Tucson: Winding Road Theater Ensemble presents Talley's Folly and Fifth of July

 

From: Dean Steeves [mailto:propaganda@laughing.com]
Sent: Tuesday, March 01, 2011 9:50 AM
Subject: News from Winding Road Theater Ensemble

 

For Immediate Release
February 18, 2011

contact: Dean Steeves
propaganda@laughing.com
520-749-3800

Winding Road Presents Two Lanford Wilson Plays in Repertory

Talley’s Folly and Fifth of July

In March and April 2011, Winding Road Theater Ensemble members Glen Coffman and Terry Erbe will direct Lanford Wilson plays, Fifth of July and Talley’s Folly, in repertory at the Cabaret Space at the Temple of Music and Art, 330 S. Scott, Tucson.  Set in Wilson’s hometown of Lebanon, Missouri, both plays focus on the Talley family.

One of three plays in what came to be known as Wilson’s “Talley Series,” Fifth of July is a multi-generational comedy set in the late ‘70s, as members of the Talley family struggle with the possibility of having to give up their family home. Among the characters is the recently widowed Aunt Sally. When the actress playing Sally in the original production asked Wilson for help in understanding her character, he wrote Talley’s Folly to show how Sally and her husband, Matt, became a couple more than 30 years earlier.  

Amy Erbe will play the young Sally of Talley’s Folly, falling in love in the 1940s; Toni Press-Coffman will play the widowed Sally, three decades later, in Fifth of July.  The repertory cast also includes Eric Anson, Jodi Ajanovic, Christopher Johnson, Susan Kovitz, Cliff Madison, Paul Matlock, Lucille Petty, and Brian Wees.

Fifth of July previews Thursday, March 24 and opens Friday, March 25, with evening performances Saturday, March 26, April 9 and16 at 7:30. Sunday matinees are March 27, April 10 and 17 at 3 PM.

Talley’s Folly previews Thursday, March 31 and opens on Friday, April 1, with evening performances April 2, 8, and 14 at 7:30. Matinees are Sunday April 3, and Saturday April 9 and 16 at 3 PM.  There will be no performances on Friday, April 15.

Ticket are $15-$18 at Winding Road’s website: www.windingroadtheater.org <http://www.windingroadtheater.org/> or by calling the box office at 520-401-3626. Patrons who buy tickets to both plays at the same time (through the box office only) will receive a discount.

About Winding Road Theater Ensemble

Winding Road Theater Ensemble was founded two years ago by Tucson theater artists Lesley Abrams, Glen Coffman, Amy Erbe, Terry Erbe, and Toni Press-Coffman. Our mission is to tell dynamic, theatrical stories that illuminate the human condition and that celebrate the theater’s power to entertain us, to move us, and to bring us joy. We are particularly committed to producing new plays: of our four previous productions, two were original plays. Two more new plays, both inspired by the events that took place on September 11, 2001, will premiere next fall.

About Lanford Wilson:

Born on April 13, 1937, in Lebanon, Missouri, Lanford Wilson began writing at the University of Chicago in 1959 after enrolling in a playwriting class. After graduation, he moved to New York, where his first play, So Long at the Fair, was produced Off-Off Broadway at the Café Cino in 1963. Other early plays include Home Free (1964), Balm in Giliad (1965), and Rimers of Eldritch (1965). In 1969, Wilson co-founded Circle Repertory Company, which premiered many of Wilson’s plays including Serenading Louie (1970), Lemon Sky (1970), Hot L Baltimore (1973), The Mound Builders (1975), and Angels Fall (1982), Burn This (1986), the Redwood Curtain (1992), Book of Days (2000), and Rain Dance (2002).  Wilson also wrote the teleplays Taxi! and The Migrants (both Emmy nominees) and the libretto for Lee Hoibe's opera of Summer and Smoke.

For Talley's Folly, Wilson won the Pulitzer Prize for Drama and the New York Drama Critics' Circle Award.  That play, along with Fifth of July, Burn This, and Hot L Baltimore, enjoyed extensive Broadway runs. Other awards include the Vernon Rice Award for Rimers of Eldritch, the New York Drama Critics' Circle Award, the Outer Circle Award, and an Obie for Hot L Baltimore, and an Obie for The Mound Builders.

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