Yale Rep's 'Happy Now?' Featuring Bacon, MacIntosh and More, Opens 10/20

YALE REPERTORY THEATRE (James Bundy, Artistic Director; Victoria Nolan, Managing Director) presents the American premiere of HAPPY NOW? by Lucinda Coxon, directed by Liz Diamond, at Yale Repertory Theatre (1120 Chapel Street).  Opening Night is October 30 with performances running through November 15th. 

The cast for HAPPY NOW? includes Kelly AuCoin, Mary Bacon, Brian Keane, David Andrew MacDonald, Joan MacIntosh, Quentin Maré, and Katharine Powell.

The creative team for HAPPY NOW? features scenic designer Sarah Pearline, costume designer Heidi Hanson, lighting designer Matt Frey, sound designer David Budries, dramaturg Sarah Bishop-Stone, voice and dialect coach Pamela Prather, fight director David DeBesse, and stage manager Amanda Spooner.

ABOUT HAPPY NOW?

Lucinda Coxon’s HAPPY NOW?, a painfully truthful, darkly comic new play about having it all, debuted at London’s National Theatre in 2008 and was hailed by The Daily Telegraph as “the best new play to arrive on the British stage for at least a year.”

In HAPPY NOW?, a chance encounter at a hotel plays upon Kitty’s mind as she struggles to balance personal freedom with family life, fidelity and a demanding job. Her husband is more interested in misplaced apostrophes than in their marriage, her parents are looking down the barrel of oblivion, and although she toys with the idea of joining a gym, Kitty’s running out of time for big changes. HAPPY NOW? dares to ask just that, in this painfully truthful, darkly comic take on contemporary life and how to survive it.

HAPPY NOW? “hits nail after nail on the head—the sense of catharsis you get when someone has the guts to go for broke and tell it exactly as it is" (The Independent).

 
PERFORMANCE SCHEDULE AND TICKET INFORMATION

HAPPY NOW? plays October 24 through November 15 only at Yale Repertory Theatre, 1120 Chapel Street, New Haven, Connecticut.  Opening Night is Thursday, October 30.

A variety of ticket packages for Yale Rep’s 2008-09 season are now available online at www.yalerep.org, by phone (203) 432-1234, and in person at the Yale Rep Box Office at 1120 Chapel Street (at York Street).

Tickets for HAPPY NOW? and all 2008-09 productions at Yale Rep are now on sale and range from $35-$65.  Student, senior, and group rates are also available.

ABOUT THE CREATIVE TEAM

LUCINDA COXON (Playwright) has worked at The Bush Theatre, Soho Theatre, The Royal Court Theatre, and the National Theatre in London; and in the US at South Coast Repertory, Magic Theatre, and Ohio Theatre in New York.  Her plays include Waiting at the Water’s Edge, Wishbones, Three Glances, The Ice Palace, Nostalgia, Vesuvius, I Am Angela Brazil by Angela Brazil, The Shoemaker’s Incredible Wife, and Happy Now?  Her screenplays include Spaghetti Slow, The Heart of Me, Lilacs, and Wild Target which is currently shooting in the UK in September starring Bill Nighy.  She has just finished work on The Danish Girl, a screen adaptation of David Ebershoff's novel, and is currently writing a new play, Persistent Illusions, for the National Theatre.

LIZ DIAMOND (Director) is a Resident Director at Yale Repertory Theatre and serves as Chair of the Directing Department at Yale School of Drama.  Previous Yale Rep productions include the world premiere of Marcus Gardley’s dance of the holy ghosts: a play on memory; Richard Nelson’s translation of Strindberg’s Miss Julie; Sunil Kuruvilla’s Fighting Words (American premiere) and Rice Boy (world premiere); Seamus Heaney’s The Cure at Troy; Paul Schmidt’s translations of Moliere's The School for Wives and Brecht’s St. Joan of the Stockyards; and the world premieres of Suzan-Lori Parks's The America Play (also at The Public Theater) and The Death of the Last Black Man in the Whole Entire World.  A longtime collaborator of Parks, Liz also directed the world premieres of Imperceptible Mutabilities in the Third at BACA Downtown and Betting on the Dust Commander at the Working Theater.  National credits include Lisa Loomer’s Distracted, Octavio Solis’s Gibraltar, and Kenneth Cavander’s translation of Euripides’ The Trojan Women (Oregon Shakespeare Festival); Racine’s Phedre (American Repertory Theatre); and Of Mice and Men (Arena Stage).  Liz is a winner of the OBIE Award and Connecticut Critics Circle Award for Outstanding Direction, and has won fellowships and grants for her work from the Ford Foundation, the National Endowment for the Arts, the New York State Council on the Arts, the Asian Cultural Council, and the SDC Foundations. She currently serves as Artistic Advisor to the Women’s Project, where most recently she directed the critically-acclaimed production of Catherine Trieschmann’s Crooked.

ABOUT THE CAST
 
Kelly AuCoin (Johnny) appeared as Octavius Caesar in Julius Caesar starring Denzel Washington on Broadway and in the National Tour of Copenhagen directed by Michael Blakemore.  His Off-Broadway credits include Some Men directed by Trip Cullman (Second Stage Theatre), the world premiere of Ernest Hemingway’s The Fifth Column directed by Jonathan Bank (Mint Theater Company), Boy directed by Joe Calarco (Primary Stages), The Sketch Comedian directed by Alex Timbers (Drama League),  and Dorothy Parker’s The Ladies of the Corridor (East 13th Street Theater).  Regional credits include Finks directed by Charlie Stratton (New York Stage & Film Powerhouse Theatre), The Real Thing, Born Yesterday directed by Bob Moss (Syracuse Stage), Melissa Arctic directed by Aaron Posner (Folger Theatre), Arcadia (TheatreVirginia), Quills (Florida Stage, Carbonell Award), and he was a member of the Oregon Shakespeare Festival acting company.  Currently, he is a resident actor at New River Dramatists.  Film and TV: Julie & Julia, The Kingdom, Serial, A Perfect Fit starring Adrian Grenier, A Perfect Murder, A Normal Life, Love & Stuff, Without A Trace, Third Watch, Waterfront (recurring), The Sopranos, numerous episodes of Law & Order, and Good God (Comedy Central, Series Regular).
 

Mary Bacon (Kitty) most recently appeared as Alma in The Actors Company Theatre production of The Eccentricities of a Nightingale and Tom Stoppard's Rock ‘n’ Roll on Broadway.  Her other New York credits include Arcadia (Lincoln Center Theater), Treason (Perry Street Theatre), The Madras House (Mint Theater Company), as well as work at and Lark Theatre Company, New Dramatists, The Directors Company, The Drama League, and New York Stage and Film. Regional credits include Misalliance (Old Globe Theatre); Hazard County (Humana Festival of New American Plays); the premiere of Don Juan (Seattle Repertory Theatre, McCarter Theatre Center) and The Triumph of Love (Seattle Rep, Long Wharf), both adapted and directed by Stephen Wadsworth; The Bald Soprano, The Rivals (Shakespeare Theatre of New Jersey); the world premiere of Iron Kisses (Geva Theatre); as well as work at Alliance Theatre, Capital Repertory Theater, Dallas Theater Center, CENTERSTAGE, Denver Center Theatre Company, Cincinnati Playhouse in the Park, Williamstown Theatre Festival, New Works Festival at Perry-Mansfield, The Eugene O'Neill Theatre Center, and others.  TV and film: Alexander Hamilton, Jonny Zero, Law & Order, Law & Order: Criminal Intent, Suzanna Most, and The Gaveltons.

BRIAN KEANE (Carl) has appeared in New York in Cyrano de Bergerac directed by Frank Langella, All My Sons directed by Barry Edelstein (Roundabout Theatre Company); Sideman directed by Michael Mayer (Naked Angels Theater Company); The Misanthrope with Roger Rees and Uma Thurman, and Richard III with John Turturro (Classic Stage Company).  His regional theatre credits include Book of Days directed by Wendy C. Goldberg (Arena Stage), How I Learned to Drive directed by Barry Edelstein (CENTERSTAGE), Discovery of America directed by Rebecca Bayla Taichman (New York Stage and Film), and A Midsummer Night’s Dream directed by David Frank (Buffalo Studio Arena). His TV and film credits include all three current Law & Order series, Queens Supreme, All My Children, Urbania, and Going Under.

David Andrew MacDonald (Michael) has appeared in the Broadway productions of Coram Boy and Two Shakespearean Actors and the National Tour of An Inspector Calls (Joseph Jefferson Award nomination, Chicago).  His Off-Broadway credits include The Green Heart and A Night and Her Stars (Manhattan Theatre Club).  Regional theatre credits include A Midsummer Night’s Dream (Hartford Stage); A Seagull in the Hamptons (McCarter Theatre Center); Julius Caesar (Shakespeare Festival of St. Louis); A Christmas Carol, Pride and Prejudice, Julius Caesar, The Comedy of Errors, Arms and the Man, Henry IV Part I, The Importance of Being Earnest (The Shakespeare Theatre of New Jersey); I Hate Hamlet, A Christmas Carol (Actors Theatre of Louisville); The Big Numbers, The Wizards of Quiz (Philadelphia Festival Theatre for New Plays); Hay Fever (INTIMAN Theatre); Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf? (Cambridge Theatre Company); A Midsummer Night’s Dream (Manitoba Theatre Centre); and The Way of the World (New York Stage and Film).  On television, he appeared for six years as Edmund Winslow on Guiding Light, and also has appeared on Sex and the City , Law & Order, Law & Order: SVU, Another World, One Life to Live, and Loving.  Mr. Macdonald is a graduate of The Juilliard School and is father to Ian and Elena.

Joan MacIntosh (June) previously appeared at Yale Rep in Talley’s Folly and Elizabeth I: Almost by Chance a Woman.   New York credits include Orpheus Descending, Our Town, The Seagull, and Abe Lincoln in Illinois (all on Broadway); Alice in Concert, Dispatches, A Bright Room Called Day, Julius Caesar, Cymbeline, All’s Well That Ends Well, Macbeth, 365 Days/365 Plays (The Public Theater); More Stately Mansions (OBIE Award, Drama League Award, The Herald Angel Award: Edinburgh Festival), Alice in Bed (also in The Netherlands, Belgium), The Misanthrope, (New York Theatre Workshop); Request Concert (Drama Desk Award), Night Sky, Endgame, and A Shayna Maidel.  With the Performance Group she appeared in Dionysus in 69 (OBIE), Commune (OBIE), The Tooth of Crime (OBIE), Mother Courage and Her Children, The Marilyn Project, and Seneca’s Oedipus.  Ms. MacIntosh is also the recipient of the OBIE for Sustained Excellence of Performance.  Regional credits include Britannicus (Elliot Norton Award), King Lear, Hedda Gabler, The Three Sisters, Plenty, Happy End, Sore Throats, By the Bog of Cats.  Film and television: Awakenings, A Flash of Green, The Confession, Fresh Horses, The West Wing, Law and Order, Lincoln and Seward, Fool’s Fire.  She has received the John D. Rockefeller III, USIA, ITI, and Spencer Cherashore grants.  Ms. MacIntosh is a Fox Fellow and an Associate Professor (Adjunct) at Yale University, where she teaches acting in the School of Drama and the Theater Studies program at Yale College.

QUENTIN MARÉ (Miles) is making his Yale Rep debut.  His Broadway appearances include Tom Stoppard’s Rock ‘n’ Roll, Coram Boy, Julius Caesar with Denzel Washington, and King Lear with Christopher Plummer.  Other New York stage credits include A Little Night Music (New York City Opera), Burn This (Signature Theatre Company), The Persians (National Actors Theatre), World of Mirth (Theatre Four), and Birdseed Bundles (Dance Theater Workshop). Regional: Compleat Female Stage Beauty (The Old Globe), New Patagonia (Seattle Repertory Theatre), and Hedda Gabler with Martha Plimpton (Long Wharf Theatre), among others.  His film and television credits include the upcoming New York, I Love You; Body Of Lies; Personal Velocity; Lisa Picard Is Famous; Conviction; Law & Order; and Johnny Zero.

Katharine Powell (Bea) is making her Yale Rep debut.  She was most recently seen on Broadway as David Sarnoff’s secretary in Aaron Sorkin's The Farnsworth Invention.  Off-Broadway, Ms. Powell has originated roles in the New York premieres of Josh Tobiessen’s Election Day, Theresa Rebeck's The Water's Edge (Second Stage Theatre); David Mamet's The Voysey Inheritance (Atlantic Theater Company); and Brooke Berman's Smashing (Play Company).  Ms. Powell's regional theatre credits include The Farnsworth Invention (La Jolla Playhouse), A Midsummer Night's Dream (American Repertory Theatre), and Three Sisters (American Conservatory Theater).  She appears in the films The Girl in the Park by David Auburn, Oranges, and The Baxter; and has guest starred on Guiding Light, Out of Practice, and Without a Trace.  Ms. Powell is a graduate of Brown University and received her MFA from Tisch School of the Arts at New York University.

Photo Credit Walter McBride/Retna Ltd.