New York's 80-year-old Provincetown Playhouse, where several of Eugene O'Neill's plays had their premieres, is about to re-open following extensive renovations.

Young Eugene, a drama by NYU professor Lowell Swortzell about the playwright's youth and early career, is scheduled to open April 23.Ironically the play, a production of the NYU Educational Theatre Program, takes place on Nov. 20, 1920, the evening that O'Neill's The Emperor Jones opened at the Playhouse.

The Provincetown Players were a group of American actors and playwrights founded in 1916 whose productions included the works of O'Neill and Susan Glaspell. The company spent their first season in Providence, RI, and then moved to the Playwrights' Theatre in NY's Greenwich Village (although they continued to do their summer plays in Providence). In 1918 they moved from the Playwrights' Theatre to another building on the same block -- a former stable that was thereafter known as the Provincetown Playhouse.

In 1929 the Provincetown Players disbanded -- but over the years the Playhouse has been home to diverse troupes and productions.

NYU owns the building, which is going to be used for the theatrical education of children and teens; in addition, NYU's Tisch School of the Arts plans to hold playwrighting workshops there. --By Rebecca Paller