Theatre grand dames Marian Seldes and Joan Copeland will star in the upcoming Drama Dept. production of George Kelly's The Torchbearers, directed by Dylan Baker. The production will go up at the Greenwich House Theatre Feb. 8, 2000, confirmed a press spokesman.

"I hope that Marian Seldes will be a part of it and a whole lot of the Drama Dept. regulars," Baker told Playbill On-Line last summer. Baker got his wish. Seldes has been busy of late, appearing, during the past year, in a Carnegie Hall concert reading of Noel Coward's Sail Away, Irish Rep's Dear Liar, and Broadway's Ring Round the Moon.

Copeland's credits include the original production of Arthur Miller's The American Clock, The Extra Man (Obie Award) and, more recently, Over the River and Through the Woods.

George Kelly, born in 1887, flourished in the 1920's and is best known for the oft-revived The Show-Off. He won a Pulitzer Prize for his next play, Craig's Wife, about a fetishistically possessive woman. Kelly began his theatre career as a vaudeville actor and some of his experiences are no doubt reflected in his first play, The Torchbearers, a satire on amateur theatricals.

Baker's many acting credits include Tartuffe, The Common Pursuit, Eastern Standard, La Bete, Pride's Crossing and That Championship Season. He is an original member of the Drama Dept., as is his wife Becky Ann Baker (June Moon). -- By Robert Simonson