Tony Award-Winner Lillias White to Lead Rubicon's GEM OF THE OCEAN, Opening 5/24
By: Kelsey Denette
RUBICON THEATRE continues the company's 14th season May 24 with August Wilson's GEM OF THE OCEAN (first preview May 16).
Rubicon's first play by August Wilson is also the first chronologically in the author's 10-play series dramatizing the African-American experience in the Twentieth Century.
GEM OF THE OCEAN is described as "a mystical play set in 1904 in Pittsburgh's Hill District. At a local mill, a man is accused of stealing a bucket of nails. But rather than confess to a crime he didn't commit, he jumps in the river and becomes a martyr to his co-workers. Riots break out and the workers begin to strike. Against this turbulent backdrop, another young man named Citizen Barlow arrives at the home of Aunt Ester, a 285-year-old healer who is the keeper of tradition and history for her people. She sends Citizen on a spiritual journey aboard the slave ship Gem of the Ocean-where he must confront his ancestors and then face the truth about himself."
Lillias White returns to Rubicon as the 285-year-old spiritual guide Aunt Ester. White starred in the World Premiere of The Best Is Yet To Come: The Music of Cy Coleman, which enjoyed a successful off-Broadway run following its initial engagement at Rubicon and was just nominated for a Drama Desk Award. She was most recently seen last February in her solo cabaret My Guy Cy for Rubicon's Broadway Cabaret Series. White's Broadway performances include Barnum,
Dreamgirls, Cats, Chicago, Once on This Island and, most recently, Fumilayo Anikulapo Kuti in FELA! (Tony nomination).
For more information on the cast or the show, visit www.rubicontheatre.org.
Beginning on May 23rd, the regular performance schedule is as follows: Wednesdays at 2:00 p.m. and 7:00 p.m., Thursdays at 8:00 p.m., Fridays at 8:00 p.m., Saturdays at 2:00 p.m. and 8:00 p.m., and Sundays at 2:00 p.m. Talkbacks with the actors and director will be held after the 7:00 p.m. Wednesday performances on May 23, May 30 and June 6. Tickets for daytime student matinees are only $10 and may be reserved through Rubicon's education office at (805) 667-2912, ext. 230. Regular tickets range in price from $25 to $54 and may be purchased in person through the Rubicon Theatre Company BOX OFFICE, located at 1006 E. Main Street (Laurel entrance), or online at www.rubicontheatre.org. Twenty-four-hour-a-day ticketing is available online, thanks to a grant from the IRVINE FOUNDATION's Regional Arts Initiative. To charge by phone, call(805) 667-2900.
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