Circle in the Square Theatre School Presents AESOP'S FABLES: A NEW MUSICAL, 3/5-16

Circle in the Square Theatre School (CITSTS) presents a Theodore Mann Production of AESOP'S FABLES: A New Musical, featuring a book by Michael Milligan and music & lyrics by Joziah Longo, at Circle in the Square Theatre, 1633 Broadway (50th Street between Broadway and Eighth Avenue), 10:30 a.m., Monday, March 5 through Friday, March 9, and on Monday, March 12, Thursday, March 15, and Friday, March 16. (www.circlesquare.org, $5.00 for adults and children; reservations required. Phone: 212-307-0388, or e-mail admissions@circlesquare.org)

This delightful musical for children (Grades K-6), which premiered two years ago to enthusiastic response and high praise ("Circus-like thrills…ingenious masks"-NY Times) and has been brought back by popular demand, blends dances, toe-tapping songs and join-in songs with the lifelong lessons of such timeless Aesop's fables as "The Boy Who Cried Wolf," "The Lion and the Mouse," "The Fox and the Crow," and "The Tortoise and the Hare."

Staged by Justin Boccitto, who was choreographer and director of the CITSTS productions of Cabaret and Andrew Lippa's The Wild Party, AESOP'S FABLES: A New Musical features songs by Joziah Longo, who is famed for his band "The Grand Slambovians," known in this country and abroad for their electrifying live performances and original music, and a book by Michael Milligan, an actor who has performed on Broadway (La Bête; August: Osage County), Off-Broadway, in regional theatre productions, and is currently in The Gaming Table at the Folger Theatre in Washington, D.C.

The musical will be performed by graduate actors of the School. The cast includes: Isaac Dayley, Sarah Grace, Seth McNeill, Peter Trojgaard, Taylor Walsh, and Anthony Zas.

Pre-performance clowns will entertain at each show, and the play (50 minutes in length) will be followed by a Q&A with the cast.

AESOP'S FABLES is the third and final production in this season's "Three-Plays for Grades K-6" annual series, which opened with ANANSI THE SPIDER and was followed by "CINDERELLA: A New Version of The Oldest Story Ever Told.

Circle in the Square Theatre School, established in 1963, is one of the country's premier schools of professional training for actors and singers, and is the only conservatory affiliated with a Broadway theatre. It offers a two-year training program and a seven-week summer program for students from across the country and around the world. (A call for auditions has just gone out for the summer program, which begins in July). Theodore Mann, a co-founder of Circle in the Square Theatre, is artistic director, and Paul Libin is president. E. Colin O'Leary is executive director. Among the School's alumni are Philip Seymour Hoffman, Kevin Bacon, Lady Gaga, Idina Menzel, Felicity Huffman, Molly Shannon, and many other luminaries of the stage and screen.

In addition to school and public performances of children's plays, CITSTS also conducts classes on playwriting for third graders (at P.S. 11), with their short plays performed by graduate actors on Circle's Broadway stage.