presents the last night of ballyhoo · presents the last night of ballyhoo by alfred uhry scenic...

The Last Night of Ballyhoo • SOUTH COAST REPERTORY P1

40th Season • 383rd ProductionSEGERSTROM STAGE / AUGUST 29 - OCTOBER 5, 2003

David Emmes Martin BensonPRODUCING ARTISTIC DIRECTOR ARTISTIC DIRECTOR

presents

THE LAST NIGHT OF BALLYHOO

by Alfred Uhry

SCENIC DESIGN COSTUME DESIGN LIGHTING DESIGNMichael Olich Frances Kenny Tom Ruzika

COMPOSER/SOUND DESIGN PRODUCTION MANAGER STAGE MANAGERMichael Roth Tom Aberger *Scott Harrison

DIRECTED BY

Warner Shook

HONORARY PRODUCERS

Mr. and Mrs. Roger B. Palley

Originally produced on Broadway by Jane Harmon, Nina Keneally and Liz Oliver. This play was commissioned by the Alliance Theatre Company and presented by the Atlanta Committee for the Olympic Games,

Cultural Olympiad for the 1996 Olympic Arts Festival. The Last Night of Ballyhoo by Alfred Uhry is presented by arrangement with Dramatists Play Service, Inc., in New York.

CAST OF CHARACTERS(In order of appearance)

Lala ................................................................................................. *Blair SamsReba ..................................................................................... *Linda GehringerBoo ....................................................................................... *Kandis ChappellAdolph ..................................................................................... *Richard DoyleJoe ........................................................................................... *Nathan BaeselSunny ................................................................................ *Debra FunkhouserPeachy ................................................................................... *Guilford Adams

SETTING December 1939, Atlanta, Georgia.

The action takes place in Adolph Freitag’s house, except for two scenes, one in a compartment aboard the ‘Crescent Limited’

and one in the Standard Club.

LENGTHApproximately two hours, including one 15-minute intermission.

PRODUCTION STAFFAssistant Stage Manager ................................................. *Randall K. LumCasting Director ............................................................... Joanne DeNautDramaturg ................................................................ Linda Sullivan BaityAssistant to the Director .................................................. Vince CampbellCostume Design Assistant ........................................................ Julie KeenStage Management Intern ............................................. Heather McClain

Cellular phones, beepers and watch alarms should be turned off or set to non-audible mode during the performance. Please refrain from unwrapping candy or making

other noises that may disturb surrounding patrons.

The use of cameras and recorders in the theatre is prohibited. Smoking is not permitted anywhere in the theatre.

* Member of Actors’ Equity Association, the Union of Professional Actors and Stage Managers.

P2 SOUTH COAST REPERTORY • The Last Night of Ballyhoo

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Atlanta’s upwardly mobile Re-form Jews enjoyed a delight-ful and fulfilling and busy lifeon the narrow neck of landbetween Protestant exclusivi-

ty and Jewish orthodoxy. Theylived almost like gypsies on thefringe of society, within their owncircle of wagons. But theylived handsomely, withrounds of fund-raisers,opera performances, bridgeparties, golf games, tennissets, and Christmas parties atthe Standard Club.

They owned their owncompanies and employedtheir sons-in-law and theircousins (for success was notpossible in gentile-ownedfirms). The Jewish-ownedclothing and departmentstores, like Rich’s, LeonFrohsin’s, and Regensteins,were Atlanta’s finest, so thepeople traveled to town anddid their shopping (the storeclerks greeted them byname) without leaving the magiccircle. So great a success was Rich’sthat descendants of the Jewishfounder would mingle with the bestChristians and die Episcopalian.

“Our social life was Jewish,”said Aline Uhry, a descendant offounders of Atlanta and mother ofplaywright Alfred. “We were a verytight little German-Jewish communi-ty revolving around the Temple andthe Standard Club. It was an oldcolonial house and it had a ball-room and people ate there. It wasthe center of social life. The youngpeople had dancing class there, anddo you know who taught the danc-ing class? Arthur Murray!

“We had a Saturday nightbridge-playing group for over 45years. At the height of it, we had 23

people. Five of us went to Welles-ley. We’d come to each other’shouses for dinner. We’d get alldressed—cocktail dresses. You’dhave drinks with hors d’oeuvres andcandy and nuts in little silver dishes.And we’d always get together onNew Year’s Eve. I think the Jewish

lifestyle tried to copy the WASPstyle, in their own way. People saythe Jewish clubs are exclusive, andthey sprang up as a result of notbeing in the other.”

The Temple Jews were hand-some, urbane, ambitious, and ener-getic. They founded and funded or-phanages, hospitals, museums,schools, and university centers, andthey went out of the Jewish commu-nity into the Atlanta community asthey became prosperous. PiousJews would, from time to time, re-vile their secularism, but the Templemembers, bare-headed, in modernsuits, unbound by ancient restric-tions, felt themselves to be likeyoung giants, with wealth and talentand new ideas at their disposal.They did good works, with good

hearts, so they did not believe Godwould turn His face away simplybecause they were not huddled liketheir brethren over thin soup andyellowish candles. And even if theWASPs shuddered at their suddenubiquity in civic life and retreated totheir exclusive sanctums, these Jews

still created skyscrapers, de-signed stadiums, and laidout a modern city. Andafter business hours theypulled back, returned totheir circle of wagons onthe fringe of accepted soci-ety, and enjoyed one anoth-er’s lively company.

The members kept upthe appearance of perfectcontentment (and were, byand large, perfectly content)by insulating themselvesagainst the petty insults,glass ceilings, and restric-tive clauses of the outsideworld. Like ants in an un-derground kingdom whosescouts lug home a crumb

of cupcake, leading to wild rejoicingup and down the tunnels, the Re-form Jews of the South drew intotheir secret worlds bits of WASP cul-ture—Christmas parties, golf cours-es, New Year’s Eve balls—and cov-ered them with their own interpreta-tions and designs. “Even though myhusband’s father was president atthe Temple and all this stuff, theyhad a Christmas tree,” one womanrecalled. “His mother told me thatone time the rabbi came over, andshe wouldn’t let him in the frontdoor. She yelled for her maid, andthey pulled the tree back into anoth-er room before they’d let him in.”

(Excerpted from Melissa Fay Greene’sbook, The Temple Bombing, publishedby Addison-Wesley in 1996.)


Dixie Jews: Living Large in the Land of Cotton

Costume Charade: young Ballyhoo ball-goers posingamidst the festivites.

LALA: I was looking at the pictures they had over in the cor-ner. Scenes from the movie. And it looked like they were inframes. But they weren’t. They were just slid in slots thatlooked like frames. So I slid one out!... It’s Scarlett in herbarbecue dress! It’s magnificent!

Tickets forthe regularrun went

on sale November 18th at a special box office in thetheatre lobby. The line stretched out the

door, up Peachtree Streetand down the

alley.


“Atlanta is the center of the world tonight!”Lala’s exclamation in the opening scene of TheLast Night of Ballyhoo is an accurate reflectionof the jubilant madness that seized the city ofAtlanta for three historic days in mid-December1939 during the star-studded world premiere ofDavid O. Selznick’s Gone With the Wind atLoew’s Grand Theatre.

Atlanta MayorWilliam R. Harts-field sent a spe-cial engraved in-vitation to digni-taries and celebri-ties throught thecountry andGeorgia Gover-nor E.S. Rivers in-vited the gover-nors of fivesouthern states to be his special guest for all thepremiere activities.

Three Days in Atlanta

LALA: My God, Mama! Clark Gable is lessthan five miles from this house right thisvery second!

So great was the crush of fans waiting tosee Clark Gable and his bride, CaroleLombard, that state troopers had to form ahuman barricade to protect them from thepushing throng.

Police estimated the downtown crowd atover 300,000, of whom about 200,000were jammed into the intersection ofPeachtree Street andPonce de Leon Av-enue in front of theGeorgian Terracehotel, where celebri-ties were intro-duced to the crowdon a Confederateflag-draped plat-form.

BOO: You mean you’re planning to go down there and stand out in the street?LALA: Yes!BOO: Are you crazy?LALA: I want to feel the excitement of the crowd! To taste it! To smell it!


Acolorful

18-page GoneWith the Wind movie programwas given to every guest as theyentered the lobby of Loew’sGrand. The program featuredwatercolor drawings of the fourmain players in the film by DanSayre Groesbeck, plus scenesfrom the movie.


*GUILFORD ADAMS (Peachy)made his SCR debut last seasonin Two Gentlemen of Verona.Theatre credits includeAmadeus at Theatrical Arts In-ternational; Fleetwood MacBeth,A Christmas Carol King, All’sKool that Ends Kool, FunkyPunks w/Junk in Trunks at theTroubadour Theatre Company;Love’s Labour’s Lost and BusStop at A Noise Within; Romeo &Juliet at Will & Company; AMidsummer Night’s Dream atGrand Canyon Shakespeare;The Taming of the Shrew andTaming of Pantalone at theKentucky Shakespeare Festival;and Twelfth Night at The GlobeTheatres. Film credits includeBoys Don’t Cry, Shooting LA,Equinox Knocks, Mouth Gar-den, Distinct Smell of Red andNatural Selection. Recent com-

mercials include Sprint, Mi-crosoft, Orbit Gum and Mer-cedes Benz.

*NATHAN BAESEL (Joe) is mak-ing his SCR debut. He ap-peared in The Countess Cotlubyat Poland’s Gombrowicz Festi-val, The Mahabharata at The-atre Mitu at The McCarter, andin a Classic Stage Companyworkshop of Monster. He gueststarred on “The District” onCBS. A graduate of The JuilliardSchool, he has his BA in The-atre from UCLA and began hiscollege career at Fullerton Col-lege. He is a proud husband,father and member of Group 31.

*KANDIS CHAPPELL (Boo) ap-peared at SCR most recently inMajor Barbara, A Delicate Bal-ance and Everett Beekin. Previ-

ously she appeared in How theOther Half Loves, Collected Sto-ries (L.A. Drama Critics CircleAward), A Streetcar Named De-sire, Lettice & Lovage, Dancingat Lughnasa, Hay Fever,Woman in Mind (LADCCAward), Intimate Exchanges,The Extra Man, HeartbreakHouse, The Crucible and Shad-owlands (the last two also gar-nering her LADCC Awards). Ms.Chappell is an Associate Artistof the Old Globe Theatre in SanDiego, where her credits in-clude Collected Stories, PrivateLives, King Lear, The Merchantof Venice, The Snow Ball, And aNightingale Sang, The DiningRoom, Julius Caesar and Inti-mate Exchanges (for which shewon a San Diego Theatre CriticsCircle Award). She appearedon Broadway in Neil Simon’s

Artist Biographies

NATHAN BAESEL

JoeKANDIS CHAPPELL

BooGUILFORD ADAMS

Peachy


Rumors, Getting Away withMurder by Stephen Sondheimand George Furth, and at Lin-coln Center in Pride’s Crossing.She has also performed at theIntiman Theatre in Seattle, Mil-waukee Repertory, PasadenaPlayhouse, Berkeley RepertoryTheatre, The Huntington inBoston, San Jose Repertory andHartford Stage. Ms. Chappellhas appeared in the feature filmAnother You and television’s“L.A. Law” and “Frasier.” She isa member of the Antaeus Com-pany in Los Angeles.

*RICHARD DOYLE (Adolph) is anSCR Founding Artist. He ap-peared last season in RelativelySpeaking, Proof, Major Barbaraand A Christmas Carol and theprevious season in The School

for Wives and The Homecoming.Additional appearances includethe world premieres of TheBeard of Avon, On the Jump(Robby Award), But Not for Me,BAFO, The Interrogation ofNathan Hale, She Stoops toFolly, Wit, Hospitality Suite andHighest Standard of Living.Other credits include Much AdoAbout Nothing, A Delicate Bal-ance, Of Mice and Men, Ah,Wilderness!, What the ButlerSaw, Pygmalion, Six Degrees ofSeparation, Arms and the Man,The Cherry Orchard, Waitingfor Godot, Our Country’s Goodand Intimate Exchanges, forwhich he earned a Los AngelesDrama Critics Circle Awardnomination. He won LADCCAwards for his roles in SallyNemeth’s Holy Days and as Rev-

erend Hale in The Crucible.“Cheers” fans will rememberhim as Woody’s snooty father-in-law Walter Gaines. Otherfilm and television credits in-clude Air Force One, “NYPDBlue,” “Sisters,” movies of theweek, “The Practice” and gueststar appearances on “The Pre-tender” and “The Lot.” He is avoice-over actor in animation,CD ROMS, television, radiocommercials, books on tape anddocumentaries, including theEmmy-winning series The Liv-ing Edens, Impressions of Cali-fornia and the recent documen-tary reenactment The Bismarkand the soon to be releasedGreen and Green, an architec-tural documentary on the cre-ation of the craftsman designmovement.

DEBRA FUNKHOUSER

SunnyLINDA GEHRINGER

RebaRICHARD DOYLE

Adolph

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*DEBRA FUNKHOUSER (Sunny)makes her SCR debut after ap-pearing as Catherine in Proof atthe Florida Studio Theatre. Sheappeared in The Last Night ofBallyhoo and Ambition FacingWest at the Intiman Theatreunder the direction of WarnerShook. She has spent two sea-sons at the Oregon ShakespeareFestival. At the Alabama Shake-speare Festival she originatedthe role of Silvancy in Fair andTender Ladies, played Juliet inRomeo and Juliet and Anne inThe Diary of Anne Frank. Ms.Funkhouser has worked at theGeorge Street Playhouse, theCincinnati Playhouse, GEVATheatre, the Sacramento TheatreCompany, Two Rivers TheatreCompany and the Idaho Shake-speare Festival. She and her

husband are the proud ownersof the new bike line, NYCbikes.

*LINDA GEHRINGER (Reba) ap-peared at SCR in The IntelligentDesign of Jenny Chow, Relative-ly Speaking, The Carpetbagger’sChildren, Getting Frankie Mar-ried—and Afterwards, HoldPlease, A Delicate Balance, AllMy Sons, Arcadia, Good As Newand as Helen Gahagan Douglasin But Not for Me. Appearancesat other Southern California the-atres include Be Aggressive andLight Up the Sky at the La JollaPlayhouse, The Poison Tree atthe Mark Taper Forum andStrange Snow at the LagunaPlayhouse. Ms. Gehringer hasworked at Washington’s ArenaStage, Boston’s Huntington The-atre, The Guthrie Theater, theBerkshire Theatre Festival, TheOjai Playwrights Conference,New York Stage and Film andspent seven seasons as a com-pany member at the Dallas The-atre Center. Roles includeBlanche in A Streetcar NamedDesire , Regina in The Litt leFoxes, Wanda in The WaitingRoom, Merteuil in Les LiaisonsDangereuses, Bette in The Mar-riage of Bette and Boo, Olga inThe Three Sisters, Catherine inThe Heiress, Edward/Betty inCloud 9 and Ann Stanton in Allthe King’s Men. She holds anMFA from the University of Min-nesota and has received numer-

ous critical awards. Her televi-sion roles include four seasonsas Fontana on “Evening Shade”and guest appearances on “TheWest Wing,” “The Practice,”“Ally McBeal,” “Providence,”“Touched by an Angel,” “TheLarry Sanders Show,” “Law andOrder, Criminal Intent,” “Boom-town,” and a recurring role on“The Division.” She also ap-peared in the film As Good as ItGets.

*BLAIR SAMS (Lala) is makingher SCR debut. Theatre creditsinclude the Broadway produc-tion of Neil Simon’s The DinnerParty, Blithe Spirit at the Indi-ana Repertory Theatre, NoisesOff at the Paper Mill Playhouse,The Last Night of Ballyhoo at theIntiman Theatre, The Steward ofChristendom at the HuntingtonTheatre Company, Candida andThe Adventures of Amy Bock atYale Repertory, Alice in Bed andThe Island of Anyplace at theAmerican Repertory Theatre,London Assurance at TheatreThree, A Christmas Carol at Ft.Worth Shakespeare and TwelfthNight at Austin Shakespeare.She has also appeared in nu-merous productions at theA.R.T. Institute includingRichard III, Measure for Mea-sure, Overboard, Faith, Hopeand Charity, The Balcony,Blood Wedding, Tales From theVienna Woods, ‘Tis Pity She’s a

BLAIR SAMS

Lala

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Whore and Leonce and Lena.Television credits include “Ed,”“Law and Order SVU,” “Dead-line” and “The Guardian.”

PLAYWRIGHT,DIRECTOR & DESIGNERS

ALFRED UHRY (Playwright) isthe only playwright to win the“triple crown” - the Oscar, theTony and the Pulitzer Prize. Hereceived a Tony nomination forhis book for The Robber Bride-groom in 1976. His play Driv-ing Miss Daisy won the 1988Pulitzer Prize, as well as theOuter Critics Circle Award. Hisscreenplay for Driving MissDaisy won the 1989 AcademyAward as well as the WritersGuild Award, and the film waschosen best picture the sameyear. Other films include MysticPizza and Rich In Love. Hisnext play, The Last Night of Bal-lyhoo, won the 1997 TonyAward, as well as the OuterCritics Circle Award and theAmerican Theatre Critics Award.His book for the musical Pa-rade (music and lyrics by JasonRobert Brown, directed byHarold Prince) won the 1999Tony Award, the Drama DeskAward and the New York CriticsAssociation Award. Two newplays had world premieres in2002—Without Walls at theWilliamstown Theatre Festivaland Edgardo Mine at the Hart-

ford Stage Company. Mr Uhryserves on the council of theDramatists Guild and is BoardPresident of Young PlaywrightsInc, an organization founded byStephen Sondheim to discoverplaywrights 18 years old andunder.

WARNER SHOOK (Director) di-rected SCR’s productions of TheCircle, You Can’t Take It withYou, Frankie and Johnny in theClair de Lune and Beyond Ther-apy. He directed the premiereof the Pulitzer Prize-winningThe Kentucky Cycle on Broad-way, the Mark Taper Forum andthe Kennedy Center. He servedas Artistic Director of the Inti-man Theatre in Seattle from1992 to 1999. While there hedirected Angels in America, TheLittle Foxes, The Royal Family,Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf?,Faith Healer, Three Tall Womenand Molly Sweeney among oth-ers. Other regional theatrecredits include the world pre-miere of The Mandrake Rootwritten by and starring LynnRedgrave at the Long Wharf;The Man Who Came to Dinnerat Oregon Shakespeare Festival;Love! Valour! Compassion! atBerkeley Repertory; Cat on aHot Tin Roof at American Con-servatory Theatre; Sister MaryIgnatius Explains It All For Youand Brian Friel’s Translations atLA Stage Company; Mrs. Cali-

fornia at the Mark TaperForum, the American premiereof Breaking the Silence and BusStop starring Lea Thompson atthe Pasadena Playhouse. Hehas been honored with a BayArea Theatre Critics Best Direc-tor Award for Love! Valour!Compassion! and a nominationfor a Helen Hayes Best DirectorAward for The Kentucky Cycle.Most recently Mr. Shook waschosen by Edward Albee to di-rect the West Coast premiere ofhis Tony Award-winning TheGoat or Who is Sylvia? at ACTTheatre in Seattle with BrianKerwin and Cynthia Mace in theleading roles.

MICHAEL OLICH (Scenic Design)is making his design debut atSouth Coast Repertory. Mr.Olich has collaborated as a free-lance designer and director withorganizations and artists fromcoast to coast, among them theAmerican Conservatory Theatrein San Francisco, Houston’sAlley Theatre, The Guthrie The-atre, Berkeley Repertory The-atre, Intiman Theatre, HartfordStage Company, Seattle Reperto-ry Theatre, Pacific NorthwestBallet, Milwaukee RepertoryTheatre, Seattle Opera, theEmpty Space and A Contempo-rary Theatre of Seattle, NewHaven’s Long Wharf Theatre,the Alliance Theatre Company,Children’s Theatre Company of


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Minneapolis, the San JoseRepertory Theatre, Pittsburgh’sCity Theatre and the OregonShakespeare Festival. In 1991,he originated the scenic installa-tion for the Pulitzer Prize-win-ning The Kentucky Cycle at theIntiman, a design that garneredthe 1992 Los Angeles Critics Cir-cle Award at the Mark TaperForum, and was produced atthe Kennedy Center and onBroadway in 1993. A past resi-dent of Seattle, in 1999 hemoved his home to Pittsburghand a new career as AssociateProfessor of Design withCarnegie Mellon’s School ofDrama. He now serves on theCity Theatre’s Board of Direc-tors.

FRANCES KENNY (Costume De-sign) makes her design debut atSouth Coast Repertory, but herumteenth collaboration with di-rector Warner Shook. Some ofher favorite shows include thePulitzer Prize-winning The Ken-tucky Cycle which had produc-tions on Broadway, the MarkTaper Forum and the KennedyCenter; the West Coast premiereof Edward Albee’s The Goat atACT in Seattle; The MandrakeRoot written by and starringLynn Redgrave, which pre-miered at the Long Wharf The-atre and San Jose Repertory;and the amazing Angels inAmerica at the Intimate Theatre

in Seattle. Other credits includeLa Jolla Playhouse, SeattleRepertory Theatre, The OregonShakespeare Festival, The Den-ver Center, Actors Theatre ofLouisville, Honolulu Theatre forYouth, Seattle Children’s The-atre and the Arizona TheatreCompany. She is also the resi-dent costume designer for thePat Graney Dance Company.When not doing theatre, Ms.Kenney styles wardrobe forcommercials, still shoots and re-lated media.

TOM RUZIKA (Lighting Design),in 29 seasons with SCR, has cre-ated award-winning lighting de-signs for many of his more than75 productions including A Del-icate Balance, The BeautyQueen of Leenane, The Philan-derer, Of Mice and Men, Arca-dia, Six Degrees of Separation,Holy Days, The Crucible, Sun-day in the Park with George,Amadeus, Jumpers, and 23 yearsof A Christmas Carol (withDonna Ruzika). He has de-signed 18 musical productionsfor Reprise, and shows for theMark Taper Forum, the GeffenPlayhouse, Ford’s Theatre, theCoconut Grove Playhouse, La-guna Playhouse, BerkeleyRepertory Theatre, SacramentoMusic Theatre, South Bay andFullerton CLO’s, McCoy Rigby,and International City Theatre.His designs can be seen at

theme parks in six differentcountries including UniversalStudios Hollywood, Japan, andOrlando; Warner Bros. MovieWorld Australia, Germany, andSpain; Knott’s Berry Farm; andDisneyland. His architecturallighting can be seen at SCR’snew Folino Theatre Center,Hard Rock Hotels and Casinos,South Coast Plaza, OrangeCounty Performing Arts Center,the Los Angeles Music Center,Santa Monica Place, and manyother retail centers, restaurants,churches, residences, and li-braries. Mr. Ruzika also servesas the head of the GraduateLighting Design Program at U.C.Irvine.

MICHAEL ROTH (Composer/Sound Design), is pleased to beback at SCR, where his workhas been heard in over 40 pro-ductions and premieres, includ-ing Donald Margulies’ DinnerWith Friends (directed by DanSullivan, also seen Off-Broad-way), Sight Unseen (also Off-Broadway), and the CultureClash/John Glore musical adap-tation of The Birds (also atBerkeley Rep). Other recentprojects: in New York, TalkingHeads, currently Off-Broadway;and The Persians (National Ac-tors Theatre); many collabora-tions with Randy Newman in-cluding SCR’s The Education ofRandy Newman (orchestrator,


music director, co-conceiverwith Jerry Patch, also seen inSeattle), orchestrating his Faust,and editing two songbooks forWarner Bros.; at La Jolla Play-house, over 35 productions in-cluding Tom Donaghy’s EdenLand and Lee Blessing’s A Walkin the Woods, also on Broadwayand PBS; with Mac Wellman,their music/theatre piece TheAllegory of Whiteness (2001 Hu-mana Festival, directed by LisaPeterson), the premieres of Bit-ter Bierce, Terminal Hip, BadPenny, and The Lesser Magoo,and directing Albanian Softshoe;the Happy Days musical, withGarry Marshall; Anne Bogart’sThe Women; collaborating withTom Stoppard and Carey Perloffon the American premieres ofIndian Ink and The Inventionof Love at ACT; Des McAnuff’sfilm Bad Dates; the independentfeature Holy Days, directed byMartin Benson; with QuincyLong, People Be Heard, upcom-ing at Playwrights Horizons; anda new opera with Nell Ben-jamin. The CD of Roth’s cham-ber opera Their Thought andBack Again, is available throughe-mail at [email protected].

*SCOTT HARRISON (Stage Man-ager) returns for his 14th seasonhaving most recently stage man-aged The Drawer Boy. He hasstage managed more than 35shows on the Mainstage, stage

managed the world premiere ofLa Posada Mágica, and previ-ously served as Assistant StageManager on more than 36 addi-tional Mainstage productions.He has also stage managed atThe Laguna Playhouse, Seattle’sIntiman Theatre, San Francisco’sPalace of Fine Arts, ShakespeareFestival/Los Angeles, La MiradaTheatre for the Performing Arts,Highways Performance Space aswell as several other smallertheatres in the Los Angeles areaand is a graduate of PepperdineUniversity. Mr. Harrison wouldlike to take this opportunity toacknowledge and continuouslysupport his friends and col-leagues who are battling thefight of AIDS.

*RANDALL K. LUM (AssistantStage Manager) is pleased to bepart of SCR’s 40th Season. Lastseason he stage managed MajorBarbara, Proof and IntimateApparel. Two seasons ago hehad the pleasure of working onGetting Frankie Married—andAfterwards , The School forWives, The Homecoming andThe Circle. During his long as-sociation as one of SCR’s resi-dent stage managers he hasworked on more than a dozenworld premieres and has beenassociated with over 65 produc-tions. In 1997, Mr. Lum stagemanaged the AIDS Benefit Helpis on the Way III at the Palace

of Fine Arts in San Francisco.Other stage management creditsinclude the American Conserva-tory Theatre in San Francisco,the Globe Theatres in SanDiego, Berkeley Repertory The-atre, San Jose Civic Light Opera,VITA Shakespeare Festival, Pa-cific Conservatory of the Per-forming Arts, Long Beach Ballet,San Francisco Convention Bu-reau and Kawasaki Motorcycles.He would like everyone to takea moment to remember allthose who have lost the battleand all those still suffering andfighting the AIDS epidemic.

DAVID EMMES (Producing Artis-tic Director) is co-founder ofSCR, one of the largest profes-sional resident theatres in Cali-fornia. He has received numer-ous awards for productions hehas directed during SCR’s 39-year history, including a 1999Los Angeles Drama Critics CircleAward for the direction ofGeorge Bernard Shaw’s ThePhilanderer. He directed theworld premieres of Amy Freed’sThe Beard of Avon and Free-domland, Thomas Babe’s GreatDay in the Morning, Keith Red-din’s Rum and Coke and ButNot for Me and Neal Bell’s ColdSweat; the American premiereof Terry Johnson’s Unsuitablefor Adults; the West Coast pre-mieres of C.P. Taylor’s Good andHarry Kondoleon’s Christmas

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on Mars; and the Southland pre-miere of Top Girls (at SCR andthe Westwood Playhouse).Other productions include theWest Coast premieres of ThreeViewings by Jeffrey Hatcher, TheSecret Rapture by David Hareand New England by RichardNelson; and Arcadia by TomStoppard, Six Degrees of Separa-tion by John Guare, The Impor-tance of Being Earnest by OscarWilde, Ayckbourn’s Woman inMind and You Never Can Tell byGeorge Bernard Shaw, whichhe restaged for the SingaporeFestival of Arts. His producingresponsibilities involve the over-all coordination of SCR’s pro-grams and projects. He hasserved as a consultant to theOrange County Performing ArtsCenter and as a theatre panelistand onsite evaluator for the Na-tional Endowment for the Arts.He has served on the ExecutiveCommittee of the League ofResident Theatres, and as a pan-elist for the California ArtsCouncil. After attending OrangeCoast College, he received hisBA and MA from CaliforniaState University, San Francisco,and his PhD in theatre and filmfrom USC.

MARTIN BENSON (Artistic Di-rector) shares co-founder creditand artistic leadership of SCRwith his colleague DavidEmmes. As one of SCR’s chiefdirectors, Mr. Benson has direct-ed nearly one third of the playsproduced here in the last 39years. He has distinguishedhimself in the staging of con-temporary work, including Hor-ton Foote’s The Carpetbagger’s

Children and the world pre-miere of his Getting FrankieMarried—and Afterwards, thecritically acclaimed Californiapremiere of William Nicholson’sShadowlands, Athol Fugard’sPlayland, Brian Friel’s Dancingat Lughnasa, David Mamet’sOleanna, Harold Pinter’s TheHomecoming, David Hare’s Sky-light and the West Coast pre-mieres of Peter Hedges’ GoodAs New and Martin McDonagh’sThe Lonesome West. He haswon accolades for his directionof five major works by GeorgeBernard Shaw, including the LosAngeles Drama Critics Circle(LADCC) Award winners MajorBarbara, Misalliance andHeartbreak House. Among thenumerous world premieres hehas directed are Tom Strelich’sBAFO and Margaret Edson’sPulitzer Prize-winning Wit,which he also directed at SeattleRepertory Theatre and the AlleyTheatre in Houston. He has di-rected American classics includ-ing Ah, Wilderness!, A StreetcarNamed Desire, A Delicate Bal-ance and All My Sons. Mr. Ben-son has been honored with theDrama-Logue Award for his di-rection of 21 productions andreceived LADCC DistinguishedAchievement in Directingawards an unparalleled seventimes for the three Shaw pro-ductions, John MillingtonSynge’s Playboy of the WesternWorld, Arthur Miller’s The Cru-cible, Sally Nemeth’s Holy Daysand Wit. He also directed thefilm version of Holy Days usingthe original SCR cast. Alongwith David Emmes, he acceptedSCR’s 1988 Tony Award for Out-

standing Resident ProfessionalTheatre and won the 1995 The-atre LA Ovation Award for Life-time Achievement. Mr. Bensonreceived his BA in Theatre fromCalifornia State University, SanFrancisco.

PAULA TOMEI (Managing Direc-tor) is responsible for the over-all administration of South CoastRepertory and has been Manag-ing Director since 1994. Amember of the SCR staff since1979, she has served in a num-ber of administrative capacitiesincluding Subscriptions Manag-er, Business Manager and Gen-eral Manager. She currentlyserves as President of the The-atre Communications Group(TCG), the national service or-ganization for the professionalnot-for-profit theater. In addi-tion, she has served as Treasur-er of TCG, Vice President of theLeague of Resident Theatres(LORT) and has been a memberof the LORT Negotiating Com-mittee for industry-wide unionagreements. She represents SCRat national conferences of TCGand LORT; is a theatre panelistand site visitor for the NationalEndowment for the Arts and theCalifornia Arts Council; servedon the Advisory Committee forthe Arts Administration Certifi-cate Program at the Universityof California, Irvine; and hasbeen a guest lecturer in thegraduate school of business atStanford. She graduated fromthe University of California,Irvine with a degree in Eco-nomics and pursued an addi-tional course of study in theatreand dance.

The Actors and Stage Managers em-ployed in this production are membersof Actors’ Equity Association, the Unionof Professional Actors and Stage Man-agers in the United States.

The Scenic, Costume, Lighting andSound Designers in LORT theatresare represented by United ScenicArtists Local USA-829, IATSE.

The Director is a member of the Soci-ety of Stage Directors and Choreogra-phers, Inc., an independent nationallabor union.

presents the last night of ballyhoo · presents the last night of ballyhoo by alfred uhry scenic...

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