CAT ON A HOT TIN ROOF Will Come to the Gamm in May
Steve Kidd directs Nora Eschenheimer and Michael Underhill in Tennessee Williams' Pulitzer Prize-winning drama
The Sandra Feinstein-Gamm Theatre (The Gamm) will bring Season 41 to a close with Tennessee Williams' American masterpiece Cat on a Hot Tin Roof. Cat on a Hot Tin Roof runs from May 28-June 21. Tickets range from $60-$80 with discounts for subscribers and members.
Directed by Steve Kidd (Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf?), this Pulitzer Prize-winning drama explores the hypocrisy, greed, and secret passions that threaten to tear apart a wealthy, dysfunctional Mississippi family made up of larger-than-life characters. The Gamm's production features Nora Eschenheimer (Ophelia in Hamlet) as Maggie "the Cat”; Michael Underhill (Lysander in A Midsummer Night's Dream) as her alcoholic husband, Brick; Joe Penczak (Polonius in Hamlet) as the dominating family patriarch, Big Daddy; and Karen MacDonald (Sally in Escaped Alone) as Big Mama, his long-suffering wife and the family's overbearing matriarch.
“Williams called Cat his most personal play, yet it remains one of the most universal and poetically truthful works of the last hundred years. It reveals a family wrestling with love, loss, expectation, and control, often with surprising humor, all caught up together in what Williams described as ‘a thundercloud of a common crisis,'” Director Steve Kidd said.
“I remember being in the audience at The Gamm's 2002 production of Cat, glued to my seat by a rare kind of emotional fullness that only theater can deliver,” he added. “I'm thrilled to be directing this production all these years later with this extraordinary team and cast. Together, we hope to bring a funny, deeply moving, and poignant close to what has been a remarkable 41st season at The Gamm.”
Gamm Artistic Director Tony Estrella echoed Kidd, calling Williams' play “one of the greatest in the history of American theater…a quintessential family drama playing out entirely around a four-poster bed. It also has a special place in Gamm history, as it was our farewell production to Providence where we had performed over so many years. I'm elated to bring it back a generation later and have Steve Kidd directing after his sensitive and devastating work with Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf? two seasons ago.”
ABOUT CAT ON A HOT TIN ROOF
In the sweltering Mississippi heat, the Pollitt family gathers to celebrate Big Daddy's birthday, but the air is thick with tension. Young Brick drinks to forget, Maggie claws for love, and everyone is hiding something. With Williams' signature lyricism and emotional depth, Cat on a Hot Tin Roof burns with desire, denial, and the desperate fight to hold on to what's already slipping away. This Pulitzer Prize-winning 20th century drama returns to The Gamm (2002) for what promises to be another unforgettable production.
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