Theater Previews at Duke to Premiere The Great Game
Durham, N.C. - Theater Previews at Duke will present the world premiere production of The Great Game in Reynolds Theater on the Duke campus. The play is by D. Tucker Smith and is being developed at Duke University. Theater Previews has brought together an award-winning and experienced creative team and cast for the play, which will run Feb. 14-March 4, 2007.
Set in 1870, The Great Game is an epic story of love, betrayal, espionage and intrigue played out in the drawing rooms of London and the snow-capped peaks of Central Asia. The play mounts as Imperialist England and Tsarist Russia battle for control of the lands between Russia and India, while dark-skinned Safia battles for acceptance in a new country where appearances are everything.
The insatiable quest of 19 th century foreign powers to dominate and exploit lucrative trade routes for economic gain is as poignant and relevant today as it has been throughout history. In an eerie parallel to the geopolitics of today, the strategic importance of Afghanistan and Pakistan is at the crux of conflict, driven by greed and a deep-rooted disrespect for the world's diversity of cultures, national origins and right of self-rule.
Theater Previews is co-producing The Great Game with Tony Award-winning producer Randall Wreghitt and Jana Robbins. Theater Previews previously partnered with Wreghitt and Robbins on Little Women - The Musical and Paper Doll . Wreghitt is a producer of the current Broadway hit, Grey Gardens . Joel & Phyllis Ehrlich and Brian & Jackie Steele are associate producers.
Wilson Milam is directing The Great Game . Nominated last season for a Tony Award for his direction of The Lieutenant of Inishmore , Milam also directed Patrick Marber's Closer in San Francisco and The Wexford Trilogy at the Tricycle in London. His production of David Rabe's Hurlyburly for the Peter Hall Company at the Old Vic and Queen's theatres, London was nominated for two Olivier Awards including one for Best Play.
The playwright D. Tucker Smith is also the author of The Knockout Suit , which was a finalist in the Samuel French Short Play Competition, and Overnight Delivery and Patriot Act , both finalists in the New York City 15-Minute Play Festival. The playwright will be active in both the production process and in related academic activities on campus.
Tony Award nominee ( The Pajama Game ) Derek McLane designed the sets for The Great Game . Greg Gale designed costumes. Both of these Broadway designers have worked at Duke on previous Theater Previews productions: McLane as set designer on Little Women , and Gale as assistant costume designer on Birdy . Ben Stanton is the lighting designer, Peter Fitzgerald, sound designer, Josh Marquette, hair designer and J. David Brimmer is fight director.
Michael O'Hagan plays Sir Henry Rawlinson. Originally from Dublin, Ireland, O'Hagan has appeared in London at such theaters as the National in Peter Gill's The Murderers , the Young Vic in Corialanus , the Whitehall in Chekhov's Three Sisters , the Bush in numerous plays and Billy Roche's award-winning trilogy The Wexford Trilogy at the Tricycle in London and the Abbey Theatre, Dublin, directed by Wilson Milam. He also appeared at the Tricycle, London, in the highly acclaimed John Bull's Other Island, and in Bloody Sunday , which won the Lawrence Olivier Award. Filmgoers will know him from Arnold Schwarzenegger's End of Days, the Oscar-winning film Gods and Monsters , Speed 2, HBO's Havana's Nocturne with Andy Garcia, Dead Man on Campus , Midnight in The Garden of Good and Evil , Restoration and Shadow of The Cobra . His long list of television roles includes The Visitor, Nightman, Johnny Harris in Eastenders, Coronation Street, Darling Buds of May , Startrek -Enterprise , and he has recently finished the mini series for Hallmark, Marco Polo.
Lois Markle plays Charlotte Hayward in The Great Game . She has appeared on Broadway in True West ; The Grapes of Wrath ; Something Old, Something New ; A Warm Body and Calculated Risk . She appeared in the national tours of Three Tall Women , One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest , Present Laughter , Fair Game and Fifth Season . Ms. Markle has extensive experience in Off-Broadway productions such as Curse of the Starving Class , The Wakefield Trilogy , Measure for Measure , Camino Real and After the Prize and in Regional Theater all over the country as well. She has also appeared in films such as Torn Between Two Lovers, The Sporting Club and Breaking Up and in numerous television shows such as The Sopranos , Sex and The City , Law and Order, American Playhouse, ABC Playbreak and NYPD Blue.
Anjali Bhimani plays the role of Safia Hayward. She was most recently seen as Evie in the U.S. premiere of The American Pilot at Manhattan Theatre Club. Her Broadway credits include Rani in Bombay Dreams and Myrrha and others in Mary Zimmerman's Metamorphoses. Off Broadway she has been in The Notebooks of Leonardo Da Vinci, Portraits , Pentecost and Tony Kushner's adaptation of Hans Krasa's Brundibar . She has appeared in many other theaters across the country, and her television and film credits include The Sopranos , Law and Order: Special Victims' Unit and the film The Medicine Show.
David Bishins , who plays Edward Hayward, has appeared in such Off-Broadway productions as Anais Nin, One of Her Lives ; A Mother, a Daughter and a Gun; Sympathetic Magic (Obie Award best play); Bad Girls ; The Nest ; Boys in the Band; Cacodemon King ; Tower of Evil and Midsummer Night's Dream . He has appeared in many regional productions as well, such as Rag and Bone, A Month in the Country , As Bees in Honey Drown , Arcadia, The Dybbuk, Reckless and A Christmas Carol . His film and television credits include The War Within , The American Revolution , Law and Order and many daytime dramas.
Christopher Burns plays Robert Shaw. He appeared in the London production and US Tour of Stones in His Pockets , and his New York and regional credits include Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf? , A Question of Mercy , Fool for Love , Satisfy Me , The Lady from the Sea , The Crucible , Beyond Recognition , Night of the Iguana , The Glass Menagerie and many more. Internationally, Christopher has appeared in Extremeties at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival. His film credits include A Perfect Christmas , The Accountant and Clown Karma, and he has appeared on television in Law and Order and Law and Order SVU and several daytime dramas.
Heather Collins (Molly, Candace Barr and Pearl) is a junior theater major at Duke. After transferring from the University of Colorado last fall, she made her Duke debut in House of Desires . She hails from Colorado, where she appeared in Twelfth Night (Viola), Romeo and Juliet (Lady Capulet), Macbeth (Lady Macbeth), Othello (Desdamona) and A Midsummer Night's Dream ( Helena) for the Boulder Shakespeare Festival Green. She has also appeared in The Vagina Monologues , Goodnight Desdamona (Goodmorning Juliet) (Desdamona), Vinegar Tom (Margery) and Aria Da Capo (Columbine), among others.
Marcus Dean Fuller plays George Hayward. He most recently appeared as Mr. Darcy in the Shakespeare Theatre of New Jersey's new adaptation of Pride and Prejudice and in the Off-Broadway productions of Coriolanus and Julius Caesar . He originated the role of Lee Blanchard in the Yale Repertory Theater American Premiere of The Black Dahlia . He has many other regional credits as well, and his television credits include: Law and Order , Charmed and MTV's Undressed . He has appeared in the feature films Paperdolls and Ocean Park and has just finished production on the upcoming features After Midnight and Once Upon a Film.
Bobby Steggert plays Martin Hayward. His New York credits include Master Harold...and the boys (Broadway), Wallace Shawn's The Music Teacher (The New Group), columbinus (New York Theater Workshop) and A Christmas Carol (Madison Square Garden). He has also appeared across the country and abroad in Shakespeare's R&J in St. Louis , The Cripple of Inishmaan in Milwaukee , Brighton Beach Memoirs in Salt Lake City and Twelfth Night and Hamlet in London. His film and TV work includes For Richer or Poorer, Game 6, Kinsey, All My Children and a supporting role in The Namesake , opening in theaters this March. This spring, he will star alongside Audra McDonald in 110 in the Shade on Broadway.
Yvonne Woods plays Pru Sidwell. She has appeared in regional productions of Miss Julie , Franny's Way, Left, Goodnight Children Everywhere , Henry Flamethrowa, Les Liaisons Dangereuses, The General From America , Life's A Dream , Slag Heap and Forbidden Christmas or The Doctor and The Patient (with Mikhail Baryshnikov, national and international tour including Lincoln Center Festival, The Kennedy Center, Spoleto Festival). She also appeared in the film If You Could Say It In Words and on Law & Order: Criminal Intent.
"We couldn't be more delighted with the cast," says Zannie Giraud Voss, producing director at Duke. "These artists will bring a wealth of talent to the Duke community and Triangle audiences, and our Duke student interns will get to work with these outstanding artists on the creation of another exciting new work for the American theater.
"The Great Game is a play whose universal themes of imperialism, racism, greed and forbidden love resonate now more than ever," says Voss. "The play is a rare and compelling work of art."
Theater Previews at Duke's mission is to serve as a breeding ground for professional, innovative and high quality new plays and musicals, and to offer audiences the opportunity to engage in productions in a variety of stages of development. The presence of the playwright is an essential part of the program. Theater Previews provides the personnel, space, time and support required to bring his or her vision to fruition in the course of producing work that makes a contribution to the field on a national scale.
The Great Game is made possible by the generous support of the Mary Duke Biddle Foundation, the Thomas S. Kenan Foundation, Inc., the Duke University Office of the Dean of Arts and Sciences, the Duke University Office of the President, the Duke MALS Program, The Forest Apartments, the Washington Duke Inn and Golf Club and Carolina Meadows Retirement Community.
Tickets are on sale for the production at University Box Office (919-684-4444, www.tickets.duke.edu). Prices range from $18 to $30, with discounts for students and groups.
www.duke.edu/web/theaterstudies.
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