Jeffrey DeMunn, Jayne Atkinson and Frank Converse have been confirmed for the cast of the Westport Country Playhouse revival of Thornton Wilder's Our Town. They join the already-announced Paul Newman and Jane Curtin. James Naughton will direct the starry group.
The production will run June 5-22.
Curtin will play one of the four parents of the story's central teenage sweethearts. Beyond "Saturday Night Live," Curtin is known for the sitcoms "Kate & Allie" and "Third Rock from the Sun" and an occasional stage turn in plays such as Love Letters.
DeMunn last appeared on the Broadway stage in The Price (also directed by Naughton). Atkinson was a guest of WCP in 2002, when she acted in Triangles for Two by David Wiltse. Soon after that, she won a Tony nomination for The Rainmaker on Broadway. Converse recently finished a run in Mercy of a Storm, a new play by Jeffrey Hatcher, at the City Theatre in Pittsburgh, PA.
Newman and his wife Joanne Woodward—who happens to be the artistic director at Westport—were featured in the sold-out 2000 Westport engagement of Ancestral Voices. At the time, Woodward told the New York Times that the sight of Newman on the Westport stage without a script in his hands (in Gurney's play, the actors read from the text) was an unlikely prospect. Newman must have reconsidered since then. The famous film actor ("Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid," "The Hustler") will play the Stage Manager. *
The 2002 Westport County Theatre season will conclude with a musical by lyricist-librettist Dick Vosburgh and composer Denis King, A Saint She Ain't.
The tuner, which will run Aug. 28-Sept. 14, will enjoy its U.S. premiere at Westport. Eric Hill will direct the "Hollywood inspired musical" in which each character is based on renowned Tinseltown figures, such as Mae West and W.C. Fields. The play, roughly based on Moliere's Le Cocu Imaginaire, concerns a couple of young lovers who mistakenly believe the other is being untrue.
A Saint She Ain't debuted at the UK's King's Head Theatre a couple seasons back and then transferred to the West End. Vosburgh and King's other shows include Stepping Out and Poppy.
The show is a co-production with the Berkshire Theatre Festival, where it will debut.
In between the Thornton Wilder play and the musical will come new productions of The Voice of the Turtle by John Van Druten and Master Harold...and the boys by Athol Fugard, as well as Outward Bound by Sutton Vane, which will be helmed by Doug Hughes. In this comedy, seven passengers take a cruise and are afforded plenty of time to discover each other's characters.
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The season runs as follows:
• The Voice of the Turtle by John Van Druten, June 26-July 13.
• Master Harold...and the boys by Athol Fugard, directed by Walter Dallas, July 17-Aug. 3.
• Outward Bound by Sutton Vane, directed by Doug Hughes, Aug. 7 24.
• A Saint She Ain't by Dick Vosburgh and Denis King, directed by Eric Hill, Aug. 28-Sept. 14
Season subscriptions are available through May 10. For subscription information call (203) 227-4177. Single tickets go on sale at the box office 10 AM May 28.
