The Dinner Party, Neil Simon's latest play, which opened June 22 at the Kennedy Center -- following previews that began June 17 -- will come to Broadway in the fall, reported the New York Times. Producers Emanuel Azenberg, in association with Ira Pittelman and Gordon Davidson, will move the play in October, according to the paper.
Azenberg's office would not confirm the accuracy of the Times piece and referred calls to a press agent, who was not immediately available.
John Ritter (of TV's "Three's Company") and Henry Winkler (of TV's "Happy Days"), who starred in the play's Center Theatre Group world premiere in Los Angeles in December 1999, repeat their roles in DC. Also at the table are Len Cariou (Sweeney Todd), Veanne Cox (The Food Chain, Company), Penny Fuller (Applause) and Anette Michelle Sanders. Sanders and Cox also repeat their L.A. roles.
John Rando recreates his December 1999 L.A. staging. Simon's 31st play is set in Paris at an upscale gourmet restaurant where a party is being thrown by a well-known divorce lawyer. Two tuxedoed strangers meet, and are joined by a third, confused guest. Ex-wives soon enter.
Lloyd Rose of The Washington Post, in her review, said it was "Neil Simon in new, dangerous terriory" and called the work "laugh out loud funny" and "Simon's emotionally richest play." John Rando's direction "gracefully glides the evening to its sweet yet mournful ending." Performances continue to July 16 in DC. The Dinner Party is produced by The Center Theatre Group/Mark Taper Forum in Los Angeles, where Gordon Davidson is artistic director and producer.
Designers are John Lee Beatty (set), Jane Greenwood (costumes), Brian MacDevitt (lighting) and Jon Gottlieb (sound).
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The Dinner Party had its world premiere Dec. 2, 1999, at the Mark Taper Forum in Los Angeles. The comedy on marital and romantic themes, set in a private dining room of a chic Parisian restaurant, continued to Jan. 16, and rewrites by the author were said to have continued through the week of Christmas last year.
The L.A. cast included Frances Conroy (The Little Foxes), Cox, Edward Herrmann (Psychopathia Sexualis), Ritter, Los Angeles actress Sanders and Winkler.
Simon is also once again represented in New York, where his Hotel Suite one-acts just opened at Off-Broadway's Gramercy Theatre. Other Simon works include Broadway Bound, Biloxi Blues, Brighton Beach Memoirs and Lost in Yonkers.
Tickets are $20-$65. For Kennedy Center information, call (202) 467 4600 or (800) 444-1324.
