Twelve years, 300 readings, and 73 main-stage productions after New Jersey Repertory Company Began carrying out its mission to develop new works for the American stage, the small, always bustling professional theater took one of its shows from its inconspicuous home base on lower Broadway in Long Branch to the number-one Off Broadway destination in New York City.
New Jersey Rep's highly successful 2009 world premiere production of "The Housewives of Mannheim" by
Alan Brody was selected by the Drama Desk Award-winning
59E59 Theaters as one of five new plays from throughout the nation to be included in its second annual Americas Off Broadway Festival. The original cast reprises their roles as four housewives living in an apartment building in Brooklyn, in this World War II-era comic drama. The play is directed by NJ Rep Artistic Director
Suzanne Barabas, and is presented by special arrangement with Broadway producers
Pat Addiss ("Promises, Promises") and
Vasi Laurence ("Passing Strange").
"Many of the plays that began their lives on our little stage have gone on to New York and regional productions throughout the country, and continue to be widely produced. But so far, we've let other producers take the gems they discover here on to bigger things," says Gabor Barabas, Executive Producer of NJ Rep. "We were waiting for a show that best represented the quality of work that we do here at NJ Rep and we all agreed that "Housewives" was that show. We invite all New Jersey theater lovers to come share this wonderful play and this adventure with us in New York."
"The Housewives of Mannheim" takes place in 1944 in the kitchen of May Black's Brooklyn apartment, while most of the city's men are away at war. May (Pheonix Vaughn) is the neighborhood beauty struggling secretly with her mind's growing restlessness. Alice Cohen (
Wendy Peace) is a world-class busybody, entering contests and passing judgment with equal gusto. Wisecracking Billie Friedhoff (
Corey Tazmania) is stuck in a loveless marriage to a man who stayed home and trying desperately to keep the lid on her forbidden yearnings. Into their world of radio dramas, ration cards, and trips to Waldbaum's enters new neighbor Sophie Birnbaum (
Natalie Mosco), an older woman who has fled the Holocaust. Sophie's sophistication and expansive view of life upsets the delicate equilibrium that May, Billie, and Alice have created and opens surprising new horizons for all of them.
Just in time for a Mother's Day theater outing, The Housewives of Mannheim will run May 6 through June 6, 2010, in 59E59 Theater B, 59 East 59th Street, between Madison and Park Avenues. Tickets are $35, available through Ticket Central: 212-279-4200;
www.ticketcentral.com. For group reservations and rates, call 212-753-5959 ext. 106. For more information, visit
www.njrep.org or
www.59e59.org.
New Jersey Repertory Company is a year-round, professional non-profit theater, a member of the National New Play Network, New Jersey Theater Alliance, Theater Communications Group, and the Monmouth and Long Branch Arts Councils.
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