Opening is Oct. 12. Four-time Tony Award winner Jerry Zaks will direct (in alphabetical order) Matthew Arkin (MTC's Moonlight & Magnolias), Scott Cohen (MTC's Glimmer, Glimmer and Shine), Mark Linn-Baker (A Year With Frog and Toad, Zaks' …Forum), Patricia Kalember (MTC's Y2K, TV's "Sisters"), Michele Pawk (a Tony Award winner for Hollywood Arms), Ana Reeder (MTC's Sight Unseen, Humble Boy) and Jama Williamson (Off-Broadway's musical Debbie Does Dallas).
Linn-Baker (also of TV's "Perfect Strangers") replaces the previously announced Adam Arkin (it would have been the Arkin brothers' first time together in a play), and Kalember replaces the previously mentioned Jan Maxwell (Chitty Chitty Bang Bang), who had a scheduling conflict.
"How do our childhood memories affect our lives?" MTC asks. "How do the mistakes of one generation impact the next? And most importantly, why does love make us do such crazy things? Interwoven events from the past and present blend together in this wise and witty new play, as two generations of family members work things out in the same bedroom, fifty years apart."
The creative team for Losing Louie includes John Lee Beatty (scenic design), Paul Gallo (lighting design), William Ivey Long (costume design) and Dan Moses Schreier (sound design).
Visit www.ManhattanTheatreClub.com for more information. For subscription information, call (212) 399-3030, Monday-Friday, noon-8 PM with a major credit card. Subscriptions are also available online at www.ManhattanTheatreClub.com.
Single tickets ($86.25-$26.25) for Losing Louie will be available starting Aug. 21 by calling TeleCharge.com at (212) 239-6200 or at www.telecharge.com.
Starting Sept. 5, tickets will be available at the Biltmore Theatre box office (261 West 47th Street).
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Losing Louie is Mendes da Costa's second staged play. His first, Table for One, which he produced himself, was performed at the Hen & Chickens Theatre, Islington in North London in November 2001. Losing Louie started its life at Hampstead Theatre which is situated in Swiss Cottage in North London and it subsequently moved to the West End after a sell out run, breaking Hampstead Theatre's all time box office record. It played in the West End for four months, which was followed by a sell-out tour.
According to MTC notes, "The playwright originally trained as a Civil Engineer but decided to leave that behind and become an estate agent, by his own admission not one of his best decisions. He then retrained as a computer programmer before deciding to change careers once again and become an actor. He received a two-year acting diploma at the Bristol Old Vic Theatre School graduating in 1991. After a number of years working as an actor he ended up, almost by chance, attending a small writing group in Crouch End, a small suburb in North London, and for no other reason than he knew somebody who went there and rather liked them! The only way to stay part of the group was to write, so that's what he did."
Mendes da Costa was nominated for 2006's Most Promising Playwright at the Evening Standard Awards in London. He has also written two plays for children both of which were performed at the studio in Hampstead Theatre, and is currently working again with Hampstead on a new commission for the main house.
For more information, visit www.manhattantheatreclub.com.
