Leslie Kritzer Joins World Premiere of every tongue confess at Arena Stage

By Kenneth Jones
03 Sep 2010

Leslie Kritzer
Leslie Kritzer

Broadway's Leslie Kritzer will play Bernadette in the Arena Stage world premiere of Marcus Gardley's every tongue confess, starring the previously announced Phylicia Rashad, under the direction of Kenny Leon.

Performances will play Arena's new home in Washington, DC, Nov. 9, 2010-Jan. 2, 2011. Tony Award winner Rashad (of Broadway's A Raisin the Sun, Cat on a Hot Tin Roof) will play Mother Sister/Sophia. Leon directed Broadway's Fences and A Raisin the Sun and Radio Golf.

Here's how every tongue confess is billed: "In the backwater town of Boligee, Alabama, the summer heat is rising higher, driving the townsfolk to distraction and conjuring the spirits of the past to walk the earth. Wrapped in the combustible music of a Deep South juke joint and the sweat-soaked gospel of a revivalist church tent, intergenerational stories of loss and redemption collide. Playwright Gardley blends ancient myth with magical realism, Biblical allegory with the local TV news to create a fiery theatrical furnace in which some will be saved, some will be purged and the truth cannot escape."

The company also includes Jason Dirden as Shadrack, Crystal Fox as Sister/Reporter, Autumn Hurlbert as Benny Pride, Jim Ireland as Stocker Pride, John Earl Jelks as Blacksmith/Bobb, Eugene Lee as Brother/Jeremiah and E. Roger Mitchell as Deacon/Tidings.

Kritzer was most recently seen on Broadway in Sondheim on Sondheim. She appeared in the new musical The Memory Show for Barrington Stage Company this summer. Her other Broadway credits include A Catered Affair (Drama Desk nominee), Legally Blonde (Clarence Derwent Award for Most Promising Performer) and Hairspray. She received critical acclaim and a Time Out New York award for her Joe's Pub run of Leslie Kritzer is Patti LuPone at Les Mouches.

The new 200-seat Arlene and Robert Kogod Cradle Theater in Arena's new Mead Center for the American Theatre will house every tongue confess.

Visit arenastage.org.