Court Theater Closes THREE TALL WOMEN 10/17

Court Theatre announces the final selection for the company's fifty-sixth season, Edward Albee's Three Tall Women, pending final approval from Mr. Albee. The production will be directed by Artistic Director Charles Newell.

Court Theatre's season also includes the previously announced productions of William Shakespeare's The Comedy of Errors directed by Sean Graney, Samm-Art Williams's Home directed by Resident Artist Ron OJ Parson and Sarah Ruhl's adaptation of Virginia Woolf's Orlando directed by Jessica Thebus. Artistic Director Charles Newell, Music Director Doug Peck and Resident Artist/Artistic Consultant Ron OJ Parson will close the season with Gershwin and Heyward's Porgy and Bess.

The 2010/11 Court Theatre Season Up-Close:

The Comedy of Errors
By William Shakespeare
Directed by Sean Graney
Run Dates: September 16, 2010 - October 17, 2010

Innovative director Sean Graney (The Hypocrites) re-imagines Shakespeare's funniest farce about mistaken identity, mental illness, and xenophobia. The story of two sets of twins separated at birth, The Comedy of Errors will be a theatrical event full of energetic slapstick and lyrical comedy, performed by six virtuosic actors. This season opener represents the next step in Graney's exploration of classic farce at Court Theatre, following What the Butler Saw (2007) and The Mystery of Irma Vep (2009).

Home
By Samm-Art Williams
Directed by Ron OJ Parson, Resident Artist
Run Dates: November 11, 2010 - December 12, 2010

Originally produced by the legendary Negro Ensemble Company in 1981, Home is an enduring and poetic story of hope and the resiliency of the human spirit told against the backdrop of the political and social upheavals of the 1960s and 70s. In 2008, Resident Artist Ron OJ Parson (Ma Rainey's Black Bottom, The Piano Lesson) directed an Audelco Award-winning production of Home at Signature Theatre Company in New York, which the New York Times called "a portrait of the black experience...that finds a homey beauty not in suffering but in carrying on."

Three Tall Women
By Edward Albee
Directed by Charles Newell
Run Dates: January 13 - February 11

Three Tall Women was written shortly after the death of Edward Albee's adopted mother, and it remains his most personal play. Wickedly funny, and told with uncompromising truth, the play takes a long, hard look at the arc of one human life from the perspectives of three different generations-one woman in youth, one woman in middle age, and one woman lying on her death bed. As the elder woman reflects on her life-including the estrangement of her son, widely interpreted to represent Albee himself-she develops clarity of mind that transcends her debilitated body. Three Tall Women will be directed by Artistic Director Charles Newell, whose 2004 production of Albee's Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf was named "the finest production...[of the play] I've seen to date" by Terry Teachout of the Wall Street Journal.

Orlando
By Virginia Woolf
Adapted by Sarah Ruhl
Directed by Jessica Thebus
Run Dates: March 10, 2011 - April 10, 2011

Sarah Ruhl, one of American theater's most exciting young playwrights, adapts Virginia Woolf's gender-bending novel about sex, love, and history. Often called the longest love letter in literary history, Woolf's Orlando tells the story of an English nobleman who lives for hundreds of years before falling asleep and waking up as a woman. Directed by longtime Ruhl collaborator Jessica Thebus (The Clean House at Goodman Theatre, Dead Man's Cell Phone at Steppenwolf), Orlando is told with humor and imagination, and it represents a step forward in Court's ongoing commitment to contemporary translations and adaptations of classic works.

Porgy and Bess
By George Gershwin, DuBose and Dorothy Heyward, and Ira Gershwin
Directed by Charles Newell
Music Direction by Doug Peck
Artistic Consultant Ron OJ Parson
Run Dates: May 12, 2011 - June 19, 2011

Porgy and Bess remains George Gershwin's magnum opus, with an unforgettable score that includes songs ("Summertime," "It Ain't Necessarily So") later recorded by popular musicians from Billie Holiday to Ella Fitzgerald. Coming off their 2008 Jeff Award-winning production of Caroline, or Change, Charles Newell and Doug Peck come face-to-face with one of the greatest-and most controversial-pieces of American music theater ever created. Often denounced as a racially insensitive portrayal of black southerners, Newell and Peck, in collaboration with Resident Artist Ron OJ Parson and an all-African-American cast, will present a thoughtful, never-before-seen retelling of Gershwin and Heyward's "folk opera" Porgy and Bess, a classic but contested piece of American theater history.

Subscription Information
Five, four and three play subscriptions to Court's 2010/2011 season range from $90 to $240 and are on sale now. To purchase a subscription or to receive more information, call the Court Theatre Box Office at (773) 753-4472, or visit Court's website at www.CourtTheatre.org. Individual tickets go on sale July 15, 2010. Groups of 10 or more may purchase tickets by calling Milan Penjovich in Court's Group Sales Office at (773) 834-3243.

Now in its 55th season, Court Theatre is guided by its mission to discover the power of classic theatre. Court endeavors to make a lasting contribution to American theatre by expanding the canon of translations, adaptations, and classic texts. Court revives lost masterpieces, illuminates familiar texts, and distinguishes fresh, modern classics. Court engages and inspires its audience by providing artistically distinguished productions, audience enrichment activities, and student educational experiences.

Court Theatre, the professional theatre in residence at the University of Chicago, is located at 5535 S. Ellis Ave. in Chicago's Hyde Park neighborhood. You can reach the Court Theatre Box Office at (773) 753-4472, or visit Court's website at www.CourtTheatre.org.

Court Theatre, under the leadership of Artistic Director Charles Newell, Board Chair Virginia Gerst and Deputy Provost of the Arts Larry Norman is generously supported by Richard and Barbara Franke, Hyde Park Bank, The Joyce Foundation, The John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation, Sara Lee Foundation, Shubert Foundation, and the University of Chicago. Court Theatre is also funded in part by grants from the National Endowment for the Arts; CityArts Program IV of the City of Chicago Department of Cultural Affairs; a Cultural Outreach Program grant from the City of Chicago; and the Illinois Arts Council, a state agency.