The Lark Theatre Company won a 2002 Jonathan Larson Award and are putting it to good use with readings of the new musical Nor'mal. Barbara Walsh (Falsettos) and Adam Heller (A Class Act, Titanic) star in the Tom Kochan-Yvonne Adrian-Cheryl Stern drama about the effects of an eating disorder on a normal family.

Walsh plays Gayla, the rock solid matriarch of a loving brood, who gets a job for the first time as her children have nearly reached maturity. Just as she is gaining control of her own life, her teenaged daughter's chronic eating disorder disrupts her plans and forces her family to reassess their relationships with one another. Nor'mal received a Jonathan Larson Performing Arts Foundation Award as well as a Theatre Resources Unlimited Grant.

Also in the cast are Alice Cannon (The Dead), Susan Mansur (The Best Little Whorehouse in Texas), Erin Leigh Peck (I Love You, You're Perfect, Now Change), Shannon Polly and Jeff Skowron (The Lion King).

Kochran is an Emmy-winning composer whose credits include "As the World Turns" and original scores for the New Group's Ecstasy and the Roundabout's The Man Who Had All the Luck. Stern is also an actress, last appearing on Broadway in The Women.

Jack Cummings III will direct. Choreography is by Kim Reis of the Mark Morris Dance Company. John DiPinto is the musical director. $15 tickets are available by calling (212) 246-2676. The Lark Theatre is located at 939 Eighth Avenue and on the web at http://www.larktheatre.org.

BareBones productions are fully-staged with suggestions of set, lighting, costumes and music. Recent BareBones stagings have included Pera Palas playwright Sinan Unel's Tolstoy's Den, KNEPP, Hilly Hicks Jr.'s A Hole in the Dark, David Rambo's Rhinebeck and the Belgian Sacco and Vanzetti musical, The American Dream.

— By Christine Ehren