Keep Your Pantheon will make its world premiere in a double-bill with Mamet's Duck Variations filling in the slot originally scheduled for Waitress, May 11-June 8, 2008. Opening night is scheduled for May 18.
"We are sorry that plans for A Waitress in Yellowstone didn't materialize as expected," stated CTG artistic director Michael Ritchie in a release. "But Mamet fans need not despair; David's wit and verbal dexterity are very much on display in these works. They pack a fun and clever one-two punch."
Neil Pepe (Romance), artistic director of the Mamet-co-founded Atlantic Theatre Company, will direct the production.
Billed as "a rousing farce," the ancient Rome-set Keep Your Pantheon follows "an impoverished acting company on the edge of eviction [that] is offered a lucrative engagement and life is finally on the upswing. But through a series of riotous mishaps, the troupe finds its problems have actually multiplied, and that they are about to learn a new meaning for the term 'dying on stage.'"
Duck Variations — first presented Off-Broadway in 1976 with Sexual Perversity in Chicago — is "a sly meditation on the meaning of life [that] depicts conversations between two elderly men who are sitting on a park bench and watching ducks." A Waitress in Yellowstone was originally scheduled to premiere last season at the Douglas but was postponed at that time so Mamet could further explore casting choices. (Patti LuPone had been mentioned as a possible star.) Come Back, Little Sheba replaced the work last season.
Season ticket holders may use their A Waitress in Yellowstone tickets for the newly nnounced presentation. Single tickets for the two plays will go on sale in February 2008.
Tickets to shows at The Kirk Douglas Theatre, 9820 Washington Blvd. in Culver City, CA, can be purchased by calling CTG Audience Services at (213) 628-2772 or online at CenterTheatreGroup.org.