She was a Walton and a Rosensweig, now she's a very different kind of mother. Actress Michael Learned will be featured in a reading of a new play, Chasing Monsters, Oct. 20 at The Directors Company in midtown Manhattan.

Learned plays a woman who's sold her business to move into a cottage by the lake. The bad new: she believes a monster in the lake is responsible for the death of her husband. Meanwhile her daughter (Jenna Stern) has just left her painter husband and shows up on mom's doorstep.

Co-starring in Monsters are Philip LeStrange (standby for Terry Beaver in Broadway's Last Night Of Ballyhoo) and Victor Slezak, who's in Jackie, which begins Broadway previews Oct. 10.

Kevin Rehac, author of Monsters, is best known in the theatre biz as a press agent for Keith Sherman Associates. This is his first play, though he's 20 pages into a second. "I sent the play to Michael Learned's manager," Rehac told Playbill On-Line, "and she [the actress] called and wanted to do it."

The Oct. 20 reading is specifically for invited producers and agents, and will be closed to the public. Chris Smith directs. --By David Lefkowitz