Photo Flash: First Look at Bathsheba Doran's THE MYSTERY OF LOVE & SEX at Signature Theatre

Signature Theatre presents The Mystery of Love & Sex directed by Stella Powell-Jones (Off-Broadway's 17 Orchard Point). Playwright Bathsheba Doran (Signature's Nest, Showtime's Masters of Sex) returns to Signature with an unexpected love story of evolving friendship, finding your own path and the value of family and was heralded as "perfectly wonderful" and "among the season's finest plays" by The New York Times. The Mystery of Love & Sex will receive its DC area premiere in Signature Theatre's MAX Theatre, April 5 - May 8.

The production stars Shayna Blass (Signature's Cabaret, Studio Theatre's Tribes) as Charlotte, Xavier Scott Evans (The Shakespeare Forum'sHenry V) as Jonny, David A. Schmidt (Classic Stage Company's The Homecoming) as Howard's Father, Jeff Still (Broadway's August: Osage County,Fish in the Dark) as Howard and Emily Townley (Studio Theatre's Between Riverside and Crazy, Woolly Mammoth's Totalitarians) as Lucinda.

The creative team includes Scenic Design by James Kronzer; Costume Design by Asta Hostetter; Lighting Design by Jesse Belsky; Sound Design byJames Bigbee Garver; Production Stage Manager Kerry Epstein; and Production Assistant Cris Ruthenberg-Marshall.

Complete opposites, Charlotte and Jonny have been best friends since they were children. Now, as college students on the eve of graduation, they toy around with taking their friendship romantic. Or not. Why decide? After all, neither is sure they are even attracted to the other. Meanwhile, Charlotte's parents, an unlikely couple themselves, push the kids for a definition even while their own relationship founders. Gradually, secrets and truths emerge as playing grown-up turns into actually growing up.

Photos by Margot Schulman