Nebraska Repertory announces summer dates

Advertising brochure for the mainstage productions
Advertising brochure for the mainstage productions

Nebraska Repertory announces summer dates

calendar icon15 May 2013    

Nebraska Repertory Theatre, the Actors’ Equity Association professional theatre on the University of Nebraska–Lincoln campus, announces its performance dates for summer 2013.

Opening Night Receptions follow each opening night performance as indicated with an asterisk (*).


Season Passes and Tickets
  • Regular: $60 pass, $25 ticket
  • Faculty, staff, senior citizen, active military: $55 pass, $22 ticket
  • Students, OLLI members: $35 pass, $12 ticket

Season passes allow holders unlimited attendance to all three NRT 2013 productions and free admission to each Destinations performance. Admission for Destinations is $7 for those who do not hold a pass.

Ordering

Telephone with Visa or Mastercard: 402-472-4747 or 800-432-3231.
Mail: Lied Center Ticket Office, 301 North 12th Street, PO Box 880157, Lincoln NE 68588-0157.
Online: unl.edu/rep.


Destinations

The Destinations series welcomes back beloved NRT alumni and professional actors Ryan Johnston and Carrie Lee Patterson for one-night only performances in Howell Theatre.


Nocturne

By Adam Rapp is Ryan Johnston’s offering. It is a lyrical and often funny play about a young man’s journey to discover what life really means.
7:30 p.m., July 30

Red Line Stories

By Carrie Lee Patterson is the winner of the 2012 Frank Mosher Fiction prize. Meet over two dozen residents as they ride into the heart of Chicago.
7:30 p.m., August 6


Productions

(Descriptions below provided by Artistic Director Virginia Smith.)


Emma
Picture of actors in 'Emma'
Jessie Tidball (Emma) and Sean Schmeits (Mr. Knightly)
- Photo by Doug Smith

By Jane Austen and adapted by Jon Jory

“A few years ago it seems there were film and television versions of Jane Austen's "Emma" everywhere. I saw every one. So I was really pleased when I discovered director and playwright Jon Jory's stylish adaptation of this beloved novel. Set not far from London in fictional 1816 Highbury, we meet Emma Woodhouse, self-proclaimed matchmaker of friends and neighbors, as they pass a pleasant season of parties and courtship.

Chicago director Catherine Wiedner will be directing. Catherine is a freelance director working out of Chicago and an Associate Professor of Classical Acting and Heightened Texts at De Paul University. The cast is led by Jessie Tidball, December graduate of the Johnny Carson School, as Emma, boldly trying to find the right match for her friend Harriet Smith, played by Emily Martinez, also a recent graduate. Emma's rather careful father, Mr. Woodhouse, will be played by St. Louis A.E.A. actor, Alan Knoll (Seen in NRT productions "Jeeves Intervenes" and "Heroes"). Longtime friend of the family and mild critic of Emma's maneuverings, Mr. Knightly, will be played by Sean Schmiets ("Doubt"). Other residents who get caught in Emma's intrigues are her friends, Mr. and Mrs. Weston and their son Frank Churchill played by Dick Nielson, Sasha Dobson ("God of Carnage"), and Alexander Jeffrey ("Becky's New Car"), Mr. Elton and Mrs. Elton, played by Chicago A.E.A. actor Dan Rodden ("39 Steps" and "Becky's New Car"), and Kim Clark-Kaczmarek ("Anatomy of Gray"), and Jane Fairfax and her talkative Aunt, Miss Bates, played by Jaimie Pruden ("Church Basement Ladies") and Chet Kincaid. Needless to say, Emma is not as adroit at matchmaking as she thought she nearly fouls up several lives, including her own, on her journey to finding a new vocation.”

  • 7:30 p.m., July 11*
  • 7:30 p.m., July 12
  • 7:30 p.m., July 13
  • 7:30 p.m., July 20
  • 2:00 p.m., July 28
  • 7:30 p.m., August 1
  • 7:30 p.m., August 9

Mrs. Mannerly
Picture of actors in 'Mrs. Mannerly'
Juanita Rice (Mrs. Mannerly) and Mark McCarthy (Jeffrey)
- Photo by Doug Smith

By Jeffrey Hatcher

“One of my former students was crazy about Jeffrey Hatcher's plays and got me started with this prolific contemporary playwright. "Mrs. Mannerly" is one of my favorites. The play is, at least somewhat, autobiographical taking place in 1967 Steubenville, Ohio, Hatcher's hometown and riffing on being a brainy ten-year old who doesn't thrive in sports, or much of anything until he finds Mrs. Mannerly's "Etiquette Class."

In this comedy we meet Jeffrey, played by New York A.E.A actor, Mark McCarthy, and Helen Kirk, Mrs. Mannerly, played by A.E.A. actor Juanita Pat Rice, and her whole class of irreverent would be ladies and gentlemen, all played by McCarthy. Directed by Rob Urbinati, a freelance director and playwright based in New York City, and Director of New Play Development at Queens Theatre, we are transported into a temple of good manners, perfect posture, polite conversation, napkin folding, table setting, and ballroom dancing (most of which doesn't work out very well) where all these things become the sum of who Jeffery becomes. We last saw Rob's work in the award winning "39 Steps.”

  • 7:30 p.m., July 18*
  • 7:30 p.m., July 19
  • 7:30 p.m., July 26
  • 7:30 p.m., July 31
  • 7:30 p.m., August 3
  • 2:00 p.m., August 4
  • 7:30 p.m., August 10

Making God Laugh
Picture of actors in 'Making God Laugh'
(L-R)Becky Key Boesen (Maddie), Dan Rodden (Thomas), Melissa Epp (Ruthie, the mother), Mark McCarthy (Richard), Alan Knoll (Bill, the father)
- Photo by Doug Smith

By Sean Grennan

“’If you want to make God laugh, tell Him your plans!’ This quote attributed to Woody Allen is the engine that drives Sean Grennan's new comedy, "Making God Laugh" which I'm directing. When we first meet this nice suburban family, it's 1980, Father Bill (Alan Knoll), Mother Ruthie (Melissa Epp), and their three twenty-something children, Rick (Mark McCarthy), Tom (Dan Rodden), and Maddie (Becky Key Boesen), each knows exactly where they're headed.

Bill and Ruthie have the golden years of an empty nest and eventually grandchildren to enjoy, Rick will make his million by the time he's forty, Tom will soon be a priest with his own parish, and Maddie, already moved to New York City, will have a successful career on the Broadway stage. Through the course of the play we drop in on the family at various holidays from 1980 to 2010. Over the years things change, but people don't...until they do. And yes, God laughs... but so will you!”

  • 7:30 p.m., July 24*
  • 7:30 p.m., July 25
  • 7:30 p.m., July 27
  • 7:30 p.m., August 2
  • 7:30 p.m., August7
  • 7:30 p.m., August 8
  • 2:00 p.m., August 11