Philadelphia Theatre Company Presents SEMINAR, Beginning 3/15

Competitive backstabbing alternates with supportive camaraderie amongst emerging writers and their famous professor in Theresa Rebeck's award-winning drama Seminar, receiving its Philadelphia premiere at Philadelphia Theatre Company March 15-April 14 at the Suzanne Roberts Theatre (Broad and Lombard Streets). Directed by Scott Schwartz, the ensemble cast features Rufus Collins, Matt Harrington, Teresa Avia Lim, Genevieve Perrier, and Luigi Sottile.

Previews begin Friday, March 15 with Opening Night on Wednesday, March 20. Performances run Tuesday through Sunday until April 14. Tickets starting at $46 are available by calling the PTC Box Office at 215-985-0420 or visiting PhiladelphiaTheatreCompany.org. Philadelphia Theatre Company's Suzanne Roberts Theatre is located at Broad and Lombard Streets.

Fast, funny, and keenly observant, Seminar is a new comedy from Pulitzer Prize nominee Theresa Rebeck. Set in Manhattan's Upper West Side, a literary giant critiques the work of four aspiring young novelists in a series of weekly and unorthodox seminars. Insults fly, alliances are made, lines are drawn, and sympathies shift as this award-winning play unfolds. There's only one thing harder than writing your first novel - letting your professor read it! Seminar ran on Broadway for six months last year. It was nominated for Best Play by the Outer Critics Circle and the Drama League.

Theresa Rebeck (Playwright) is the author of Dead Accountants, recently on Broadway, Mauritius, The Understudy, Omnium Gatherum, a Pulitzer Prize finalist, and many others. The creator of the hit TV series Smash, Rebeck's other television credits include Law & Order: Criminal Intent, Third Watch, and NYPD Blue, for which she earned several awards. She is also the recipient of the National Theater Conference Award for The Family of Mann, the William Inge New Voices Playwriting Award for The Bells, and the IRNE Award for Best New Play and the Eliot Norton Award, both for Mauritius.

PTC began their relationship with Theresa Rebeck more than twenty years ago when she was one of the first young playwrights in PTC's Mentorship Project as part of its STAGES new play development program. Rebeck spent the year at PTC mentored by playwright Arthur Kopit and wrote Spike Heels which was subsequently produced by New York's Second Stage Theater in 1992. Her play What We're Up Against was part of the inaugural season of PTC@Play and has since been produced at Alley Theatre and San Francisco's Magic Theatre.

Scott Schwartz (Director) directed the Broadway productions of Golda's Balcony and Jane Eyre. His direction of Bat Boy: The Musical won Lucille Lortel and Outer Critics Circle Awards for Outstanding Off-Broadway Musical and a Drama Desk nomination for Outstanding Direction of a Musical, and his production of tick, tick...BOOK! won an Outer Critics Circle Award for Outstanding Off-Broadway Musical and a Drama Desk nomination for Outstanding Direction of a Musical. Other directing credits include productions at The Old Globe, Alley Theatre, Dallas Theatre Center and Paper Mill Playhouse including three other plays by Theresa Rebeck.

Rufus Collins (Leonard) appeared on Broadway in The Royal Family, An Ideal Husband, and The Homecomingas well as in Orson's Shadow at Barrow Street, Aristocrats at the Irish Rep, and House and Garden at Manhattan Theatre Club. Regionally he has been seen at Long Wharf Theatre, The Old Globe, Pittsburgh Public Theatre, Alley Theatre, Florida Studio Theatre, and the Humana Festival/Actors Theatre of Louisville.

Matt Harrington (Martin) was seen on Broadway in Harvey and at Berkshire Theatre Festival in The Puppetmaster of Lodz and Moonchildren. He has also appeared at Portland Stage, Weston Playhouse and Syracuse Stage.

Teresa Avia Lim (Izzy) starred in the world premieres of Water by the Spoonful at Hartford Stage, Edith Can Shoot Things and Hit Them at Humana Festival/Actors Theatre of Louisville, and Concerning Strange Devices From the Distant West at Berkeley Rep. She has also been featured in several productions at Washington D.C.'s Shakespeare Theatre. A graduate of The Yale School of Drama, she was the first recipient of the Jerome L. Greene Scholarship.

Genevieve Perrier (Kate) returns to PTC where she won an Outstanding Leading Actress Barrymore Award for her performance in Neal LaBute's reasons to be pretty. In a single year, Perrier was nominated for three Barrymore Awards for Outstanding Supporting Actress (for The Lonesome West) and Outstanding Ensemble (for both Go, Dog, Go! and Pay Up), and she won Outstanding Leading Actress in Skylight. She has appeared locally at Lantern Theatre Company, Arden Theatre Company, Theatre Exile, and People's Light & Theatre Company.

Luigi Sottile (Douglas) received a Barrymore nomination for Best Supporting Actor and a Barrymore Award for Best Ensemble, both for In the Next Room or the Vibrator Play, as well as a Barrymore nomination for Angels in America Millenium Approaches, both at The Wilma Theater. In addition to appearances at the Walnut Street Theatre, he has been a frequent guest at Arden Theatre Company, People's Light & Theatre Company, and Lantern Theatre Company.

Seminar brings back a creative team of PTC favorite designers: set and lighting designer Kevin Rigdon(PTC's Race); costume designer Alejo Vietti (PTC's Stars of David, Red, The 25^th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee, and Nerds://A Musical Software Satire); and sound designer Rob Kaplowitz (PTC's Stars of David).

PTC's 2012-2013 season concludes with the Tony nominated black comedy Venus in Fur by David Ives (May 24-June 30).

Founded in 1974, Philadelphia Theatre Company is a leading regional theatre company whose mission is to produce, develop and present entertaining and imaginative Contemporary Theatre focused on the American experience that both ignites the intellect and touches the soul. By developing new work through commissions, readings and workshops, PTC generates projects that have a national impact and reach broad regional audiences. Under the leadership of PTC's Producing Artistic Director Sara Garonzik since 1982 and Managing Director Shira Beckerman, who joined PTC in August, 2011, PTC supports the work of a growing body of diverse dramatists and takes pride in being a home to many nationally recognized artists who have participated in more than 140 world and Philadelphia premieres. PTC has received 46 Barrymore Awards and 155 nominations. In October 2007, PTC opened the Suzanne Roberts Theatre, their home on Philadelphia's Avenue of the Arts, which has helped contribute to the revitalization of Center City Philadelphia's thriving arts district.