British director Christopher Luscombe will stage Coward's sophisticated comedy of manners that stars Harris (Thoroughly Modern Millie, Old Acquaintance) as family matriarch Judith Bliss and Jones (Blithe Spirit, Shadowlands and former artistic director of TACT/The Actors Company Theatre) as patriarch David Bliss. Hay Fever officially opens March 16 for a run through April 22.
The cast will also feature John Skelley and Cat Walleck as Simon and Sorel Bliss, respectively. Completing the company are Matt Sullivan, Heidi Bakke, John Catron, Charity Jones, Anna Hanson, Torsten Johnson and Barbara Bryne.
According to the Guthrie, "Hay Fever is set in the Bliss family's British country home. The eccentric Blisses — Judith (Harris), a recently retired stage actress, David (Jones), a self-absorbed novelist, and their two equally unconventional children (Skelley and Walleck) — live in a world where reality slides easily into fiction. Upon entering this world, the unfortunate weekend guests — a proper diplomat (Sullivan), a shy flapper (Bakke), an athletic boxer (Catron) and a fashionable sophisticate (Jones) — are repeatedly thrown into melodramatic scenes wherein their hosts profess emotions and react to situations that do not really exist. The resulting comedic chaos ends only when the tortured visitors tiptoe out the door."
The Hay Fever design team includes Janet Bird (set and costume design), Philip S. Rosenberg (lighting design), Reid Rejsa (sound design), D'Arcy Smith (voice and dialect Ccoach), Carla Steen (dramaturg) and Marcela Lorca (movement).
For tickets phone (612) 377-2224 or visit guthrietheater.org.