DONALD MARGULIES’S

PULITZER PRIZE-WINNING

DINNER WITH FRIENDS

MAKES AREA PREMIERE AT OLNEY

AUGUST 25 – SEPTEMBER 26

(OLNEY, MD) No one ever said marriage was easy, as Donald Margulies’s Pulitzer Prize-winning Dinner With Friends reveals.

Dinner With Friends plays the Mulitz-Gudelsky Theatre Lab August 25 through September 26.  Tickets are $26 to $54, with discounts available to groups, seniors, military, and students.  Call the Box Office at 301.924.3400 or visit olneytheatre.org for tickets and information.  In addition, Olney offers several special performances that include sign interpretation, audio description, and post-show discussions. 

Playwright Donald Margulies has been quoted as calling Dinner With Friends “a rueful comedy.”  The story is not just a thoughtful study on divorce, but a turbulent meditation on the minefield of middle age.  Gabe and Karen, a happily married couple, have been friends with Tom and Beth for many years.  While having dinner at Gabe and Karen's home one night, Beth tearfully reveals that she is getting a divorce from Tom, who has been unfaithful.  Over the course of the play, the audience is witness to the effects of Tom and Beth's breakup on Gabe and Karen, who first feel compelled to choose sides, and then begin to question the strength of their own seemingly tranquil marriage.  The play exposes the same, universal insecurities that people face every time there are shattering changes in their lives.  According to The Orange County Register, Dinner With Friends “will have audiences nodding in recognition of the emotions on display in every scene.”

Olney Theatre Center has been the producer or co-producer of all of Margulies’s professional area premieres, including Collected Stories, Sight Unseen, and most recently, Brooklyn Boy.  Margulies was most recently represented on Broadway with Collected Stories and Time Stands Still, for which he received a Tony Award nomination for Best Play.

The cast for Dinner With Friends consists of the following Olney audience favorites:

Julie-Ann Elliott (Karen) marks her 24th performance at Olney Theatre Center, including productions with Potomac Theatre Project and Summer Shakespeare.  Favorite roles include Constance Middleton in The Constant Wife, Molly in The Mousetrap, Hedda in Hedda Gabler, M in Crave, Hannah in Arcadia, Elmire in Tartuffe, and Jesse Mae in The Trip to Bountiful.  Locally, she has performed with Everyman Theatre, Folger Theatre, The Kennedy Center, Rep Stage, The Shakespeare Theatre Company, Theater J, Washington Stage Guild, Horizon’s, Metro Stage, and Washington Jewish Theatre.  Ms. Elliott also narrates books for Potomac Talking Book Services, Inc., and does industrials and voice-overs.  She holds an MFA in Acting from The Catholic University of America and was a National Player on Tour 44.

Paul Morella (Gabe) has appeared at Olney Theatre Center in A Passion For Justice, The Millionaires, Rabbit Hole, The Mousetrap, Brooklyn Boy, Sight Unseen, Private Lives, Coffee with Richelieu, The Laramie Project, The Rivals, Becket, Broken Glass, M. Butterfly, and The Time of Your Life.  Other regional appearances include leading roles at Folger Theatre, Woolly Mammoth Theatre Company, Arena Stage, Signature Theater, Shakespeare Theatre Company, The Studio Theater, Round House Theatre, Potomac Theatre Project, Theatre J, Everyman Theatre, Rep Stage and The Kennedy Center.  He can also be heard as George in All My Sons (with Julie Harris and James Farentino) and Joe Cantwell in The Best Man (with Fred Thompson and Marsha Mason) for LA Theater Works.  He will bee seen late this season at Olney Theatre Center performing in his version of A Christmas Carol by Charles Dickens.

Jeffries Thaiss (Tom) returns to Olney, where his credits include Trumpery, The Glass Menagerie, Is He Dead?, The Underpants, The Mousetrap, Democracy, 13 Rue de L’Amour, An Enemy of the People, Hedda Gabler, The Heiress, Saint Joan, Carousel, Piaf (with Potomac Theatre Project), Anna Karenina, Monster, Candida, She Loves Me, and Holiday.  His other regional credits include shows at Seattle Repertory Theatre, Cincinnati Playhouse in the Park, The Repertory Theatre of St. Louis, Shakespeare Theatre Company, Syracuse Stage, The Kennedy Center, Portland Stage Company, Great Lakes Theatre Festival, Cape Playhouse, Ogunquit Playhouse, Idaho Shakespeare Festival, Triad Stage, Virginia Musical Theatre, and New London Barn Playhouse, among others.  Jeffries’ television credits include As the World Turns and One Life to Live. Member: Actors’ Equity Association.

Peggy Yates (Beth) happily returns to Olney where she has appeared as Madame Caron in Is He Dead?, Lydia in Omnium Gatherum, and Lydia Languish in The Rivals (all directed by Halo Wines) as well as Peter Pan, Oliver!, Hayfever, Man of La Mancha, and She Loves Me.  She has also performed locally in many productions at Ford’s Theatre, The Kennedy Center, Arena Stage, Rep Stage, and Metro Stage, among others.  A two time Helen Hayes Award nominee, Peggy has toured nationally and performed abroad.  Television appearances include numerous commer­cials and television credits including the recurring role of Maria Delgado on Homicide.  A National Players veteran, she holds an MFA in Acting from The Catholic University of America.

Dinner With Friends is directed by Olney’s Artistic Director, Jim Petosa.  In addition, the creative team includes James Kronzer (Scenic Designer), Howard Vincent Kurtz (Costume Designer), Dan Wagner (Lighting Designer), Christopher Baine (Sound Designer), and Josiane M. Lemieux (Stage Manager).

NATIONAL PLAYERS’

FREE SUMMER SHAKESPEARE

RETURNS WITH

A MIDSUMMER NIGHT’S DREAM

AUGUST 27 AND 28 ONLY

(OLNEY, MD) Olney Theatre Center continues its 21st annual Summer Shakespeare Festival with National Players’ new production of A Midsummer Night’s Dream.

A Midsummer Night’s Dream plays the Root Family Stage at Will’s Place Friday, August 27 and Saturday, August 28 at 8 p.m.  These outdoor performances are free to the public; reservations are highly recommended.  For reservations or more information, call Olney’s Box Office at 301.924.3400.  Lawn chairs and blankets are encouraged.  A limited number of bleacher seats are available.  Please see the Fact Sheet for more details.

National Players’ production offers a fresh twist on the setting, making it relevant to today’s fast-moving, electronic media saturated world.  The woods glow in the dark and fairies dance to electronica, setting the scene for the wonderful and silly vagaries of love. 

A Midsummer Night’s Dream is directed by Olney’s Associate Artistic Director, Clay Hopper.  Hopper most recently directed the critically acclaimed production of Triumph of Love this season on Olney’s Mainstage.  He has been directing National Players and Olney’s Summer Shakespeare Festival since 2003.  In 2002, he founded and produced a new play series called New Works/After Hours at Lincoln Center Institute’s Clarke Studio Theatre.

Since 1989, Olney Theatre Center’s National Players has produced Summer Shakespeare, with the purpose of bringing plays of a classical nature to regional audiences in outdoor venues.  The Summer Shakespeare Festival develops a new appreciation for “The Bard” by presenting classical dramas and comedies to families in a relaxed outdoor setting.

Click here for more season information