I AM MY OWN WIFE - Pulitzer And Tony Winner At Gulfshore Playhouse
By: Beau Higgins
Gulfshore Playhouse announces final play for 2012-2013 Season: "I Am My Own Wife" by Doug Wright
Gulfshore Playhouse announced the final show that will complete their 2012-2013 season: "I Am My Own Wife", the Tony Award-winning and Pulitzer Prize-winning play by Doug Hughes. The Playhouse will present this play that the New York Times called "both moving and intellectually absorbing" January 18-Feb 3, 2013, with a preview performance on January 17th.
I Am My Own Wife is a play by Doug Wright based on his conversations with German cross-dresser Charlotte von Mahlsdorf. Based on a true story, and inspired by interviews conducted by the playwright over several years,"I Am My Own Wife" tells the fascinating tale of a real-life German man who managed to survive both the Nazi onslaught and the repressive East German Communist regime, as a cross-dressing museum owner. One actor plays all 37 roles, sky-diving from accent to accent and gender to gender. This one man tour-de-force results in a compelling play about survival, freedom and what it means to be truly human.
Charlotte's devotion to her astonishing collection – she turned her home into a museum in which she preserved furniture, especially pieces from the 1890's and other household relics like Victrolas and gramophones – gave focus and motivation to a life who's grandest achievement was that it proceeded to its natural end. In fact, "I Am My Own Wife" is largely about Charlotte's enduring the cruel repressions of the Nazis and the Communists, and her harrowing tales of survival through the eras of the Gestapo and the Stasi, the East German secret police, are nothing short of breathtaking.
A play which very subtly but in the end quite powerfully makes a case for the necessity of storytelling in our lives, "I Am My Own Wife" reminds us that lives themselves are narratives and that the perspective, sympathy and reliability of the narrator are crucial to our understanding of them. In other words, to endure the world, people may lie about themselves or to themselves, and the lies are as important as the truth.
Founder and Producing Artistic Director Kristen Coury will direct the production. "I am thrilled to be able to direct this Pulitzer Prize-winning and Tony Award-winning play. I remember being riveted by it when I saw it on Broadway. With its nuanced performance and relevant universal themes, I am sure this will be a true crowd-pleaser."
Gulfshore Playhouse is Naples' first and finest professional theatre company offering a variety of stimulating, thought-provoking and entertaining productions from important classics to Broadway hits and innovative new works. Their shows are conceived and created in-house using a team of professional designers and technicians as well as Equity actors with credits ranging from Broadway shows to film and television.
The Gulfshore Playhouse Theatre Education Project serves Southwest Florida through a wide variety of unique educational opportunities. Their programming provides people from our diverse community accessibility to the art of theatre. Program offerings range from ART SMART, their in-school residencies which teach content curriculum through the lively art of theatre during the school day, to the STAR (Student Theatre Artist in Residence) after-school theatre classes and Theatre Summer Camps. They offer a variety of educational opportunities for adults, from rigorous internship programs to classes taught by professional actors and members of the Gulfshore Playhouse creative team, and their newly unveiled Synergy Series, a series of panel discussions and talk-backs relating to our mainstage productions.
Tickets are $40 and can be purchased by visiting www.gulfshoreplayhouse.org or by calling the box office at 1-866-811-4111.
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