Photo Flash: First Look at Bruce Connelly in SAY GOODNIGHT, GRACIE at Ivoryton Playhouse

Ivoryton favorite Bruce Connelly returns to the Playhouse stage tonight, October 29th, in the hit Broadway show, Say Goodnight, Gracie. This stunning tour de force invites you to spend an hilarious, heart-warming evening in the uplifting company of the world's favorite and funniest centenarian, George Burns, who spanned one hundred years of American entertainment history. Say Goodnight, Gracie was Broadway's third longest running solo performance show and was nominated for a 2003 Tony Award for BEST PLAY and won the 2003-04 National Broadway Theatre Award for BEST PLAY. Scroll down for a first look at Connelly onstage!

In Say Goodnight, Gracie, George Burns looks back upon his impoverished, plucky youth on the lower East Side of New York... his disastrous but tenacious career in Vaudeville ... the momentous day when he meet a fabulously talented young Irish girl named Grace Ethel Cecile Rosalie Allen ... their instant chemistry, with his flawless timing a perfect mate to her dizzy delivery ... his wooing of her, their marriage and their rise to the pinnacles of Vaudeville, Movies, Radio and Television. Gracie's demise forced George to start from square one in life and in his career, eventually achieving an equal level of success as a solo raconteur and Academy Award-winning actor, portraying everything from a Sunshine Boy to, oh, God.

Say Goodnight, Gracie was written by multiple Tony Award-winning playwright Rupert Holmes, whose Broadway credits include the Tony Award-winning musical The Mystery Of Edwin Drood and who is also creator and writer of the nostalgic Emmy Award-winning comedy series Remember WENN.

Bruce Connelly* appeared last at the Ivoryton Playhouse as Jim in the summer production All Shook Up. Notable roles include Barney Cashman in Last Of The Red Hot Lovers, Max Bialystock in The Producers, Felix Unger in The Odd Couple, Pseudolus inA Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum, and Finian in Finian's Rainbow. Since 1993, Bruce has played Barkley, Jim Henson's Muppet dog on Sesame Street for which he has been honored fifteen times by the National Academy of Television and Radio at the Daytime Emmy Awards.

Say Goodnight, Gracie is a tender, funny, life-affirming love story ... a personal guided tour through an American century in the company of George Burns, a man who laughingly lived and loved each day for all it had to offer, until he finally went "gently into that good night" to forever reunite with his beloved Gracie.

Say Goodnight, Gracie opens at the Ivoryton Playhouse tonight, October 29th and runs through Sunday, November 16th, 2014. Directed by Michael McDermott, the set design is by Dan Nischan, lighting by Marcus Abbott and costumes by Kari Crowther.

Performance times are Wednesday and Sunday matinees at 2pm. Evening performances are Wednesday and Thursday at 7:30pm, Friday and Saturday at 8pm. Tickets are $42 for adults, $37 for seniors, $20 for students and $15 for children and are available by calling the Playhouse box office at 860-767-7318 or by visiting our website at www.ivorytonplayhouse.org (Group rates are available by calling the box office for information.) The Playhouse is located at 103 Main Street in Ivoryton.

Photo Credit: Rose Picarelli