THE ALLEY THEATRE
www.alleytheatre.org
Gregory Boyd, Artistic Director
PRESENT
The Foreigner
By Larry Shue
Directed by James Black
July 3 - August 9, 2015
|
The Alley Theatre Invites You to Attend |
|
University of Houston’s Wortham Theatre
|
Alley Theatre Announces Cast and Creative Team for The Foreigner
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The Foreigner
ends the Alley Theatre’s 2014-2015 season at UH and runs July 3 through
August 9, 2015
The Alley
Theatre is currently performing at the University of Houston’s Wortham Theatre.
One Man, Two Guvnors
begins
the Alley Theatre’s Inaugural Season in the newly renovated theatre on October
2, 2015.
TICKET INFORMATION
Tickets
to
The Foreigner
start at
$26. All tickets are available for purchase at alleytheatre.org, at the Alley
Theatre Box Office or by calling 713.220.5700. Groups of 10 or more can receive
special concierge services and select discounts by calling 713.220.5700 and
asking for the group sales department.
ABOUT THE
PLAYWRIGHT
Larry Shue
(Playwright)
A New Orleans native, actor/playwright Larry Shue began his career at the age of
eight, performing with his sister in an act titled “The Dancing Shues.” After
graduating from college, Shue joined the Army as an entertainment specialist. It
was during this time that he met John Dillon, then Artistic Director of the
Milwaukee Repertory Theatre, who encouraged Shue to begin writing plays. Shue’s
first playwriting endeavors were a musical adaptation of
The Emperor’s New Clothes
and the one-act play
Grandma Duck is Dead,
based on his experience in the Army. In 1977, Shue became a member of the
Milwaukee Repertory Theatre. During his seven-year tenure there as an actor,
director, and later as a playwright-in-residence, he wrote
Wenceslas, Square, The Nerd
and
The Foreigner.
When
The Foreigner
opened Off-Broadway in New York City in 1985, the play received an Obie Award,
an Outer Critics Circle Award, and a citation from the American Theatre Critics
for being one of the best new plays to originate in an American regional theatre
(Milwaukee Repertory Theatre). Shue was adapting
The Foreigner
into a screenplay when he was killed in a plane crash in 1985, at the age of 39.
Elizabeth Bunch
(Catherine Simms) has performed in over 50 productions at the Alley. Favorite
roles include Ann Deever in
All My Sons,
Rosalind in
As You Like It,
Lucy in
Dracula,
Margaret in
Good People,
Joss in the World Premier of
Fool
by
Theresa Rebeck, Brooke Wyeth in
Other Desert Cities,
Mrs. Kendal in
The Elephant Man,
Bev/Kathy in
Clybourne Park,
Desdemona in
Othello,
Eliza Dolittle in
Pygmalion,
August Osage County, Peter
Pan, Boeing-Boeing, Harvey, 39 Steps, The Lieutenant of Inishmore, Doubt, Steel
Magnolias, Proof,
and
Who’s Afraid of Virginia
Woolf.
New York and Regional Theater includes
The Water Children
with Playwrights Horizons,
The Voice of the Turtle
and
Museum
with The
Keen Company,
The Light Outside
with Bat Theater Company,
Little Foxes
with The Denver Center for the Performing Arts,
A Midsummer Night’s Dream
with The Guthrie Theater. She appeared in
A Streetcar Named Desire,
as Juliet in
Romeo and Juliet,
Viola in
Twelfth Night,
Isabella in
Measure for Measure,
Big Love,
and
Arcadia
with the Breadloaf Acting Ensemble. Television includes
Law and Order SVU.
Elizabeth is a graduate of New York University's Tisch School of the Arts.
Annalee Jefferies
(Betty Meeks) was last seen in
The Old Friends
by Horton Foote at the Alley where she spent 20 years as a resident company
member (1986-2007). Some of her favorite roles were in
A Streetcar Named Desire,
Angels in America, Bad Dates, One Flew over the Cuckoo’s Nest, Hedda Gabler,
Danton’s Death, Orpheus Descending,
and
Moon for the Misbegotten.
She was in the nine hour trilogy of Horton Foot’s
Orphan’s Home Cycle
in NY, directed by Michael Wilson, which won the Drama Desk and Tony awards for
Theatrical Event of the Season of 2010. She played Violet in
Suddenly Last Summer
at Westport Country Playhouse, Hannah in
Night of the Iguana
at Hartford Stage, Amanda in
The Glass Menagerie
at Kansas City Rep, which was among the Wall Street Journal’s best 10
productions of 2009. She toured England in John Barton’s ten hour epic
Tantalus,
directed by Sir Peter Hall. She did 3 years as a resident company member at the
Arena Stage from 1978 to 1981. Film credits include
Hellion
at Sundance and SXSW,
Arlo and Julie
at SXSW,
The Sideways Light,
The Girl
at Sundance,
Monsters, Violets Are Blue,
and
No Mercy.
Television creds include
Dallas
in 2013 and PBS American Experience
War of The Worlds
in 2013. She trained at the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art, London. She currently
lives on a farm in Brenham Texas.
ABOUT THE CREATIVE TEAM
Pamela Prather
(Dialect Coach) Productions at the Alley Theatre include
Dracula, Good People,
Communicating Doors, Venus in Fur, You Can't Take It With You, The Hollow, The
Elephant Man, Death of A Salesman, Black Coffee, Noises Off, Boeing-Boeing, The
Gershwins’ An American in Paris, Othello
and
The Lieutenant of Inishmore.
She has also coached productions for Yale Repertory Theatre, Hartford Stage
Company, Primary Stages in NYC, Bay Street Theatre in NY, Underwood
Theatre in NYC, The Play Company in NYC, The Edge Theatre Company in NYC, New
York Classical Theatre, St. Ann’s Warehouse, Dance Theatre Workshop in NYC and
Hampton’s Shakespeare Festival. Pamela has been on faculty at Yale School of
Drama, NYU and UCLA and is currently an Assistant Professor of Theatre at SUNY
Purchase College. She received her MFA in Acting from UCLA and is certified in
Fitzmaurice Voicework®, Laughter Yoga and Prana Yoga. www.pamelaprather.com
James Black
(Director) is proud to be celebrating his 29th consecutive season at the Alley
Theatre where, as an actor and occasional director, he has been involved in over
100 productions. Recent appearances include
All My Sons
as Joe Keller,
As You Like It
as Jacques,
Dracula
as Van Helsing,
Communicating Doors
as Julian,
Freud’s Last Session
as Sigmund Freud,
You Can’t Take It With You
as Martin Vanderhof,
The Hollow
as Sir Henry Angkatell,
Sherlock Holmes and the
Adventure of the Suicide Club
as Mr. Richards/Mycroft Holmes,
The Elephant Man
as Man/Conductor/Snork,
A Few Good Men
as Capt. Matthew A. Markinson,
Black Coffee
as Hercule Poirot,
Noises Off
as Lloyd Dallas,
The Seafarer
as James “Sharky” Harkin,
The Seagull
as Trigorin,
Dividing the Estate
as Lewis Gordon,
Pygmalion
as Colonel Pickering,
Amadeus
as Count
Orsini-Rosenberg,
August: Osage County
as Steve Heidebrecht,
Peter Pan
as
Captain
Hook/Mr. Darling,
St. Nicholas, Boeing-Boeing
as Bernard,
Harvey
as Elwood P. Dowd,
Mrs. Mannerly
as Jeffrey, and
Our Town
as Stage Manager, among others. He has also directed
Good People, Clybourne Park,
A Behanding in Spokane, Doubt, Death on the Nile, Glengarry Glen Ross,
Deathtrap, Dial “M” for Murder, Our Lady of 121st Street, The Foreigner, Of Mice
and Men
and
As Bees in Honey Drown.
His film and television credits include
Olympia, The Man with the
Perfect Swing, Houston: The Legend of Texas, Fire and Rain, Challenger, Night
Game,
and
Killing in a Small Town.
He received a Theatre World Award for Outstanding Broadway Debut and a Drama
Desk nomination for Best Actor for
Not About Nightingales
and a BackStage West Garland Award for his appearance as Eddie Carbone in the
Alley’s production of
A View from the Bridge.
# # #
HOUSTON, TX – Alley Theatre Artistic Director Gregory Boyd announced the
cast and creative team for The Foreigner, the last play in the “Alley
Theatre @ UH” season. Alley Resident Company member Jeffrey Bean returns
to one of his signature roles as Charlie Baker.
“The Foreigner is
one of the most popular comedies in the Alley’s history” said Artistic
Director Gregory Boyd. “We are fortunate to have Jeffrey Bean reprising
the role of Charlie Baker in this this audience favorite and ending our
season at the University of Houston.”
In the thrillingly funny
comedy, Alley Resident Company member Jeffrey Bean leads the cast of
this comic gem, set in a remote fishing lodge, where socially awkward
Charlie discovers intriguing and dangerous secrets under the guise of a
foreigner who speaks no English.
The cast of The Foreigner
features Jeffrey Bean as Charlie Baker, Elizabeth Bunch as Catherine
Simms, Paul Hope as Sergeant “Froggy” Le Sueur, Chris Hutchison as Owen
Musser, Annalee Jefferies as Betty Meeks, Jay Sullivan as Reverend David
Marshall Lee and Jeremy Webb as Ellard Simms.
“I directed Jeffrey
Bean in this role in 2003 and I am thrilled to get the chance to return
to this play with Jeffrey once again leading the cast in one of his
signature roles” said Director James Black.
The Foreigner
includes scenic and lighting design by Kevin Rigdon with costume design
by Janice Pytel, sound design by Rob Milburn And Michael Bodeen, Dialect
Coach is Pamela Prather and Assistant Director Brandon Weinbrenner.
The Foreigner, by Larry Shue, directed by James Black, begins
performances Friday, July 3, opens officially Wednesday, July 8, and
runs through Sunday, August 9 at the University of Houston’s Wortham
Theatre.
ABOUT THE CAST
Jeffrey Bean
(Charlie Baker) is in his 20th season as an Alley Company Artist and has
appeared in over 100 Alley productions since 1989. Recently he has appeared in
All My Sons
as
Dr.Jim Bayliss,
As You Like It
as
Touchstone,
A Christmas Carol
as
Ebenezer Scrooge,
Dracula
as Dr.Seward,
The Old Friends
as
Albert Price,
Vanya and Sonia and Masha and
Spike
as Vanya,
Communicating Doors
as Reece, the World Premiere of
Fool
as King William,
You Can’t Take it With You
as Mr. De Pinna,
The Elephant Man
as Frederick Treves,
Clybourne Park
as Russ/Dan,
Death of a Salesman
as Charley and
November
as Charles Smith. Previous Alley highlights include
Amadeus
as Salieri,
Boeing-Boeing
as Robert,
The Farnsworth Invention
as David Sarnoff,
Cyrano de Bergerac
as Cyrano,
The Scene
as Charlie,
Doubt
as Father
Flynn,
Subject to Fits
as Prince Myshkin,
Much Ado About Nothing
as Benedick,
The Pillowman
as Michal,
Twelfth Night
as Feste,
The Importance of Being
Earnest
as Algernon,
Billy Bishop Goes to War
as
Billy
Bishop,
Gross Indecency
as Oscar Wilde,
The Foreigner
as Charlie Baker and
Stones in His Pockets
as Charlie Conlon, et al. Broadway credits include
Bells Are Ringing
as Francis and
Amadeus
as Kappelmeister Bonno. Film and television credits include
Clinger, Law & Order, Law &
Order: SVU
and
All My Children.
He is a graduate of Southern Methodist University’s Meadows School of the Arts
and a Princess Grace Award winner.
www.jeffreybean.com
Paul Hope
(Sergeant “Froggy” Le Sueur) is a native Houstonian and an Alley Company Artist,
who has appeared on the Alley stages for 20 seasons in a wide range of roles,
recently including Mr. Kirby in
You Can’t Take it With You,
Edward Raynor in
Black Coffee,
Crumpet in
The Santaland Diaries,
William Crocker in
The Farnsworth Invention,
Beverly Carlton in
The Man Who Came to Dinner,
and Julian Farrar in
The Unexpected Guest,
among many others. His musical theatre roles include Rohna in
Grand Hotel
and Col. Lockert in
Dodsworth,
both at Casa Mañana in Fort Worth; and Beauregard in
Mame,
Bienstock in
Sugar
and M. Renaud in
La Cage,
all at Theater Under the Stars. He has also performed as Steve Baker in
Showboat
at Houston Grand Opera, and took over for John Lithgow as the narrator of
Carnival of the Animals
for Houston Ballet and Pennsylvania Ballet. He is the Artistic Director for
Bayou City Concert Musicals, which has presented concert stagings of
Follies, Falsettos, A Little
Night Music, She Loves Me, 70 Girls 70, Assassins, Fiorello, The Secret Garden,
Pal Joey, On the Town, Gentlemen Prefer Blondes, Finian’s Rainbow, One Touch of
Venus,The Pajama
Game,
and
New Girl in Town.
Chris Hutchison
(Owen Musser) is in his eighth season as an Alley Company Artist. This is his
43rd Alley Theatre production since first appearing here as Hal in
Proof
in 2004. Other favorite roles include Orlando in
As You Like It,
George Deever in
All My Sons,
Michael in
Good People,
Mervyn in
A Behanding in Spokane,
and Padraic in
The Lieutenant of Inishmore.
Off-Broadway credits include Ensemble Studio Theatre Marathon and revivals of
The Second Man,
Museum
and
The Hasty Heart
with Obie award-winning Keen Company. Chris’s solo show
TRIP
was
selected for production by HERE Arts Center in SoHo. Regionally he has appeared
at The Guthrie Theater, The Pasadena Playhouse, Baltimore’s Center Stage,
Milwaukee Repertory Theater, Pittsburgh Public Theater, Hartford TheaterWorks
and Capital Repertory Theatre, as well as six summers as a member of the Acting
ensemble at Bread Loaf in Vermont, where he most recently played Stanley
Kowalski in
A Streetcar Named Desire.
Film and television credits include
Kill the Poor, Ed,
Chappelle’s Show, All My Children, Guiding Light
and some Movies of the Week. Chris is a proud member of Actors' Equity
Association.
Jay Sullivan
(Reverend David Marshall Lee) is in his third season as an Alley Company Artist
Alley appearances include
All My Sons, As You Like It,
Dracula, The Old Friends, Vanya and Sonia and Masha and Spike, Freud’s Last
Session, You Can’t Take it With You, The Hollow, Sherlock Holmes and the
Adventure of the Suicide Club, The Elephant Man, A Few Good Men, Clybourne Park,
A Christmas Carol, Death of a Salesman, Black Coffee, Red, Peter Pan, Our Town
and
Eurydice.
Before joining the Alley's Resident Acting Company Jay recently made his
Broadway debut in
Jerusalem.
Other theatre credits include
Durango
at The Public Theater and Long Wharf Theatre;
DogSeesGod
at Soho Repertory Theater;
Orestes: A Tragic Romp
at Folger Theatre and Two River Theater Company;
Afternight Seating
at Abingdon Theatre Company; and
The Bilbao Effect
at The Center for Architecture, as well as
The History Boys
and
Rock ‘n’ Roll
at The Studio Theatre;
Much Ado About Nothing
for As Written Productions; and
Romeo and Juliet
at Arkansas Repertory Theatre. Film and television credits include
The Good Wife, Law & Order:
SVU
and
The Unidentified.
Jay is a graduate of Florida State University.
Jeremy Webb
(Ellard Simms) is thrilled to return to The Alley where he appeared in
A Few Good Men,
Fool
and
Dracula.
Other Houston credits include Sir Robin in
Spamalot
at Theatre Under The Stars. New York credits include
The Glorious Ones
at Lincoln Center Theater, Original Cast Recording,
The Baltimore Waltz
at Signature Theatre Company,
Tabletop
at Working Theater which received a Drama Desk Award,
Photograph 51
at The Ensemble Studio Theatre,
BFF
at Women's Project Theater and workshops of
The Royal Family of Broadway,
Dance of the Vampires, Yeast Nation, Kander and Ebb's The Visit
with The Actor's Fund. Regional credits include
Buyer and Cellar
at Repertory Theatre of St. Louis,
The Apple Family Plays
at Studio Theatre which received a Helen Hayes Nomination, Williamstown Theatre
Festival, McCarter Theatre Center, The Eugene O'Neill Theater Center, New York
Stage and Film, The Old Globe, The Kennedy Center, Long Wharf Theatre,
Shakespeare Theatre Company, the Huntington Theatre Company and The Hangar
Theatre. His film and television credits include
Love Walked In,
Law & Order,
Law & Order: SVU,
Law & Order: Criminal Intent,
and over 100 episodes as Thomas on
The Guiding Light.
Radio credits include
Next Fall
on NPR/ LA Theatreworks. Mr. Webb received his training from The Drama School at
The University of North Carolina School of the Arts. Upcoming projects include
Regular Singing,
part of Richard Nelson's
The Apple Family Plays
at Studio
Theatre.
Kevin Rigdon
(Scenic & Lighting Design) is an Associate Director for Design for the Alley
Theatre. For the Alley, he has created scenic, lighting and costume designs for
more than 80 productions, including
As You Like It, Good People,
November, What We’re Up Against, The Seagull, The Monster at the Door, August:
Osage County, A Behanding in Spokane, St. Nicholas, Intelligence-Slave, Mrs.
Mannerly, Our Town, The Crucifer of Blood, Mauritius, Secret Order, The
Unexpected Guest, Underneath the Lintel, The Lieutenant of Inishmore, The Scene,
Death on the Nile, The Clean House, Subject to Fits, Orson’s Shadow, The
Pillowman, Glengarry Glen Ross, The Crucible, After the Fall, Life X 3,
Topdog/Underdog, Proof, The Greeks, Twelfth Night, In the Jungle of Cities,
among many others. He has designed the Broadway productions of
One Flew Over The Cuckoo’s
Nest, The Old Neighborhood, Buried Child, The Rise and Fall of Little Voice, The
Song of Jacob Zulu, A Streetcar Named Desire, The Grapes of Wrath, Our Town,
Speed-the-Plow, Glengarry Glen Ross, The Caretaker,
and
Ghetto.
His Off-Broadway credits include
Oleanna, Distant Fire, Ricky
Jay and His 52
Assistants, Orphans, Balm in Gilead, And a Nightingale Sang…, Edmond,
and
True West.
His designs have been seen in the London productions of
Waiting for Godot, You Never
Can Tell, American Buffalo, The Man Who Came to Dinner, Speed-the-Plow, The
Grapes of Wrath,
and
Orphans.
He has designed more than 110 productions for Steppenwolf Theatre in Chicago,
and has designed for organizations including The Peter Hall Company, The Kennedy
Center, American Repertory Theatre, The Goodman Theatre, The Center Theatre
Group, The Festival of Sydney, and The Cameri Theatre of Tel-Aviv, among others.
He is the recipient of two Tony Award nominations, two American Theatre Wing
Design awards, and seven Joseph Jefferson awards among many others. Kevin is the
Moores Professor of Theatre and head of graduate design at the University of
Houston.
Janice Pytel
(Costume Design) Previous at Alley Theatre credits include
Good People, Clybourne Park
and
The Farnsworth Invention.
Broadway credits include
33 Variations
and
I Am My Own Wife.
Regional credits include Steppenwolf Theatre, 13 productions since 1997,
Milwaukee Rep, Goodman Theater, Geffen Playhouse, Alliance Theatre, Centerstage,
Center Theatre Group, Kansas City Rep, Chicago Shakespeare Theatre, Madison Rep,
La Jolla Playhouse, Arena Stage and Indiana Rep. Recent credits include
The Low Down Dirty Blues
at Milwaukee Rep;
Bad Jews
at Theater Wit,
Rest
at
Victory Gardens Theatre and the world premier of
The Qualms
by Bruce Norris at Steppenwolf Theatre. She is a member of Rivendell Theatre
Ensemble in Chicago, and serves on their literary committee.
Rob Milburn & Michael Bodeen
(Sound Design) Broadway credits include music composition and sound for
No Man's Land
and
Waiting for Godot, Breakfast
at Tiffany’s, The Miracle Worker, One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest
and
The Speed of Darkness;
music for
My Thing of Love;
and sound for Larry David's
Fish in the Dark, This Is Our
Youth, Of Mice and Men, Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf?, Superior Donuts,
reasons to be pretty, A Year with Frog and Toad, Ma Rainey's Black Bottom,
Hollywood Arms, King Hedley II, Buried Child, The Song of Jacob Zulu
and
The Grapes of Wrath.
Off Broadway credits include music and sound for
Sticks and Bones, Checkers,
Inked Baby, After Ashley, Boy Gets Girl, Red, Space, The Notebooks of Leonardo
da Vinci
and
Marvin's Room;
sound for
The Spoils, Tales of Red
Vienna, Brundibar, The Pain and the Itch
and
Jitney;
and music direction and sound for
Eyes for Consuela
and
Ruined.
Recent original music and sound credits at Houston’s Alley Theatre include
As You Like It, Good People,
Fool, Sherlock Holmes and the Adventure of the Suicide Club, The Seagull, Peter
Pan or The Boy Who Would Not Grow Up, Cyrano de Bergerac, Hamlet
and
The Invention of Love
and sound
design for
All My Sons, Dracula, You
Can’t Take It With You
and
Rock ’n’ Roll.
They have created music and sound at many of America's resident theatres, often
with Chicago's Steppenwolf Theatre, the Comedy Theatre in London's West End, The
Barbican Center, the National Theatre of Great Britain, the Cameri Theatre in
Tel Aviv, the Subaru Acting Company in Japan and festivals in Toronto, Dublin,
Galway, Perth and Sydney.
www.milbomusic.com
Brandon Weinbrenner
(Assistant Director) is pleased to be working on his thirteenth show at the
Alley as Assistant Director, having previously worked on
All My Sons, As You Like It,
Dracula the Original Vampire Play, Fool, Other Desert Cities, The Elephant Man,
A Few Good Men,
among others. Brandon made his Alley Theatre directing debut with David Ives’
Venus in Fur
last season. Most recently, he directed Sarah Ruhl's
Stage Kiss
at Stark Naked Theatre Co. Past theatrical credits include serving as the Bret
C. Harte Directing Fellow at Berkeley Rep, producing the 2013 Out of the Loop
Fringe Festival in his hometown of Dallas, Texas, and acting in productions at
the Guthrie Theater, The Children’s Theatre Co., Illusion Theater, WaterTower
Theatre, and Undermain Theatre. Brandon is a graduate of the University of
Minnesota/Guthrie Theater BFA Acting Training Program.
SPONSORS
The Foreigner
is
generously sponsored by Presenting Sponsor Exxon Mobil Corporation, Lead Sponsor
Enbridge Energy Company Inc. and Supporting Sponsor PwC. The Alley Theatre is
supported by the 2014-2015 season sponsor United Airlines, the official airline
of the Alley Theatre.
ABOUT THE ALLEY
THEATRE
The Alley Theatre produces 400 performances annually, more than all other
performing arts organizations in the Theater District combined. The Alley
has attracted over 8 million people to Houston’s Theater District since 1968 and
has a $34.5 million annual economic impact on the City of Houston (“Arts &
Economic Prosperity III: The Economic Impact of Nonprofit Arts & Culture
Organizations and their Audiences in the City of Houston,”
Americans for the Arts,
2005.)
The Alley Theatre, one of America’s leading not-for-profit
theatres, is a nationally recognized performing arts company focused on
collaborating with resident actors, visiting artists, directors, designers,
dramaturgs, and authors to cultivate the new voices, new work, and new artists
of the American theatre. A staff of 177 is under the direction of Artistic
Director Gregory Boyd and Managing Director Dean R. Gladden. The Alley has also
brought its productions to 40 American cities, and to Berlin, Paris, St.
Petersburg and New York’s Lincoln Center, as well as to major European festivals
(including two in one season at the Venice Biennale) and Broadway. A recipient
of the Special Tony Award for Outstanding Regional Theatre, the Alley creates a
wide-ranging repertoire and innovative productions of classics, neglected modern
plays, and premieres, as well as new works developed through the Alley’s new
play initiative. During the 2014 - 2015 season the Alley Theatre will be
performing at the University of Houston’s Wortham Theatre as the Alley’s
downtown home is being renovated. For more information go to
www.alleytheatre.org/uh.
ALLEY THEATRE @ UH
The Wortham Theatre is
located just off Cullen Boulevard on UH’s main campus inside the Cynthia Woods
Mitchell Center for the Arts building (also called building 507 on a UH campus
map), which also houses the UH School of Theatre & Dance. Free designated
parking for Alley patrons will be actively monitored and patrolled by campus
security for all performances and is located at campus entrance 16 off Cullen
Boulevard, just across the street from the theatre building. The best address to
use for online maps and directions to the UH theatre is 4116 Elgin, Houston TX
77004.