First Look: Kentwood Players Presents NATIVE GARDENS by Multi-Award Winning Latina Playwright Karen Zacarias

Kentwood Players presents NATIVE GARDENS, a comedy by multi-award winning Latina playwright Karen Zacarias, opening Friday, January 21 at the Westchester Playhouse. Directed by George Kondreck and produced by Kathy Dershimer for Kentwood Players with rights secured from Samuel French, Inc., here is your first look at the cast: Marina Portillo as Tania Del Valle; Robert Anaya as Pablo Del Valle; Phyllis M. Nofts as Virginia Butley; and Steve Izant as Frank Butley.

In this brilliant new comedy, cultures and gardens clash, turning well-intentioned neighbors into feuding enemies. Pablo, a rising attorney, and doctoral candidate Tania, his very pregnant wife, have just purchased a home in the suburbs of Washington D.C. which is a bit of a fixer-upper, and Tania, a botanist, plans to transform the yard with native plants.

However, their new neighbors Frank and Virginia are a well-established D.C. couple with a prize-worthy English garden. An impending barbeque for Pablo's colleagues and a delicate disagreement over a long-standing fence line soon spirals into an all-out border dispute exposing both couples' notions of race, taste, class and privilege.

Performances run Friday, January 21 through Saturday, February 12, 2022.

Reserved seat tickets are $22 with a $2 discount for seniors and students, available by either visiting www.kentwoodplayers.org to purchase online and book your reserved seats, emailing the box office at boxoffice@kentwoodplayers.org or calling (310) 645-5156.

Everyone ages 12 and over must show proof of vaccination for admittance and is required to properly wear a mask while inside the Westchester Playhouse (unless performing onstage).

Photos by Gloria Plunkett Photography