Zoe Caldwell News

Classic Stage Company (CSC), under the leadership of Artistic Director Brian Kulick and Executive Director Jessica R. Jenen, has announced details for their upcoming 2009-10 season.

Natalie Joy Johnson, currently starring as Paulette in Legally Blonde at the Pantages Theatre, brings her popular club act to Upright Cabaret for its West Coast premiere, after sold out engagements at Joe's Pub, the Cutting Room, Feinstein's and Ars Nova. Natalie's act harkens back to a time when the great ladies of show business entertained every night in swanky, smoky rooms.

Funny, magical, and moving, Lorenzo Pisoni's Humor Abuse is a tour-de-force journey through the photo album of his extraordinary life. A touching homage to his father, Humor Abuse opens Philadelphia Theatre Company's 2009/2010 season at the Suzanne Roberts Theatre. Co-written by Pisoni and Erica Schmidt, who also directs the piece, Humor Abuse runs September 25-October 25.

Second Stage Theatre (Carole Rothman, Artistic Director) will launch its 31st season this fall with the New York premiere of Anna Deavere Smith's LET ME DOWN EASY. Conceived, written, and performed by Ms. Smith and directed by Leonard Foglia, LET ME DOWN EASY will begin preview performances on Tuesday, September 15 and will officially open on Wednesday, October 7 at 6:45pm.

Rattlestick Playwrights Theater is pleased to announce its 15th Anniversary season. This award-winning company, whose mission - 'to provide a positive, nurturing experience for emerging playwrights, to present diverse and challenging plays that otherwise might not be produced, and to foster the future voices of the American theater' - will continue during this celebratory season when it produces new plays by two emerging playwrights, as well as the works of two of Rattlestick's accomplished alumni.

Philadelphia Theatre Company announces the cast of City of Nutterly Love: Funny as Bell!, a co-production of Philadelphia Theatre Company and Chicago's famed The Second City, running July 8 through July 26 at the Suzanne Roberts Theatre (Broad and Lombard Streets). The six-member cast combines three performers from Chicago and three performers from Philadelphia in a hilarious spoof of all things 'Philadelphia.'

Philadelphia Theatre Company shines a hot spotlight on comedy by offering some cool entertainment this summer. PTC collaborates with the legendary Second City comedy theatre to create a world premiere revue running July 8 through August 2, 2009. The improv troupe's lauded wit, irreverence and audience interaction will be showcased in a hilarious spoof of all things 'Philadelphia'.

Philadelphia Theatre Company shines a hot spotlight on comedy by offering some cool entertainment this summer. PTC collaborates with the legendary Second City comedy theatre to create a world premiere revue running July 8 through August 2, 2009. The improv troupe's lauded wit, irreverence and audience interaction will be showcased in a hilarious spoof of all things 'Philadelphia'.

The stage will brighten with Philadelphia Theatre Company's mainstage season finale Grey Gardens, book by Doug Wright, music by Scott Frankel, and lyrics by Michael Korie, on May 22 - June 28 at the Suzanne Roberts Theatre (Broad and Lombard Streets). Directed by Lisa Peterson, the ensemble cast features Todd Almond, Cole Burden, Kim Carson, Maggie Fitzgerald, Joy Franz, James Ijames, John Jellison, Anastasia Korbal, and Hollis Resnik.

The personal theatrical papers of Katharine Hepburn, which were acquired by The New York Public Library for the Performing Arts in 2007, will be on view for the first time in the new library exhibition, Katharine Hepburn: In Her Own Files, opening Wednesday, June 10. Her long and rich theater career is documented through typescripts (some, like the script for Coco, annotated in Hepburn?s hand), hundreds of photographs (publicity shots and formal portraits, as well as informal snapshots and rehearsal candids), scrapbooks, promotional ephemera, and sixty years of correspondence (fan mail, congratulatory notes, and general letters from such notable friends and admirers as Judy Garland, Richard Burton, John Ford, Vivien Leigh, Peter O?Toole, Cary Grant, Humphrey Bogart, and Jeremy Irons, among scores of others. She saved telegrams from her friends and from stage crews and even the cards that come with flower bouquets, including many signed ?Pot,? Hepburn?s pet name for long-time companion Spencer Tracy). The exhibition continues through Saturday, October 10, 2009 in the Vincent Astor Gallery of The New York Public Library for the Performing Arts Dorothy and Lewis B. Cullman Center, located on the Lincoln Center campus at 40 Lincoln Center Plaza. Admission is free. For exhibition information, call 212.870.1630 or visit the Library?s website at www.nypl.org/lpa. In conjunction with this exhibition, a series of Hepburn films based on stage plays will be screened on Saturday afternoons in July and August at the Library.

Philadelphia Theatre Company announces the cast of City of Nutterly Love: Funny as Bell!, a co-production of Philadelphia Theatre Company and Chicago's famed The Second City, running July 8 through July 26 at the Suzanne Roberts Theatre (Broad and Lombard Streets). The six-member cast combines three performers from Chicago and three performers from Philadelphia in a hilarious spoof of all things 'Philadelphia.'

Philadelphia Theatre Company announces its 2009-2010 mainstage season, highlighted by a world premiere by Terrence McNally, a Tony Award-winning musical and a pre-Broadway production. Expanding to a five-play series, the season features the world premiere of Terrence McNally's Golden Age, the six-time Tony Award-winning Broadway musical The Light in the Piazza by Craig Lucas and Adam Guettel, Lorenzo Pisoni's multi-award winner Humor Abuse, August Wilson's first major play Ma Rainey's Black Bottom, the dark comedy thriller Mauritius by Theresa Rebeck, and a special summer comedy revue, City of Nutterly Love: Funny as Bell!, co-produced with Chicago's The Second City.

Following a critically acclaimed season which included the Pulitzer Prize finalist Becky Shaw and the Broadway transfer of its musical hit Next to Normal, Second Stage Theatre (Carole Rothman, Artistic Director; Ellen Richard, Executive Director) has announced three of the four plays scheduled for its upcoming 31st Season.

Eric McCormack, Emmy Award winner for 'Will & Grace,' will play El Gallo, Lucas Grabeel from 'High School Musical' will play Matt, and Broadway star and Tony nominee Harry Groener will play Bellomy in 'The Fantasticks,' which concludes the 2008-2009 Reprise Theatre Company at the Freud Playhouse May 5-May 17 (press opening May 6).

Eric McCormack, Emmy Award winner for 'Will & Grace,' will play El Gallo, Lucas Grabeel from 'High School Musical' will play Matt, and Broadway star and Tony nominee Harry Groener will play Bellomy in 'The Fantasticks,' which concludes the 2008-2009 Reprise Theatre Company at the Freud Playhouse May 5-May 17 (press opening May 6).

In anticipation of its upcoming production Groundswell, The New Group proudly presents 'Creative Producing: A Conversation with Hal Prince.' This ONE NIGHT ONLY special event takes place Monday, April 27 at 7:00 PM. Tickets are $20 and may be arranged through Ticket Central at www.ticketcentral.com or (212) 279-4200. This event is free to New Group subscribers.

The stage will brighten with Philadelphia Theatre Company's mainstage season finale Grey Gardens, book by Doug Wright, music by Scott Frankel, and lyrics by Michael Korie, on May 22 - June 28 at the Suzanne Roberts Theatre (Broad and Lombard Streets). Directed by Lisa Peterson, the ensemble cast features Todd Almond, Cole Burden, Kim Carson, Maggie Fitzgerald, Joy Franz, James Ijames, John Jellison, Anastasia Korbal, and Hollis Resnik.

Second Stage Theatre (Carole Rothman, Artistic Director; Ellen Richard, Executive Director) will launch its 31st season this fall with the New York premiere of Anna Deavere Smith's LET ME DOWN EASY. Conceived, written, and performed by Ms. Smith and directed by Leonard Foglia, LET ME DOWN EASY will begin preview performances on Tuesday, September 15 and will officially open in early October.

The world-renowned Imagination Workshop was founded 40 years ago by Margaret Ladd, the award-winning actress and Founding Artistic Director, and her husband Lyle Kessler, the critically-acclaimed playwright, and Co-Founder of the organization. Today, the Imagination Workshop, a unique theatre company comprised of professional theatre artists collaborating with patients recovering from mood disorders and other mental illnesses, is one of the longest running Arts and Social Institutions in the country.

Eric McCormack, Emmy Award winner for 'Will & Grace,' will play El Gallo, Lucas Grabeel from 'High School Musical' will play Matt, and Broadway star and Tony nominee Harry Groener will play Bellomy in 'The Fantasticks,' which concludes the 2008-2009 Reprise Theatre Company at the Freud Playhouse May 5-May 17 (press opening May 6).