Both works were developed from staged readings as part of Seattle Rep's Hot Type festival earlier this year. The Forgette play will run March 13-April 10, 2004 and the latest Cruz work is set for April 24-May 15, 2004.

Seattle native Forgette's The O'Conner Girls brings Christmas a little early as the O'Conner sisters head back to their Minnesota home to attend their father's funeral and sort through his belongings when a family secret is revealed. Christine Sumption directs.

This year's Pulitzer winner for his Anna in the Tropics shares with Seattle one of his latest Beauty of the Father, May 27. Cuban-born Cruz sets his work in Spain where an artist reunites with his daughter after a long separation with her mother. Sharon Ott directs the co-premiere with The New Theatre in Coral Gables, Florida.

Seattle Rep's season at the Bagley Wright Theatre currently continues with Bernard Shaw's Misalliance through Nov. 1. The season also includes Steven Dietz's Over the Moon adapted from a P.G. Wodehouse novel, Lisa Loomer's Living Out, William Saroyan's The Time of Your Life, and It Ain't Nothin' But the Blues, by Charles Bevel, Lita Gaithers, Randal Myler, Ron Taylor, and Dan Wheetman.

Tickets for The O'Conner Girls and Beauty of the Father will go on sale in early February 2004. Subscribers will be able to purchase tickets during a January pre-sale period. For ticket and subscription information, call the Seattle Rep, 155 Mercer Street in the Seattle Center, at (206) 443-2222 or visit the website www.seattlerep.org.