, and film that touch us. Because contemporary life demands examination, ACT is driven to inspire and strengthen our diverse community through works that advance our understanding of human life. With more than 100,000 people who attend shows annually, ACT is an interactive community where artists and the public witness, contemplate, and engage in dialogue on today's thought-provoking issues, ideas and art, presented with intelligence, insight, and humor.

ACT gratefully acknowledges the generous support of Season Sponsors ArtsFund, ACT Foundation, The Mayor's Office of Arts & Cultural Affairs, and The Shubert Foundation, along with Producing Partners 4Culture, The Paul G. Allen Family Foundation, The Boeing Company, Microsoft Corporation, Nesholm Family Foundation, the Peg & Rick Young Foundation, and PONCHO.