Westport Country Playhouse Announces 2013 Season

Westport Country Playhouse announces its 2013 season of five productions, playing next year from April through October. The series ranges in style from "wild farce to dark humor to charming sentiment, all centered on predicaments, conflicts, and bonds surrounding families." Under the artistic direction of Mark Lamos, 2013 will mark the Connecticut professional theater’s 83rd season.

“The 2013 season will be a feast of fabulous theater for our audience and a testament to the genre of comedy,” said Lamos. “The five productions will continue our tradition of ‘theater worth talking about’.”

Now available are 2013 subscription renewals for current subscribers, including online renewal capability 24/7. Those who renew by the Early Bird Deadline, September 15, 2012, will be entitled to a special gift and an invitation to an exclusive pre-season event in the spring with Lamos and other artists. New 2013 subscriptions, including the super-flexible Flex Pass, will be available beginning October 9, 2012. Subscribers receive a host of benefits not afforded single ticket buyers, including significant savings, priority seating, free and easy ticket exchanges, and restaurant discounts. Single tickets will go on sale March 5, 2013.

The 2013 season will begin with the first major revival in decades of playwright A.R. Gurney’s “The Dining Room,” directed by Mark Lamos, April 30 – May 18, 2013. A witty and heartfelt story of the American family and its vanishing traditions, it is set in the most singular of rooms, where people gather, meals are eaten, conversations begin, and generations converge.

The season’s second production, playing June 11 – 29, 2013, will be a rare American classic comedy, “The Show-Off” by George Kelly, a funny, surprising, and moving story of a family in upheaval when their youngest daughter becomes engaged to a brash loudmouth. Nicholas Martin will helm the production.

“Loot,” an outrageous romp by the master of British farce Joe Orton, will run July 16 – August 3, 2013, directed by David Kennedy, Playhouse associate artistic director. On the trail of stolen money hidden by bumbling bank robbers, “Loot” is a wickedly funny send-up of larcenous, lascivious behavior among the English middle classes.

The Playhouse’s second world premiere in as many seasons, “Oblivion” by Carly Mensch, writer for the award-winning television series “Weeds,” is a touching and funny—and very modern—tale of parents, children, and the gulf that sometimes exists between them. The new play, commissioned by Playwrights Horizons and developed by Steppenwolf Theatre Company, will run August 20 – September 7, 2013.

Rounding out the season, October 8 – 26, 2013, is John Murray and Allen Boretz’s “Room Service.” Directed by Mark Lamos, the madcap American farce is about a producer and his ragtag bunch of actors who try to raise money for a Broadway show as they scramble to evade their hotel bill. The play was adapted into a 1938 movie with the Marx Brothers and Lucille Ball.

Lamos added, "It's amazing that comedy can take so many different forms, such as the outright knockabout farce of ‘Loot’ or ‘Room Service’; or the gently human and character-based humor of ‘The Show-Off.’ Then there are plays with serious themes presented with a deft, witty, enlightened touch, like the wry, occasionally wistful ‘The Dining Room’ and our world premiere ‘Oblivion,’ which deals with contemporary issues of family and belonging. Though the last might best be described as a dramatic comedy, it looks with insight at the human comedy, as well as misunderstanding and deception—themes that seem to be central to almost all comic writing."