Photo Flash Exclusive: Elaine Stritch Visits COWARD AT CHRISTMAS: A CABARET FOR NOEL

The performance schedule is Tuesday - Friday at 8:30 PM; Saturday at 6:30 PM and 9:30 PM; and Sunday at 3:30 PM and 7:30 PM. Press Opening is Thursday, December 18 at 8:30 PM. Tickets are $25 ($17.50 for 59E59 Members). To purchase tickets, call Ticket Central at (212) 279-4200 or go to www.ticketcentral.com. For more information, visit www.59e59.org.

There was a special Noel Coward Birthday Celebration Performance on Tuesday, December 16 at 8:30 PM, which included a champagne toast, birthday cake and special guest theatre icon Elaine Stritch.

Making its US premiere at the 59E59 Theaters Holiday E:Café, Simon Green Sings COWARD AT CHRISTMAS: A Cabaret for Noël is a Holiday treat direct from London. West End favorite Simon Green (part of the original casts of Sondheim's Follies, Passion and Sunday in the Park with George), together with his musical director and archivist David Shrubsole, brings a wonderful evening of Coward sophistication, wit and warmth to 59E59 to celebrate Coward's 109th birthday. This new program blends great Coward classics and some rediscovered comedy gems, unearthed from the British Library, with lesser-known work that is given new life with Shrubsole's arrangements and a fresh Green interpretation.

Simon Green makes his 59E59 debut as a performer, after helming several wildly successful shows for Brits Off Broadway, including Cooking for Kings, Beau Brummel and Fascinating Aida in Absolutely Fascinating. He served as Consulting Director for The Hired Man.

Among Simon's many London and West End credits are the originAl West End productions of three Stephen Sondheim musicals. He appeared as Young Ben in Follies with Dolores Gray and Diana Rigg (Shaftesbury Theatre), Torasso in Passion (Queen's Theatre), and as Jules/Bob Greenberg in the recent multi award winning Sunday in the Park with George (Menier Chocolate Factory and Wyndham's Theatre). Simon made his West End debut playing Tony in Sir Cameron Macintosh's 30th anniversary production of The Boyfriend and went on to play Robespierre in The Scarlet Pimpernel (Her Majesty's); Merrythought in The Knight of the Burning Pestle (Young Vic at the Barbican); Lumiere in Disney's Beauty and the Best (Dominion); Clorinda in La Cenerentola (Drill Hall); Whizzer in March of the Falsettos (Albery); Brian in Elegies for Angeles, Punks and Raging Queens (Criterion); Titus Lartius in Coriolanus (Young Vic); Frank Shallard in Elmer Gantry (Gate); Dick in Lady Be Good (Regent's Park); Alone Together (King's Head). For the Royal Shakespeare Company he played the Tin Man in The Wizard of Oz (Stratford and Barbican) and Frank Schultz in Showboat, co-production with Opera North (London Palladium and national tour).

Simon has played leading roles in many of Britain's best regional theatres including Bernard Nightingale in Arcadia, Henry Carr in Travesties (both by Tom Stoppard) and Crestwell in Noel Coward's Relative Values. He has acted and directed at Sir Alan Ayckbourn's theatre in Scarborough and spent two Christmas seasons as the traditional pantomime dames Widow Twankey in Aladdin and Sarah the Cook in Dick Whittington at the Oxford Playhouse.

Together with his musical director and arranger, David Shrubsole, Simon's cabaret, Simon Green-Solo, has been seen extensively in London at the Pizza on the Park, The Café Royal, Leighton House, The October Gallery, Riverwalk at The Oxo Tower, LauderDale House, Belair House, The Talk of London, Jermyn Street Theatre and at Cliveden. In 1999 he was invited to sing in Mad About the Boy, Noel Coward's centennial gala celebration at Carnegie Hall with, amongst others, Barbara Cook, Elaine Stritch and Helen Hunt. He returned to New York to perform his solo show at Carnegie's Weill Recital Hall for the Hawthorn Foundation. His album Take Me to the World was released in 2005.

David Shrubsole (Musical Director and Arranger) works internationally as a composer, orchestrator and musical director. He has worked extensively as an arranger and musical director for Simon Green and together they have played many venues around the world including the Firebird Café and Carnegie Hall in New York. David also produced and arrangEd Simon's first album Take Me to the World.

Conducting credits include: Matthew Bourne's Dorian Gray (Edinburgh International Festival); Major Barbara and The Alchemist both directed by Nicholas Hytner (National Theatre, London), Ragtime (Piccadilly Theatre, London), My Fair Lady (National Theatre and Theatre Royal, Drury Lane), The Christmas Carol (Royal Festival Hall, London), Dick Whittington (Sadler's Wells) and Master Class starring Patti LuPone (Queens Theatre, London). Composition for plays include Romeo & Juliet (Regent's Park Open Air Theatre), The Enchantment (National Theatre, London), Gaslight (Old Vic, London), Total Eclipse (Menier Chocolate Factory, London), Troilus and Cressida (co-composed with George Stiles and nominated for a Chicago Jeff Award, for the Chicago Shakespeare Theater), Epitaph for George Dillon (Comedy Theatre, London), A Streetcar Named Desire (Clwyd Theatr Cymru) and Unless (Stephen Joseph Theatre, Scarborough). As an orchestrator/arranger his credits include Let's Face the Music and Dance (Salisbury Playhouse), Peter Pan (Birmingham Repertory Theatre), Aspects of Love (UK tour), The Importance of Being Earnest (Vaudeville Theatre, London) and The Three Musketeers (Chicago Shakespeare Theatre).

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