It’s not often that Edward Albee’s drama “The Lady from Dubuque” is produced, but Seattle Repertory Theatre is staging this classic starting with previews Thursday.
The show runs through Feb. 10.
Directed by the Rep’s artistic director, David Esbjornson, the play is set at a party, but this is anything but a happy gathering of friends.
The party’s hosts are Jo and Sam. As the evening goes on, the guests and hosts begin to lose their congeniality when it becomes clear that something ugly is hiding behind Jo’s biting humor. As the party ends, an unexpected guest and her mysterious companion arrive. The drama escalates as Jo and Sam confront these newcomers and struggle with accepting what they have to offer, according to Seattle Rep’s Web site.
Among his many honors, Albee, author of such classics as “Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf” and “A Delicate Balance,” was awarded the Gold Medal in Drama from the American Academy and Institute of Arts and Letters in 1980 and received a special Tony Award for Lifetime Achievement in 2005.
“The 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee”: The first national tour of this Tony Award-winning musical comedy opens Tuesday at The Paramount Theatre in Seattle.
Audience members may need to brush up on their spelling for this show because volunteers are called upon to become on-stage spellers.
Those volunteers join the cast’s six youngsters who are in the throes of puberty, and are being overseen by grown-ups who barely escaped childhood themselves, according to the Paramount Web site. In the end, the day’s lesson plan is: Winning isn’t everything and losing doesn’t mean you are a loser.
The Wall Street Journal called the show “perfect in every possible way – that rarity of rarities, a super-smart musical that is also a bona fide crowd-pleaser. An ingenious blend of simplicity and sophistication, it’s not merely funny, it’s wise.”
“Spelling Bee” is directed by James Lapine, a Tony and Pulitzer Prize-winner whose work includes “Sunday in the Park with George,” and “Into the Woods.”
Baxter Black: Baxter Black, cowboy poet and humorist, may be best known as a regular on National Public Radio, but on Saturday, he’s bringing his humor out from behind the microphone to the Northshore Performing Arts Center.
Baxter, whose idea of a modern device is Velcro chaps, is a cowboy’s cowboy with his cartoonish moustache, his personality and his poetry. Black makes his living by pointing out the flaws and foibles of everyday cowboy life, according to information from the performing arts center.
Baxter has been described as the real thing because, as he has said, “It’s hard to be what you aren’t.”
“TeenSpeak: The Playwriting Project”: This is a collaboration between Seattle Repertory Theatre and Roosevelt High School in which the partners present an evening of staged readings that features four 10-minute plays written and performed by the students and directed and produced by Seattle Rep staff.
The plays will be performed beginning at 7:30 p.m. Tuesday at Seattle Rep.
The program has generated more than 50 plays in the past four years. This year’s program has the general theme of “Please Hold,” where each play will deal with situations that involve waiting or, in most cases, the moments and experiences that lead up to a transformation, according to Seattle Rep’s Web site.
The names of this year’s plays are “Spilt Milk,” “The Outrageous Psychology of Mid-Day Soap Operas,” “Good Morning I’m the Voice in Your Head” and “The Devil’s Door is Always Open.”
Joan Marcus photo
The cast from “The 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee” touring production.
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