FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE (9-3-99)
Contact: Marjorie Lyons Playhouse, 318-869-5242
The opening theatre production for 1999-2000 at Centenary College's Marjorie Lyons Playhouse will be Tina Howe's Coastal Disturbances . Opening night is Sept. 23 for a two-week, seven-performance run. Performances are at 8 p.m. on Sept. 23, 24, 25, 30, and Oct. 1 and 2, with a 2 p.m. matinee on Sunday, Oct. 3.
There will be a Wednesday, Sept. 22 preview performance at 7 p.m. with tickets priced at $3. Regular tickets for performances other than the preview, cost $13 for adults; $11 for senior citizens; $8 for students; and $6 for children 12 and under.
On Friday, Sept. 24 and Friday, Oct.1, the theatre will be offering a dinner- and-theatre combination for $25, with dinner to be served in Byrnum Commons by the Marriott Food Service before the play.
The box office will open on Sept. 16, with hours from noon to 4 p.m. Reservations can be made by calling 318-869-5242.
Coastal Disturbances is being directed by Robert Buseick, a multiple Times Drama Award winner who won last season for his direction of Grand Hotel. Set and light design is by Don Hooper,costume design by Patric McWilliams, sound design by Michael Tooke. Eric Lee is assistant to the director, and Vanessa Keller will handle properties.
The cast of nine features, as the hero of the play, double TDA winner Logan Sledge as Leo Hart, the appealing, heart-throb life guard. Sledge won his Times Drama Awards for best actor in Angels in America and best supporting actor for his creation of Ariel in The Tempest. He is a senior theatre major at Centenary and has been seen in productions of Dracula, Picasso at the Lapin Agile, Blood Brothers, Grand Hotel, Period of Adjustment, subUrbia, Lost in Yonkers and God's Country.
The heroine is Holly Dancer, a photographer from New York, being created by Kacee Carter. Miss Carter has appeared at MLP in productions of Little Women and God's Country. She is a senior speech/communications major at Centenary.
The retired couple in Coastal Disturbances brings together Charlton Lyons Jr. as Dr. Hammond Adams and Geri Van Tiem as his wife, M.J. Mr. Lyons won two TDA's for his roles in The Oldest Living Graduate at Shreveport Little Theatre and The Little Foxes at Theatre One. He last appeared at MLP in Prelude to a Kiss and his original script, Under Hunter's Moon, received its world premier at Centenary.
Geri Van Tiem has received five Times Drama Award nominations and was last seen as Margaret Civil, in A Perfect Ganesh at MLP. Mr. Lyons and Ms. Van Tiem have appeared together previously in Something's Afoot and The Little Foxes.
The two mothers in the play are being created by Vanessa Keller and Emily Kirkland. Faith Bigelow, a pregnant and happy wife is being played by Emily Kirkland, a senior theatre major who received a Times Drama Award nomination for her role of Linda in Blood Brothers and appeared in the chorus of 42nd Street.
Ms. Keller will be playing Ariel Took, a divorced mother at the mercy of her exposed nerves. She was nominated for a TDA for her performance in Picasso at the Lapin Agile. She played Maggie Jones, the writer, in this past summer's production of 42nd Street and is a senior theatre major at Centenary.
The children of Faith and Ariel are being played by veteran Peter Pan Players actress Jessica Maxey, who received a TDA nomination for her role as Jimminy Cricket in PPP production of Pinocchio last season. Jessica plays Miranda Bigelow. The role of Winston Took is being played by Alex Lee. Both of these young actors are in the fourth grade. Jessica attends the Montessori School and Alex attends South Highlands Elementary Magnet for Academics and the Performing Arts.
Rounding out the cast as Andre Sor, the owner of a New York art gallery, is Jeff Hendricks, professor of English at Centenary. Dr. Hendricks has appeared in productions of The Devils, Desire Under The Elms and Tom Paine at Centenary's Marjorie Lyons Playhouse.
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