Katharine Farmer News

LAGUNA PLAYHOUSE is thrilled to present a co-production with the Rubicon Theatre Company, the critically acclaimed (LA Times Critics' Choice) production of HEISENBERG, written by Simon Stephens (The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time) directed by Katherine Farmer (South Pacific, Gulf View Drive) and starring Faline England (Valentine's Day) & Joe Spano (Hill Street Blues and NCIS).  Comments Artistic Director Ann E. Wareham and Executive Director Ellen Richard, "What a special opportunity to co-produce this critically acclaimed production with the Rubicon Theatre Company. Simon Stephens has written a funny, tender and quirky love story that celebrates human relationships in all their complexity. Faline England and Joe Spano are giving masterful performances under the brilliant direction of the gifted Katharine Farmer. Our subscribers and audiences are sure to fall in love with this wonderful and extraordinary play." HEISENBERG begins previews on Wednesday, March 27; will open on Sunday, March 31 at 5:30pm and perform through Sunday, April 14, 2019 at the Laguna Playhouse, 606 Laguna Canyon Drive in Laguna Beach.

LAGUNA PLAYHOUSE presents a co-production with the Rubicon Theatre Company, HEISENBERG, written by Simon Stephens (The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time) directed by Katherine Farmer (South Pacific, Gulf View Drive) and starring Faline England (Valentine's Day) & Joe Spano (Hill Street Blues and NCIS).

Katharine Farmer directs Lin Blakely (Eastenders/ Silent Witness) as Bea, Michael Brandon (Episodes/Jerry Springer the Opera) as Jorgy, Amy Burke (Serial Thriller) as Kate, Rob Locke (NCIS, General Hospital) as Larry and Mark Rose (True West) as Coles in a timely revival of Jerry Sterner's darkly comic Off-Broadway hit, Other People's Money at Southwark Playhouse. Written in 1989, Other People's Money is a funny, fast-paced and provocative comment on the greed and excess of the 1980s.

Joe Spano and Ovation-Award nominee Faline England portray two lost souls who meet in a London Underground station and embark on an unlikely May-December romance. The story takes unexpected twists and turns that results in a life-affirmation display of how walls need to be broken down, and not built between people of different backgrounds and experiences.

Rubicon Theatre Company opens the 2019 season with HEISENBERG by playwright SIMON STEPHENS, a quirky romance starring Ovation Award-winner FALINE ENGLAND and Emmy and L.A. Drama Critics Circle Award-winner JOE SPANO. Sweet, sexy and full of surprises, the story follows two strangers whose lives intersect in a bustling London train station. Free-spirited Georgie, an American in her 40s, unexpectedly plants a kiss on the neck of Alex, an Irish butcher in his 70s. She doesn't really know why. Or does she? When Georgie turns up in Alex's shop a few days later, full of contradictions, his conventional life becomes chaotic, uncertain and undeniably richer. Peeling away the many layers of everyday relationships with subtle humor and quiet poeticism, HEISENBERG brings to poignant theatrical life the uncertain and sometimes comical sparring match that is human connection.

Rubicon Theatre Company opens the 2019 season with HEISENBERG by playwright SIMON STEPHENS, a quirky romance starring Ovation Award-winner FALINE ENGLAND and Emmy and L.A. Drama Critics Circle Award-winner JOE SPANO. Sweet, sexy and full of surprises, the story follows two strangers whose lives intersect in a bustling London train station.

Rubicon Theatre Company opens the 2019 season with HEISENBERG by playwright SIMON STEPHENS, a quirky romance starring Ovation Award-winner FALINE ENGLAND and Emmy and L.A. Drama Critics Circle Award-winner JOE SPANO. 

The Rubicon Theatre Company brings back a Rodgers & Hammerstein classic, 'South Pacific,' in a uniquely intimate two-piano version, featuring stellar performances and a ravishing set design. This one will be talked about for years to come.

Rubicon Theatre's 20th Anniversary Season culminates with a two-piano version of Rodgers and Hammerstein's soaring epic South Pacific, helmed by award-winning director KATHARINE FARMER and featuring a cast of 28 led by Tony honoree BEN DAVIS (Baz Luhrmann's La Boheme) and MADISON CLAIRE PARKS (Luisa in The Fantasticks Off-Broadway).

This Thursday, December 7 marks the anniversary of the air raid on Pearl Harbor in which Japanese planes attacked a United States Naval Air Base in the Territory of Hawaii in the Pacific. Thousands of Americans lost their lives or were injured, and more than 300 ships were destroyed. The event brought citizens together in support of U.S. participation in the war. President Roosevelt addressed the nation, calling the event, 'a day that will live in infamy.'

SOUTH PACIFIC is the final show of Rubicon Theatre Company's 20th Anniversary Season. Winner of eight Tony Awards, including Best Musical, SOUTH PACIFIC is set on an exotic island during World War II. The plot follows two love stories about seeming-opposites brought together by the circumstances of war and torn apart by prejudice and fear. SOUTH PACIFIC is based on James Michener's Pulitzer Prize-winning novel "Tales of the South Pacific." The timeless score includes beautiful ballads such as "Younger than Springtime" and "Some Enchanted Evening," as well as exuberant up-tempo songs like "I'm in Love with a Wonderful Guy," and driving anthems like the ever-timely "You've Got to Be Carefully Taught."

Rubicon Theatre's 20th Anniversary Season culminates with a two-piano version of Rodgers and Hammerstein's soaring epic South Pacific, helmed by award-winning director KATHARINE FARMER and featuring a cast of 28 led by Tony honoree BEN DAVIS (Baz Luhrmann's La Boheme) and MADISON CLAIRE PARKS (Luisa in The Fantasticks Off-Broadway). 

Rubicon Theatre Artistic Director Karyl Lynn Burns today announced that London-based director Katharine Farmer will helm the company's next two productions, a two-piano version of South Pacific (Dec. 5 - 23, 2018) which concludes Rubicon's 20th Anniversary Season, and Heisenberg (Jan. 30 - Feb. 17, 2019), a co-production with Laguna Playhouse, where the show runs Mar. 27 to Apr. 14, 2019).

Rubicon Theatre Artistic Director Karyl Lynn Burns today announced that London-based director Katharine Farmer will helm the company's next two productions, a two-piano version of South Pacific(Dec. 5 - 23, 2018) which concludes Rubicon's 20th Anniversary Season, and Heisenberg (Jan. 30 - Feb. 17, 2019), a co-production with Laguna Playhouse, where the show runs Mar. 27 to Apr. 14, 2019).

LAGUNA PLAYHOUSE is thrilled to announce its 2018-2019 season of shows. Executive Director Ellen Richard comments, "This is a sensational 98th season. We are happy to give our audiences a diverse array of musicals and plays that they will find moving, compelling and entertaining."

Rubicon Theatre Company kicks off its 20th Anniversary Season with the return of the critically-acclaimed holiday hit CHARLES DICKENS' A CHRISTMAS CAROL. Broadway, TV and film veterans Peter Van Norden (RTC's Taking Sides, Copenhagen) and Emmy Award-winner Joe Spano ( NCIS, RTC's Bucky) reprise their roles as Scrooge and Marley, respectively, in this innovative telling of Dickens' timeless tale of transformation and redemption. Adapted by Producing Artistic Director Karyl Lynn Burns and directed by Brian McDonald, the 27-member cast features many of the same actors from the original production that earned a Critic's Pick in the Los Angeles Times and rave reviews from Ventura County Star, CASA Magazine, VIDA Magazine and the Ventura Breeze. This imaginative version of Dickens' novella offers a revealing portrait of the yearning, lost child inside the cold-hearted miserly man. Actors perform in the storytelling style of the Royal Shakespeare Company's production of Nicholas Nickleby, playing characters, animals even dressing gowns and doors! CHARLES DICKENS' A CHRISTMAS CAROL opens in Ventura on Saturday, December 9at 7:00 p.m. followed by an after-party at Rhumb Line Restaurant. Low-priced previews are December 6-8. The show runs Todays through Sundays through December 23.

Rubicon Theatre Company kicks off its 20th Anniversary Season with the return of the critically-acclaimed holiday hit CHARLES DICKENS' A CHRISTMAS CAROL. Broadway, TV and film veterans Peter Van Norden (RTC's Taking Sides, Copenhagen) and Emmy Award-winner Joe Spano ( NCIS, RTC's Bucky) reprise their roles as Scrooge and Marley, respectively, in this innovative telling of Dickens' timeless tale of transformation and redemption. Adapted by Producing Artistic Director Karyl Lynn Burns and directed by Brian McDonald, the 27-member cast features many of the same actors from the original production that earned a Critic's Pick in the Los Angeles Times and rave reviews from Ventura County Star, CASA Magazine, VIDA Magazine and the Ventura Breeze. This imaginative version of Dickens' novella offers a revealing portrait of the yearning, lost child inside the cold-hearted miserly man. Actors perform in the storytelling style of the Royal Shakespeare Company's production of Nicholas Nickleby, playing characters, animals even dressing gowns and doors! CHARLES DICKENS' A CHRISTMAS CAROL opens in Ventura on Saturday, December 9at 7:00 p.m. followed by an after-party at Rhumb Line Restaurant. Low-priced previews are December 6-8. The show runs Wednesdays through Sundays through December 23.

Nick Payne's acclaimed Off-Broadway smash 'Incognito' makes its West Coast debut with this thought-provoking production, staged at the Rubicon Theatre Company in Ventura.

Upon entering the Rubicon opening night, I first remarked the bare stage with four chairs against a solid color background that would serve as a sort of screen for projections (Mike Billings-set, lighting, projection designer). This kind of setup usually indicates that there is no set for the play and that the actors will sit and move about to create the scenarios. This can be a good thing or bad depending on the content and framework of the play. In this case Incognito, a west coast premiere by British playwright Nick Payne presents on the surface quite a bit to swallow. The message beneath, however, is much more simplistic and the ensemble of actors under the supremely intelligent direction of Katharine Farmer make the play worth a trip to Ventura to the Rubicon Theatre now through October 1.

Rubicon Theatre Company (RTC) is pleased to announce the cast for the West Coast premiere of NICK PAYNE'S profoundly moving play INCOGNITO, directed by Ovation nominee and Indy Award-winner KATHARINE FARMER. This dazzling new drama explores what it means to be human and how memory and imagination shape our identities. Four actors play 21 characters in interwoven stories (some based on true events) about our desire to know ourselves and our yearning to be known and understood by others.