Photo Flash: Second Street Players Presents BRIGHTON BEACH MEMOIRS

Second Street Players will stage Neil Simon's comic hit "Brighton Beach Memoirs" in its newly renovated theater in May. The show is directed by Mark Dissinger and produced by Tracy Dissinger.

"Brighton Beach Memoirs" is part one of Neil Simon's autobiographical trilogy: a portrait of the writer as a young teen in 1937 living with his family in a crowded, lower middle-class Brooklyn walk-up. Eugene Jerome, played by Brodie Sapp, is the narrator and central character. Dreaming of baseball and girls, Eugene must cope with the mundane existence of his family life in Brooklyn: formidable mother (Dana Willens), overworked father (Tony Pierantozzi), and his worldly older brother Stanley (Colby Crawford).

Throw into the mix his widowed Aunt Blanche (Carol Torrey), her two young, but rapidly aging, daughters (Alexia Nadel and Sydney Gross) and you have a recipe for hilarity, served up Simon-style. This bittersweet memoir evocatively captures the life of a struggling Jewish household where, as his father states, "if you didn't have a problem, you wouldn't be living here."

"Brighton Beach Memoirs" is the first show Second Street Players will host since undertaking a renovation project at the Riverfront Theater that broke ground at the beginning of 2019. Audiences will enter an expanded and updated lobby with renovated restrooms.

Show dates are May 10-12 and 17-19 at the Riverfront Theater in downtown Milford. Friday and Saturday shows begin at 7:00 p.m.; Sunday shows begin at 2:00 p.m. Tickets are $17 each, with a $1 discount offered to seniors and students for Sunday matinees. Tickets can be purchased in advance at www.secondstreetplayers.com or by calling 800-838-3006.