The sights and sounds of Italy alight in Arlington's Crystal City as Arena Stage presents the lush and soaring The Light in the Piazza, directed by Arena Stage Artistic Director Molly Smith. The Light in the Piazza, based on the novel by ElizaBeth Spencer, was written by Craig Lucas (Broadway's Prelude to a Kiss) with music and lyrics by Adam Guettel (Off-Broadway's Floyd Collins). Hailed as one of the best of the decade for its "superior achievement in the classical mold of musical theater" (New York Times), the musical explores the essence of love and its triumph across cultures. The Light in the Piazza runs March 5 - April 11, 2010 at Arena Stage in Crystal City. The press opening performance is Thursday, March 11, 2010.
"I love this musical because it asks hard questions," shares Smith. "How far will a mother go to get what her child wants and needs? Are there limits to family love? How should we judge someone: for what they are or for what they could become? This show goes to the core of who we are as human beings and uncovers the human condition in all of its complexity."
Hollis Resnik, who recently won her second Sarah Siddons Society Chicago's Leading Lady Award for her role as little Edie/Edith in Grey Gardens, leads a cast of 11 as the devoted matriarch Margaret Johnson. She is joined by Margaret Anne Florence (Off-Broadway's The Fantasticks) and Nicholas Rodriguez (Broadway's Tarzan and the upcoming film Sex and the City 2) as the young lovers Clara Johnson and Fabrizio Naccarelli.
The Light in the Piazza follows the story of Margaret Johnson and her daughter, Clara, who are touring Italy in the early 1950s. One windy day, Clara loses her hat in a sudden gust of wind, and as if guided by fate, it lands at the feet of the handsome Fabrizio. As their whirlwind courtship unfolds, Margaret struggles to conceal a family secret that may put an end to Clara's happiness as well as her own.
The Broadway production of The Light in the Piazza opened April 18, 2005 and ran for just over a year at Lincoln Center Theater. It garnered 11 Tony Nominations and six Tony Awards including Best Score. Its success led to a national tour the following year. In 2008, Guettel revised the musical and created a chamber version, scaling down the fifteen-piece orchestra to a five-to six-piece ensemble. The new version, which "not only makes this transition with grace, it positively thrives" (Variety), premiered at the Weston Playhouse in Vermont. The Arena Stage production will feature a five-piece ensemble of harp, violin, bass and cello led by Music Director Paul Sportelli on piano.
"When I heard The Light in the Piazza was being reworked as a chamber version I knew I wanted to bring it to Arena Stage," continues Smith. "Each voice and each instrument is individualized, which makes the beautiful story even more raw and human."
"This is one of the most romantic musical theater scores ever written," said Sportelli. "It is inflected with opera, classical and Italian popular music yet is fused into a completely unique and original whole. It shimmers, it thrills and it soars. The music reaches out to you."
Adam Guettel (Music & Lyrics) is an artist in residence at Intiman Theater, Seattle. His newest musical, The Light in the Piazza, opened on Broadway in 2005, following a world premiere at Intiman in 2003 and a run at Goodman Theatre in 2004 (three Jeff Awards, incl. Best Musical). The Light in the Piazza won six Tonys (incl. Best Original Score, Best Orchestrations) and five Drama Desk Awards (incl. Best Music, Best Orchestrations). He wrote music and lyrics for Floyd Collins, which won a Lortel Award for Best Musical and an Obie for Best Music. Floyd Collins has been seen at Playwrights Horizons, New York; Prince Theatre, Philadelphia; Goodman Theatre, Chicago; Old Globe, San Diego; Bridewell, London; and elsewhere. His other works include Love's Fire, written with John Guare for The Acting Company, and Saturn Returns, a concert at NYSF. Saturn Returns was recorded under the title Myths and Hymns. Four of Mr. Guettel's songs appear on Audra McDonald's 1998 album, Way Back to Paradise, and two more on her 2000 album, How Glory Goes (incl. the title track). Film scores include Arguing the World, a documentary by Joe Dorman, and Jack, a CBS documentary by Peter Davis. Accolades for Mr. Guettel include the Stephen Sondheim Award (1990), ASCAP New Horizons Award (1997), and American Composers Orchestra Award (2005).
Craig Lucas' (Book) plays include Missing Persons, Blue Window, Reckless, God's Heart, The Dying Gaul, Stranger, Small Tragedy, Prayer for My Enemy and The Singing Forest. He co-wrote the musical Three Postcards (with Craig Carnelia) and the operas Orpheus in Love (with Gerald Busby) and Two Boys (with Nico Muhly), commissioned by the Metropolitan Opera. His English adaptations include Brecht's Galileo, Chekhov's Three Sisters and Uncle Vanya, and Strindberg's Miss Julie. His screenplays include Longtime Companion (Sundance Audience Award), The Secret Lives of Dentists (N.Y. Film Critics Best Screenplay), Prelude to a Kiss, Reckless and The Dying Gaul, which he directed. Onstage he directed Harry Kondoleon's Saved or Destroyed (Obie, Best Director) and Play Yourself as well as his own This Thing of Darkness (written with David Schulner). Twice nominated for a Tony (Prelude to a Kiss; The Light in the Piazza), three times for a Drama Desk (Prelude; Missing Persons; Reckless), he won the L.A. Drama Critics Award (Blue Window), Steinberg/ATCA for Best American Play (The Singing Forest), Hull-Warriner Award (The Light in the Piazza), Lambda Literary Award (the anthology What I Meant Was), Flora Roberts Award, American Academy of Arts & Letters' Excellence in Literature Award, Laura Pels/PEN Mid-Career Achievement Award, and Joan Cullman Award; he twice won the Obie for Best Play (Prelude; Small Tragedy).
Molly Smith (Director, Artistic Director) has been a passionate leader in new-play development for the past 30 years, while at Arena Stage as well as at Perseverance Theatre in Alaska, the theater she founded and led for 19 years. During 10 seasons as Arena's artistic director, she's focused the repertory on American voices, making Arena the largest theater in America focusing on American artists. Ms. Smith has commissioned or championed numerous world premieres, including Paula Vogel's Pulitzer Prize-winning How I Learned to Drive and Mineola Twins; Tim Acito's The Women of Brewster Place; Moisés Kaufman's 33 Variations; Charles Randolph-Wright's Blue; Zora Neale Hurston's lost American play Polk County; Karen Zacarias' Legacy of Light; and Passion Play, a cycle by Sarah Ruhl, some of which she has directed. She founded Arena's downstairs series, which has read or workshopped some 60 plays, half of which have gone on to full productions. In 2009, two shows nurtured at Arena Stage (33 Variations and Next to Normal) moved to Broadway. Her directorial work has also been seen at the Shaw Festival in Canada, Berkeley Repertory Theatre, Trinity Repertory Company, Tarragon Theatre in Toronto, and Centaur Theatre in Montreal, and includes classics such as South Pacific, Mack and Mabel, Anna Christie and Cat on a Hot Tin Roof. She has served as literary advisor to Sundance Theatre Lab and formed the Arena Stage Writers Council, composed of leading American Playwrights. An avid traveler, Ms. Smith brings artists of international renown to work at Arena Stage and serves as a member of the board of Theatre Communications Group as well as the Center for InterNational Theatre Development. She directed two feature films, Raven's Blood and Making Contact, and received honorary doctorates from both Towson Univ. and American Univ.
