59E59 Hosts Godlight Theatre Company's Fahrenheit 451

59E59 Theaters (Elysabeth Kleinhans, Artistic Director; Peter Tear, Executive Producer) welcomes the return of Godlight Theatre Company and their new production, Ray Bradbury's adaptation of his cult-classic novel Fahrenheit 451, directed by Joe Tantalo. Fahrenheit 451 begins previews on Thursday, March 16 for a limited engagement through Sunday, April 23. Opening Night is Tuesday, March 21 at 8:30 PM. The performance schedule is Tuesday - Saturday at 8:30 PM and Sunday at 7:30 PM. Single tickets are $25 ($17.50 for 59E59 members) and are available by calling Ticket Central at 212-279-4200 or online at www.ticketcentral.com. For more information visit www.59E59.org.

Ray Bradbury's imaginative meditation on censorship and defiance receives it NYC premiere by Godlight Theater Company. In Bradbury's futuristic world, books are banned and television rules. Fireman set the fires, burning books along with the homes in which they were hidden. When young firefighter Guy Montag learns of a past when people were not afraid, and glimpses a future in which people can think, he realizes what he has to do to attain intellectual freedom. Adapted from his cult novel of the same name, Fahrenheit 451, according to Mr. Bradbury, "is more relevant today than it was when it was published in 1953."

Joe Tantalo (director) has been the Artistic Director of Godlight Theatre Company since 1994. Directing highlights include: The Third Man (World Premiere), A Clockwork Orange (2005 Edinburgh Festival Fringe, NY Premiere and 2003 OOBR Critic's Choice Award Winner), Principia (World Premiere Musical), Picasso at the Lapin Agile (NY Revival), The Manchurian Candidate, Pilgrims of the Night (NY Premiere), The House of Yes, Escape from Happiness, Poor Superman (NY Premiere and 2001 NYCFringe Award Winner), Unidentified Human Remains, Raised in Captivity, subUrbia, Wait Until Dark, The Exhibition: The Life of John Merrick, Theatre of the Film Noir, A Few Good Men, Soul in the Symphony of Confusion (NY Premiere), and Labor Day: A Community Struggle with AIDS (World Premiere with AIDS Project USA/Long Wharf Theatre and Contra Sida), among others. Off-Broadway: A Clockwork Orange (59E59 Theaters). Ensemble Studio Theatre: A Clockwork Orange, Only We Who Guard The Mystery Shall Be Unhappy, Curious George Goes to Class, The Adventures of Ashman, The Trial of George W., Brown, Big Al, Beds are Made to Lie In. Mr. Tantalo trained at the Shakespeare Theatre, The Circle in the Square and the Kennedy Center. He was named Director of the Year (2002) by nytheatre.com.

Ray Bradbury's (playwright) formal education ended when he graduated from high school in Los Angeles in 1938. He began selling newspapers on L.A. street corners from 1938 to 1942, spending his nights in the public library and his days at the typewriter. He became a full-time writer in 1943, and contributed numerous short stories to periodicals before publishing a collection of them, Dark Carnival, in 1947. His reputation as a writer of courage and vision was established with the publication of The Martian Chronicles in 1950. In 1953, Fahrenheit 451, which many consider to be Bradbury's masterpiece, a scathing indictment of censorship set in a future world where the written word is forbidden. Other works include The October Country, Dandelion Wine, A Medicine for Melancholy, Something Wicked This Way Comes, I Sing the Body Electric!, Quicker Than the Eye, and Driving Blind. In all, Bradbury has published more than thirty books, close to 600 short stories, and numerous poems, essays, and plays.

Ray Bradbury has been awarded the O. Henry Memorial Award, the Benjamin Franklin Award, the World Fantasy Award for Lifetime Achievement, the Grand Master Award from the Science Fiction Writers of America, the PEN Center USA West Lifetime Achievement Award, among others. In November 2000, the National Book Foundation Medal for Distinguished Contribution to American Letters was conferred upon Mr. Bradbury at the 2000 National Book Awards Ceremony in New York City.

Ray Bradbury has never confined his vision to the purely literary. He has been nominated for an Academy Award (for his animated film Icarus Montgolfier Wright), and has won an Emmy Award (for his teleplay of The Halloween Tree). He adapted sixty-five of his stories for television's Ray Bradbury Theater. He was the creative consultant on the United States Pavilion at the 1964 New York World's Fair. In 1982, he created the interior metaphors for the Spaceship Earth display at Epcot Center, Disney World, and later contributed to the conception of the Orbitron space ride at Euro-Disney, France.

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