CLEAR BLUE TUESDAY Comes To The NY Musical Theatre Festival 9/10

The New York Musical Theatre Festival will proudly present the World Premiere of Clear Blue Tuesday, a musical movie by Elizabeth Lucas on Thursday, September 10 at both 7pm and 9:15pm. The screenings will take place at the School of Visual Arts (SVA) Theatre (333 West 23rd Street between 8th and 9th Avenues). Tickets for this World Premiere are $20 including a post-screening Q&A and will go on sale Saturday, August 15 at www.NYMF.org or by calling 212-352-3101. As part of their membership benefits, NYMF Platinum Members receive free admission by emailing platinummembers@nymf.org.

Eleven New Yorkers change course after catastrophic events force them to examine why they moved to New York and to decide whether they'll stay. Clear Blue Tuesday follows their lives over the course of six years, each year on a Tuesday in September, as they pursue the dreams that drew them to the city.

Combining original songs with an unconventional narrative style, Clear Blue Tuesday was developed by an ensemble of eleven New York actor-singer-songwriters through an extended rehearsal process with director Elizabeth Lucas. Using personal journeys and improvisation as a springboard for developing characters and narrative, the cast wrote the songs they sing. The resulting stories and songs are both fictional and intensely personal, exploring the difference between the goals we pursue and what makes us happy and how the expanding gap between the two becomes more visible against the backdrop of catastrophic world events.

The principal cast includes Asa Somers, Becca Ayers, Brother Love, Cassandra Kubinski, Erin Hill, Greg Naughton, Jan O'Dell, Jeremy Schonfeld, Julie Danao-Salkin, Robert Hager, Vedant Gokhale. The film also features Al Parinello, Chris Anderson, Chris Orbach, Christian Campbell, Christopher J. Hanke, Hollis Scarborough, James Naughton, Julia Murney, Kelli O'Hara, Marsha Lawson, Mary Ellen Ashley, Patricia Mikes, Ramona Keller, and Samantha Stockwell.

Filmmaker Elizabeth Lucas has developed new musicals for the theatre at every stage, including several premieres at the New York Musical Theatre Festival: The Cure (upcoming), Wild About Harry, The Last Starfighter, The View From Here and Captian Gravy's Wavy Navy. Lucas, also as a producer, is one of the founders of the New York Musical Theatre Festival, for which she spearheaded the Movie Musical Screening Series in 2004. Executive Producer for Clear Blue Tuesday is Al Parinello; Joel Ehrlich and Phyllis Ehrlich are Co-Executive Producers. Producers are Elizabeth Lucas, Alexander Hammer, Daniel Wallace, Trish Whitehust, and Associate Producer Julie Miller.

NYMF is the flagship program of National Music Theater Network, Inc., a 501(c) (3) not-for-profit organization. NYMF 2009 is presented in association with BroadwayWorld.com, Production Resource Group and TheaterMania.com, and is supported by Back Stage, Barnes & Noble Booksellers, BroadwayBox.com, BroadwayInsider.com, Broadway.TV, Clear Channel Spectacolor, DFD-TV, Frank & Camille's Fine Pianos, King Displays, Manhattan Movement & Arts Center, New World Stages, NASDAQ OMX, Next Magazine, Queerty.com, Reuters, Sweet Caroline's, Tekserve, TheMenEvent.com, The Tank, and Times Square Squared. Major supporters include The ASCAP Foundation, BMI Foundation, Inc., The Nathan Cummings Foundation with the support and encouragement of Jamie Mayer, The Charlie & Jane Fink Charitable Fund, The Rodgers & Hammerstein Foundation, The Shubert Foundation, and The Theater League. NYMF is supported, in part, by an award from the National Endowment for the Arts, and by public funds from the New York City Department of Cultural Affairs and from the New York State Council on the Arts, a state agency.

Tickets to individual festival events are now on sale to NYMF Members and will go on sale to the general public on September 1. NYMF Memberships, which combine charitable contributions with valuable, flexible ticket packages and perks like early seating, are currently available for purchase at (212) 352-3101 or www.nymf.org.