Spotlight Newsletter - September 2009

Our Season debuts on September 18 with
Moonlight and Magnolias by Ron Hutchinson
Three men + one woman ÷ some bananas and peanuts × a novel = ONE FAMOUS SCRIPT
Daily News said—Frankly, My Dear, this is one funny play!

While we are celebrating the birth of our new name Twin City Stage, we are also celebrating 75 years of continuous high quality theatre here in Winston-Salem. The Little Theatre of Winston-Salem was presenting its third season of plays when The Wizard of Oz and Gone With the Wind premiered in 1939! Here in Winston-Salem our members and volunteers were staging Fly Away Home, which had starred Montgomery Clift on Broadway in 1935, as these classic films debuted across the country. This makes Moonlight and Magnolias a special comedy to open this season. We get to meet 1930’s movie legends, David O. Selznick (producer of Gone With the Wind) and Victor Fleming (the legendary film director of The Wizard of Oz and Gone With the Wind.) It is ten days into filming, the burning of Atlanta has just been completed, and the script just won’t work! In comes Hollywood screen writer Ben Hecht to help save the day. Our cast features local favorites, Anthony Liguori, Chad Edwards and Don Gunther, with Cheryl Ann Roberts as Selznick’s hilarious secretary. This is all under the direction of Stan Bernstein whose comedies have all been huge crowd pleasers. This is a wonderful and elegant comedy you won’t want to miss. Tickets are available for members beginning Tuesday Sept 8 and for the public Monday Sept 14.
Tickets are priced $ 18 - 22 for performances Sept 18 - 20 and 24 - 27.
Don’t miss this side splitting tribute to the glory days of Hollywood.
The season continues with:
Smoke on the Mountain
Homecoming
AUDITIONS September 14
Performances
November 6 – 22, 2009
25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee
AUDITIONS November 16
Performances
January 29 – February 7, 2010
All Shook Up
AUDITIONS January 11
Performances
March 12 – 28, 2010
Dixie Swim Club
AUDITIONS April 12
Performances
May 28 – June 6, 2010

We hope you will join us for all of these great shows—ALL NEW TITLES FOR US!
Smoke on the Mountain Homecoming is the third and final episode in our popular Sanders Family Story, sure to delight all of their fans as well as newcomers to the family. You will recall that daughter, June Sanders, was engaged at the end of Sanders Family Christmas—well now she’s expecting—and still signing! We are indeed privileged to be selected as the first community theatre in the nation to produce the 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee! This wonderful musical comedy just closed on Broadway last year and was the winner of two Tony Awards including best book for a musical! And, at each performance members of the audience will have the chance to match skills with these precocious spellers. We are also presenting the area premiere of the Broadway hit—All Shook Up. The music is all Elvis, but the story is all NEW. You’ll be dancing in the aisles with this hit musical comedy. Season ticket holders get a $25 savings over individual tickets at a bargain price of $85—discounted to $75 for seniors over 62 and full time students.

OTHER EVENTS:
An exciting season is just getting started with an air of celebration and collaboration we plan to continue for the whole season. We have our season kick-off party set for Friday Sept 11 at the Millennium Center celebrating our 75th Season with a tribute to Hollywood Glamour. Look for other grand party events during the season as well. Also, we are just beginning rehearsals for the first of two New Horizons Events. First up is the Pulitzer Prize winning play The Shadow Box, which I will be directing and coordinating with the Hospice and Palliative Care Center. The play introduces us to three families in hospice care and is gentle, loving, filled with hope and liberally peppered with humor. The audience will fall in love with three new old friends and their families. The three are attended and visited by family and close friends: Agnes and her mother Felicity, estranged further by the latter's dementia; Brian and Beverly whose martial complications are exacerbated by Brian's new lover, Mark; and Joe and Maggie, unready for the strain of Joe's impending death and it's effect on their teenage son. It is a work the New York Times called “an extraordinarily good Broadway play.” We are also continuing our collaboration with the Children’s Theatre of Winston-Salem on the thrilling Blue’s Clues Live! which has been licensed to us by Nickelodeon for local production. As we celebrate our rich and impressive heritage we are also celebrating many new and exciting ventures ahead and we are thrilled to have you along for the ride!

We welcome a new Director of Sales and Marketing!
According to Twin City Stage’s new Marketing Director, Laura Ward, she has THE MOST WONDERFUL JOB in the world! “My job is magical because I work in a world of make believe and pretend. Live theatre is like the circus, the show must go on and my job is to tell people how amazing Twin City Stage and the Children’s Theatre are and bring in audiences who are as excited about our shows as we are,” said Ward. A veteran marketing and public relations specialist, Ward has worked as a writer and publicist for several of the region’s most respected advertising agencies, as well as area non-profits and professional theatre companies. “My passion and joy comes from hearing the laughter of a live audience and watching the incredible interaction and talent of the actors,” explained Ward. “Our society is so busy texting and tweeting, that to see people come together and step away from the outside world into a world of make-believe gives me chills. It restores my faith that mankind’s imagination and creativity is alive and vibrant.” When she’s not “playing “ at her job, Ward lives a life that mirrors the old TV show, Wild Kingdom and is more colorful than any Broadway play. A dyed-in-the-wool farm girl, Doris Day wanna-a-be and possibly the world’s oldest living tomboy, she artfully wrangles ten dogs, three horses, two rabbits, a bird and a boyfriend—and somehow remains unflappable. Ward laughs, “When I was eight years old I told my mother I wanted to be an animal trainer, ride a horse, and live in a magical kingdom with a handsome prince…and guess what, I DO!”

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