New Jewish Theatre Continues 'Bat Mitzvah' Season with BROOKLYN BOY Tonight, 12/2

NEW JEWISH THEATRE CONTINUES "BAT MITZVAH" SEASON WITH MARGULIES SCRIPT

As the New Jewish Theatre continues its Bat Mitzvah Season, we take another look at Father-Son relationships with Donald Margulies' brilliant Brooklyn Boy which opens with a preview performance on Wednesday, December 2 and runs through December 20.  For this production, we will once again return to Clayton High School's more intimate Little Theatre.

In Brooklyn Boy we meet Eric Weiss, a successful novelist whose new novel has just become a Best Seller and is about to be produced as a Hollywood film.  In Margulies' play, Weiss' novel hits the bestseller list at the same time that his life begins to unravel.  His wife is about to divorce him, his father is in the hospital dying, and his childhood friend thinks he has sold himself to the devil. For Weiss, who has returned to Brooklyn to see his ill father, this pilgrimage is a return to a neighborhood, a mind-set, and a religion: Brooklyn and Judaism, both of which he had escaped from and had no wish to embrace.  Notably, his name is the same as that other great escape artist, Houdini.

Like the character, who gradually returns to his roots, in Brooklyn Boy, Margulies seems to have at last comes to terms with his own Jewish background. This funny and emotionally rich look at family, friends and fame, is a self-reflective dream reverie comedy drama that is tough, insightful, bittersweet, funny and ultimately wise.

The play is directed by NJT's Artistic Associate Bobby Miller and features Jason Cannon * as Weiss along with his wife Sarah Cannon, Travis Estes *, Peter Mayer *, Kate Frisina, Justin Ivan Brown and Paris McCarthy.

Performances are Wednesdays and Thursdays at 7:30, Saturdays at 8 PM and Sundays at 2 PM & 7:30. Partial subscriptions are available by calling the box office at 314-442-3283. Single tickets are available through the website, www.newjewishtheatre.org.  The Little Theatre is at 2 Mark Twain Circle, Clayton.

* denotes member Actors Equity Association