OTHER DESERT CITIES Opens Tonight at Asolo Repertory Theatre

The politically divided and emotionally stunted Wyeth family puts the "fun" in dysfunctional in Jon Robin Baitz's OTHER DESERT CITIES. Opening night will be tonight, January 17 at 8pm, and the show will run through February 27. FSU/Asolo Conservatory for Actor Training Director/Associate Artistic Director of Asolo Rep Greg Leaming will be at the helm of this five-time 2012 Tony Award-nominated production. OTHER DESERT CITIES, a 2012 Pulitzer Prize Finalist, had its Off Broadway premiere in January 2011 and transferred to Broadway in November 2011.

Former actor-turned-ambassador, Republican Party bigwig Lyman Wyeth and his wife, Polly, live a picturesque life in their very own affluent exile - the Palm Springs Desert. When their daughter, left-winged Brooke, returns home during Christmas of 2004 for the first time in six years, she reveals that she has written a tell-all memoir that discloses the family's controversial past, including one very painful incident. This shocking announcement sends the Wyeth family down an emotional spiral where they are forced to revisit and ultimately heal their wounds from the past. Polly's recovering alcoholic sister, Silda, and Brooke's TV producer brother, Trip, complete this holiday family reunion.

"Jon Robin Baitz's extraordinary play charts how politics can tear apart a family, and this family is a kind of emblem for America itself. It is painful, hilarious and profound," said Michael Donald Edwards, Producing Artistic Director of Asolo Rep.

Baitz is one of America's most celebrated playwrights. The Drama Desk Award winner's other works include A Fair Country, The Substance of Fire, Ten Unknowns, Three Hotels, The Paris Letter, and Mizlansky/Zilinsky.

OTHER DESERT CITIES is the third show in the second season of Asolo Rep's American Character Project and continues its concentration on the American Family. In Jon Robin Baitz's Broadway debut, the Wyeth family's ups and downs vividly mirror the issues that challenge so many American families.

"In what in many ways is Baitz's most American play, he has woven a very complex series of relationships in the Wyeth family," said Director Greg Leaming. "It's a very raw, very honest, very funny play - smart, bitter, scathing, really one of this author's best works. OTHER DESERT CITIES is a portrait of a family that is very unique and uniquely American!" CAST (In order of appearance)
Lauren Klein*
Lucy Lavely
J. Kenneth Campbell*
Benjamin Williamson
Carolyn Michel* Polly Wyeth
Brooke Wyeth
Lyman Wyeth
Trip Wyeth
Silda Grauman

*Members of Actors' Equity Association, the Union of Professional Actors and Stage Managers in the United States.

Tickets for OTHER DESERT CITIES and the entire 2013-14 Asolo Repertory Theatre season are on sale now. Tickets for OTHER DESERT CITIES start at $21. To purchase tickets, call 941.351.8000 or 800.361.8388, visit www.asolorep.org, or visit the Asolo Repertory Theatre Box Office, located in the lobby of the theatre. Asolo Repertory Theatre is located at 5555 North Tamiami Trail in the Florida State University Center for the Performing Arts. Box office hours are Monday 10am - 4pm, Tuesday - Saturday 10am - 8pm, and Sunday 10am - 2pm. The box office closes at 5pm when there are no evening performances and phone lines close one hour prior to the start of any performance. Season subscription packages are also available online and by visiting or calling the box office.