Special ANNA CHRISTIE Post-Show Event, Announced At The Lyric Stage

Special Post-Show Event, April 15, after the 3pm performance. Feminist or Misogynist: Eugene O'Neill and "Anna Christie" A panel discussion with Director Scott Edmiston, O'Neill scholars Steven Bloom & Beth Wynstra, and members of the cast of Anna Christie.

Anna Christie, which premiered on Broadway in 1921 and earned him the second of his four Pulitzer Prizes, can be viewed as an early feminist drama. Tales of a woman with a past were not new to the stage, but O'Neill dispelled the Victorian notion that prostitution was a result of female licentiousness. He tells Anna's story with compassion and an awareness of gender economics. Consequently, the role of Anna has become a favorite of great actresses including Ingrid Bergman, Liv Ullman, and Natasha Richardson. Greta Garbo chose the role for her first talking picture in 1930.

Come see the show, and discuss with the panel if the character of Anna was part of her time or decades ahead. In the midst of the #metoo movement when traditional gender roles and the power dynamics between men and women are being questioned and challenged, Eugene O'Neill's Anna Christie is more significant and relevant than ever.

Free & open to all Anna Christie ticket holders.

Winner of the Pulitzer Prize, O'Neill's classic is a surprisingly contemporary play that crackles with fierce physicality, humor, and drama. After a 20-year separation, a coal barge captain (Lyric Stage favorite Johnny Lee Davenport) is reunited with the daughter he unknowingly abandoned to a life of hardship. When Anna falls in love with a shipwrecked sailor, her father and her suitor come to recognize their own culpability in her plight, and all three struggle in their own way for salvation. Following his acclaimed production of Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf?, Scott Edmiston takes a fresh look at one of America's greatest playwrights.

FEATURING: Nancy E. Carroll*, Johnny Lee Davenport*, Lindsey McWhorter*, James R. Milord, Dan Whelton*

Scott Edmiston (Director) returns to the Lyric Stage where he recently directed the award-winning productions of Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf? (2017 Elliot Norton Award) and My Fair Lady, (2016 Elliot Norton Award). Other Lyric Stage credits: Light Up the Sky, Cat on a Hot Tin Roof, Water by the Spoonful, Time Stands Still, My Name is Asher Lev, Miss Witherspoon, The Scene, Lobby Hero, and Private Lives. He has directed more than 60 Boston-area productions at SpeakEasy Stage, American Repertory Theatre, Huntington Theatre, and Underground Railway Theatre, among others. Highlights include Long Day's Journey into Night, Constellations, Shakespeare in Love, The History Boys, Casa Valentina, The Light in the Piazza, Reckless, Five by Tenn, In the Next Room or the vibrator play, A Marvelous Party, and Betrayal. Six of his productions have received Elliot Norton Awards as Outstanding Production or Musical, and he has received four Norton Awards and three IRNE Awards for his direction. He is the recipient of the Distinguished Alumni Award from Penn State, the StageSource Theatre Hero Award, and the Norton Prize for Sustained Excellence in Theatre. He is the author of "Acting Misbegotten: The Creative Journey to Eugene O'Neill" published in the anthology Critical Insights: Eugene O'Neill (Salem Press, 2012). Scott is a Professor of the Practice and Chair of the Department of Theatre at Northeastern University.

Beth Wynstra is an Assistant Professor of English at Babson College where she teaches courses in American Drama, Political Theater, and Modernism as well as directs plays and musicals. She holds a Ph.D. in Theater Studies from the University of California at San?ta Barbara and a certificate in Directing from the Yale School of Drama. Beth is working on a book manuscript titled "I Only Act a Part You've Created": Marriage and Modernity on the American Stage which investigates the agency, persuasive tactics, and status of wife characters in the plays of Eugene O'Neill. She has written extensively on the life and plays of Eugene O'Neill and serves on the board of the Eugene O'Neill International Society.

Steven F. Bloom is the Associate Vice President for Academic Affairs and Professor of English at Lasell College. He holds a Ph.D. in English and American Literature from Brandeis University. He is the author of the Student Companion to Eugene O'Neill, and editor of Critical Insights: Eugene O'Neill. Steve has published numerous articles and reviews on O'Neill in The Eugene O'Neill Review and elsewhere, and he has spoken on O'Neill at many professional conferences and public forums. He has served on the Board of Directors of the Eugene O'Neill Society since 2000, was President of the Society from 2006 through 2007, and is currently Chairman of the Board. Steve is a 2017 recipient of the Eugene O'Neill Medallion.

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