TampaRep to Present DINNER WITH FRIENDS

Tampa Repertory Theatre will inaugurate its ninth season with the Pulitzer-winning comedy-drama Dinner with Friends by Donald Margulies.

Dinner with Friends will run in the Studio Theatre of HCC-Ybor City, on the corner of East Palm Ave. and Avenida Republica de Cuba, from September 13 through September 29 at 8 PM on Thursdays, Fridays and Saturdays and at 3 PM on Sundays. (A paid preview will be performed at 8 PM on Thursday, September 12.) Tickets are $25 ($20 student/military/senior) and are available at the door or from a link on TampaRep's website at www.tamparep.org/dinner. TampaRep also offers its FlexPass, which enables patrons to attend multiple shows in Season 9 at a discount.

Dinner with Friends follows two longtime couples through the unsettling effects of the breakup of one of the couples on all four friends. Premiering off-Broadway in 1999, Dinner with Friends won the 2000 Pulitzer Prize for Drama. Of the New York production, the Daily News described the play as "full of life, warmth, laughs and wisdom." Of the play's 2001 London debut, The Guardian lauded Dinner with Friends as "a psychologically perceptive play: smooth on the palate with just a touch of astringency."

"This play challenges us to think about how changes in relationships alter our present interactions, our future plans, and the validity of our memories," says director Robin Gordon (TampaRep's hit Flying). "With honesty and humor, it reminds us to drop assumptions about right and wrong, cause and effect, life and love."

Gordon has assembled an outstanding cast for Dinner with Friends: Emilia Sargent (TampaRep's Heisenberg and A View from the Bridge), Ned Averill-Snell (A View from the Bridge), Ami Sallee (TampaRep's Copenhagen) and Alan Mohney, Jr. (freeFall Theatre's Assassins).

In addition to premiering Dinner with Friends, in September TampaRep is reviving its playreading series, Conversation Starters, starting with Precious Little by Madeleine George on September 16 and Please Excuse My Dear Aunt Sally (PEMDAS) by Kevin Armento on September 23. The playreadings will be performed in the Studio Theatre of HCC-Ybor City. Tickets are $10 at the door or online at www.tamparep.org/conversation19.

Following Dinner with Friends, TampaRep's Season 9 features The (Curious Case of the) Watson Intelligence by Madeleine George in January, 2019 and Shakespeare's King Lear in May.

More information about TampaRep and its mission is available at TampaRep.org.

Photo Credit: Kara Gold LLC