Birney, LaChanze, Overbey and More Join Playwrights Horizons 2008/09 Season

Playwrights Horizons, under the leadership of Artistic Director Tim Sanford and Managing Director Leslie Marcus, has announced additional casting and details for its 2008/2009 Season.  Joining the season’s roster of stars are Tony Award and Obie Award winner LaCHANZE (The Color Purple, Dessa Rose, plus both Once on This Island and The Bubbly Black Girl Sheds Her Chameleon Skin at Playwrights Horizons), Obie winner Reed Birney (The Butterfly Collection, Pen and Gemini at Playwrights Horizons; the current Blasted; Stuff Happens; “Gossip Girl”), Obie winner Nikkole Salter (In the Continuum), Kellie Overbey (Betty’s Summer Vacation at Playwrights Horizons, The Coast of Utopia, Good Boys and True), ZACHARY BOOTH (the current film Nick and Norah’s Infinite Playlist, both Spine and Pentecost at The Barrow Group), two-time Audelco Award nominee ANGELA LEWIS (Hoodoo Love, Caligula) and NANA MENSAH (365 Days/365 Plays).

Tony Award winner LaChanze, Obie Award winner Nikkole Salter, Angela Lewis and Nana Mensah are the first cast members to join INKED BABY, the World Premiere of a new play by 2007 Susan Smith Blackburn nominee Christina Anderson in her Off-Broadway playwriting debut.  Directed by Kate Whoriskey (Fabulation at Playwrights Horizons, The Piano Teacher), the production will begin previews on Thursday, March 5, 2009 at Playwrights Horizons’ Peter Jay Sharp Theater (416 West 42nd Street).   

LaChanze has a long history with Playwrights Horizons, dating back to 1990 when she originated the leading role of Ti Moune in the musical Once on This Island at the theater company’s Off-Broadway home before transferring to Broadway. For her performance, she earned Tony, Drama Desk and Outer Critics Circle nominations and won a Theatre World Award. She also starred in the theater company’s 2001 musical The Bubbly Black Girl Sheds her Chameleon Skin (Drama Desk nomination). Her other theater credits include The Color Purple (Tony Award), Dessa Rose (Obie Award, Drama Desk nomination), Ragtime, Company and The Vagina Monologues. This will mark her first return to the New York stage since THE COLOR PURPLE.

Obie Award winner Nikkole Salter is returning to the stage for the first time since starring in the hit play In the Continuum, which she also co-wrote.  The play had its Off-Broadway premiere at Primary Stages prior to moving to a commercial Off-Broadway run, and has since toured the U.S. and played engagements around the world. For her work on the play she earned Obie and Outer Critics Circle awards and a Helen Hayes nomination. 

Angela Lewis is an actress and choreographer who has been twice-nominated for Audelco Awards for performance (Hoodoo Love at Cherry Lane Theatre) and choreography (Caligula for Classical Theatre of Harlem).  Other New York credits include Unconditional (Public) and Sand (The Women’s Project).

Nana Mensah’s Theater credits include 365 Days/365 Plays (The Public), Seating Arrangements (The Flea) and Mother Courage and Her Children (NYSF).

Obie Award winner Reed Birney and Kellie Overbey complete the cast of THE SAVANNAH DISPUTATION, the New York premiere of a new play by Evan Smith (Psych and The Uneasy Chair at Playwrights Horizons, Servicemen at The New Group). Directed by Tony Award winner Walter Bobbie (Chicago, New Jerusalem), the production will begin previews on Friday, February 6, 2009 at Playwrights Horizons’ Mainstage Theater (416 West 42nd Street).

Mr. Birney and Ms. Overbey join a cast that already includes five-time Tony Award nominee and three-time Obie Award winner Dana Ivey (Driving Miss Daisy, Sunday in the Park with George and Mr. Smith’s The Uneasy Chair at Playwrights Horizons, The Rivals, Butley) and Drama Desk Award winner Marylouise Burke (Fuddy Meers, plus Kimberly Akimbo, Broadway’s recent Is He Dead? and the revival of Into the Woods).

Mr. Birney, a 2006 recipient of an Obie Award for Sustained Excellence in Performance, also has a long history with Playwrights Horizons.  He made his New York debut at Playwrights Horizons in 1976 in Gemini and has since appeared there in Herself As Lust, An Imaginary Life, The Butterfly Collection and Pen. Other New York appearances include the current Blasted at Soho Rep, Stuff Happens (Drama Desk Award for Outstanding Ensemble), Our Leading Lady, Bug, Loose Knit, The Family of Mann and The Common Pursuit.

Ms. Overbey previously appeared at Playwrights Horizons in Christopher Durang’s Betty’s Summer Vacation.  On Broadway she’s appeared in The Coast of Utopia, Twentieth Century, Judgment at Nuremberg, Q.E.D., Present Laughter and Buried Child. Off-Broadway credits include Good Boys and True (Second Stage), Ophelia in Hamlet (CSC) and her own Once Around the Sun (Zipper). 

Zachary Booth completes the cast of PRAYER FOR MY ENEMY, the New York premiere of a new play by two-time Tony Award winner, two-time Pulitzer Prize finalist and two-time Obie winner Craig Lucas (Small Tragedy at Playwrights Horizons, The Light in the Piazza, Prelude to a Kiss, Reckless, The Dying Gaul).   Directed by Tony Award winner Barlett Sher (The Butterfly Collection at Playwrights Horizons, the current Tony-winning Broadway revival of South Pacific, The Light in the Piazza), the production will begin previews on Friday, November 14 at Playwrights Horizons’ Mainstage Theater (416 West 42nd Street).

Mr. Booth joins a cast that includes Tony Award winner Victoria Clark (The Light in the Piazza, the recent The Marriage of Bette and Boo at Roundabout, Follies and Juno at City Center, How to Succeed..., the film The Happening), Tony Award winner Michele Pawk (Hollywood Arms, Hairspray, Mamma Mia!, Drama Desk nominations for Crazy For You, Cabaret and Off-Broadway’s The Paris Letter), Tony Award nominee Jonathan Groff (Spring Awakening, the recent and Broadway-bound Hair for Shakespeare in the Park), 2008 Theatre World Award winner Cassie Beck (The Drunken City) and Skipp Sudduth (Lincoln Center’s current South Pacific).

Mr. Booth appears in the current film Nick & Norah’s Infinite Playlist.  His New York stage credits include Spine, Penetcost, Victoria Martin: Math Team Queen and Trojan Horse.  He’s currently filming Ang Lee’s upcoming film Taking Woodstock, also featuring Mr. Groff, and appeared in the FX series “Damages.”

Also announced are dates for the final production of the season, the New York premiere of OUR HOUSE, a new play by Pulitzer Prize finalist Theresa Rebeck (The Butterfly Collection and Bad Dates at Playwrights Horizons, Mauritius, co-author of Omnium Gatherum).  Directed by Tony Award winner Michael Mayer (Spring Awakening, plus The Credeaux Canvas and Baby Anger at Playwrights Horizons), the production will begin with previews on Friday, May 15, 2009 at Playwrights Horizons’ Mainstage Theater (416 West 42nd Street).  Opening night is set for Tuesday, June 9 for this limited engagement which will play through Sunday, June 21.

Complete casting for OUR HOUSE and additional casting for INKED BABY will be announced in the coming weeks.  

 Playwrights Horizons, under the leadership of Artistic Director Tim Sanford and Managing Director Leslie Marcus, is a writer’s theater dedicated to the support and development of contemporary American playwrights, composers and lyricists, and to the production of their new work.  In its 38 years, Playwrights Horizons has presented the work of more than 375 writers and has received numerous awards and honors, most recently being honored with a special 2008 Drama Desk Award for “ongoing support to generations of theater artists and undiminished commitment to producing new work.”  Notable productions include four Pulitzer Prize winners: Doug Wright’s I Am My Own Wife (2004 Tony Award, Best Play), Wendy Wasserstein’s The Heidi Chronicles (1989 Tony Award, Best Play), Alfred Uhry’s Driving Miss Daisy and Stephen Sondheim and James Lapine’s Sunday in the Park with George, as well as Michael Friedman, John Dempsey and Rinne Groff’s Saved, Sarah Ruhl’s Dead Man’s Cell Phone, Doug Wright, Scott Frankel and Michael Korie’s Grey Gardens (2006 Outer Critics Circle Award, Outstanding Off-Broadway Musical), Bruce Norris’s The Pain and the Itch, Lynn Nottage’s Fabulation (2005 Obie Award for Playwriting), Craig Lucas’s Small Tragedy (2004 Obie Award, Best American Play), Kenneth Lonergan’s Lobby Hero, Kirsten Childs’s The Bubbly Black Girl Sheds Her Chameleon Skin, Richard Nelson and Shaun Davey’s James Joyce’s The Dead, William Finn’s March of the Falsettos and Falsettoland, Christopher Durang’s Betty’s Summer Vacation and Sister Mary Ignatius Explains It All For You, Richard Nelson’s Goodnight Children Everywhere and Franny’s Way, Jon Robin Baitz’s The Substance of Fire, Scott McPherson’s Marvin’s Room, A.R. Gurney’s Later Life, Adam Guettel and Tina Landau’s Floyd Collins and Jeanine Tesori and Brian Crawley’s Violet.  

Playwrights Horizons’ 2008/2009 Season is generously supported by The Harold and Mimi Steinberg Charitable Trust.

Playwrights Horizons is supported in part by public funds from the National Endowment for the Arts, the New York State Council on the Arts, the New York City Department of Cultural Affairs, the New York State Assembly and the New York State Senate.  In addition, Playwrights Horizons receives major support from Carnegie Corporation of New York, Charina Endowment Fund, The Peter Jay Sharp Foundation, The Shubert Foundation and Time Warner Inc.

For subscription and ticket information to all Playwrights Horizons productions, call TICKET CENTRAL at (212) 279-4200, Noon to 8 pm daily, or purchase online at the Playwrights Horizons website at www.playwrightshorizons.org

Photo Reed Birney by Carlos Gustavo Monroy

Photo of LaChanza by Linda Lenzi

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