Restoration Off-Broadway Original Cast

Two-time Tony Award-nominee, playwright and actress Claudia Shear reunites with acclaimed director Christopher Ashley to create and star in her new play Restoration. Shear plays the lead role of Giulia, down-on-her-luck art restorer from Brooklyn who receives the possibly career-reviving job of “refreshing” Michelangelo's sculpture David in time for its 500th birthday celebration in Florence.

Claudia Shear and Christopher Ashley first met and worked together in the legendary NYTW production of Shear’s OBIE Award-winning solo performance piece Blown Sideways Through Life. Directed by Ashley, Blown Sideways played an extended New York run and was later filmed for PBS’s “American Playhouse.” Shear triumphantly returned to NYTW with Dirty Blonde, a comic exploration of the life of Mae West, directed by James Lapine, for which she won a Theatre World Award, as well as Tony and Drama Desk Award nominations for Best Play and Best Actress. Christopher Ashley’s directing credits include Xanadu, for which he was nominated for a Drama Desk Award for Outstanding Director of a Musical, and The Rocky Horror Show for which he received nominations for the Tony Award for Best Direction of a Musical and the Drama Desk Award for Outstanding Director of a Musical.