Ensemble Theatre to Present OTHER DESERT CITIES, 9/4-22

Right-wing parents and left-leaning offspring take center stage in the regional premiere of Jon Robin Baitz's political potboiler, Other Desert Cities-the Pulitzer Prize finalist and Tony Award-nominated "best new play on Broadway" (New York Times), that USA Today calls "funny, maddening, and moving". Full of surprisingly touching moments, Jon Robin Baitz (creator of ABC's Brothers & Sisters) brings dysfunctional family drama to new heights in this witty and deeply enjoyable work, which plays September 4-22, 2013. Directed by D. Lynn Meyers; Premiere Sponsor is the Otto M. Budig Family Foundation.

It's Christmas Eve, 2004, at the Palm Springs mansion of Lyman and Polly Wyeth-a notably conservative California couple. Home for the holidays are their son Trip, a laid-back Hollywood producer; daughter Brooke, a liberal writer with a history of depression; and Polly's sister Silda, a liberal former screenwriter recently released from rehab. But the warm desert air turns chilly when Brooke announces the impending publication of her juicy tell-air memoir, which threatens to revive the most painful chapter of the family's history. As Brooke confesses her true motivations behind the book, she learns the real history is more shocking than she ever knew, leading to an ending that has left audiences stunned and talking everywhere the play has been performed. Other Desert Cities is a riveting portrait of a prominent family and their very public fall from grace.

"I am captivated by the amount of interaction that has to happen in the course of one day with a family that has never been immersed in that kind of relationship," explains Producing Artistic Director D. Lynn Meyers. "Jon Robin Baitz has created such an intriguing dichotomy between love and need, between the shelter that a family can provide as well as the devastating alienation it can inflict. These themes are beautifully explored in Other Desert Cities and I am thrilled to bring it to our stage."

Other Desert Cities won the Outer Critics Circle Award, and was nominated for the Pulitzer Prize and a Tony Award. Its 2011 Broadway debut earned unanimous critical praise: a "boldly conventional yet altogether gripping work" (Newsday); "a full-bodied, emotionally alive play," (The Hollywood Reporter); "nothing short of dazzling" (New York Magazine); "great from start to finish" (Associated Press); and as having "the appeal of a Broadway hit from another age" (The New York Times). Jon Robin Baitz's plays include The Film Society, The Substance of Fire, The End of the Day, Three Hotels, A Fair Country (Pulitzer Prize finalist 1996), Mizlansky/Zilinsky, Ten Unknowns and The Paris Letter, as well as a version of Hedda Gabler that appeared on Broadway in 2001. He is the creator of Brothers & Sisters, a television series that ran for five seasons on ABC until 2011. Other television work includes PBS's version of Three Hotels, for which he won the Humanitas Prize, and episodes of The West Wing and Alias. He is the author of two screenplays: the film script for The Substance of Fire (1996) and People I Know (2002). Baitz is a founding member of Naked Angels Theater Company, and on the faculties of the MFA programs at The New School for Drama and Stony Brook Southampton.

Tickets are $39 for Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday performances.

Tickets are $43 for Friday, Saturday, and Sunday performances.

Half-price rush tickets and $15 student rush tickets are available starting two hours prior to show time.

Tickets and seating subject to availability.

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