Lorna Luft to Return for IRVING BERLIN'S WHITE CHRISTMAS 2016 National Tour

The producers of IRVING BERLIN'S WHITE CHRISTMAS, the stage adaptation of the beloved classic film, have announced today that Lorna Luft will reprise her role as Martha Watson in the upcoming National Tour. Additional casting will be announced at a later date.

"We are excited to see Lorna return to the role of Martha after performing in the UK premiere and subsequent touring productions," said producer Nancy Gabriel. "She is a consummate performer with an extraordinary history in the theatre, and we are thrilled to have her join this year's cast."

IRVING BERLIN'S WHITE CHRISTMAS is scheduled to perform in the following cities during the 2016 holiday season:

Bloomington, IN November 12-13, 2016

Omaha, NE November 15-20, 2016

Las Vegas, NV November 22-27, 2016

Los Angeles, CA November 29-December 4, 2016

Salt Lake City, UT December 6-11, 2016

San Francisco, CA December 14-24, 2016

Sacramento, CA December 27-January 1, 2017

The creative team for the National Tour includes direction and choreography by Randy Skinner (Tony Award Nomination, Best Choreography); book by David Ives (Finnian's Rainbow, On the Town) and Paul Blake (Producer, Beautiful-The Carole King Musical); set design by Anna Louizos (Avenue Q, In The Heights); set adaptation by Kenneth Foy; costumes by Carrie Robbins (A Class Act); lighting design by Ken Billington (The Drowsy Chaperone, Annie); sound design by Keith Caggiano; orchestrations by Larry Blank (Tony Award nomination, Best Orchestrations); vocal and additional arrangements by Bruce Pomahac; music direction by Michael Horsley; casting by Binder Casting. Original Broadway production directed by Walter Bobbie.

IRVING BERLIN'S WHITE CHRISTMAS is produced by Work Light Productions, whose other current & upcoming touring productions include Rent 20th Anniversary Tour, Rodgers + Hammerstein's Cinderella, MAMMA MIA!, Vocalosity, and Crazy For You.

IRVING BERLIN'S WHITE CHRISTMAS features Music and Lyrics by Irving Berlin, and is based upon the Paramount Pictures film written for the screen by Norman Krasna, Norman Panama and Melvin Frank.

Lorna Luft was born to the legendary Judy Garland and her film producer husband Sid Luft. She made her debut in the industry at the age of 11 singing in the 1963 Christmas edition of her mother's television show, later joining the family's concert tour. Culminating in a month-long residence at New York's Palace Theatre, it was the last time the 14-year-old Lorna would star on stage with her mother.

Lorna made her Broadway debut four years later in the show Promises, Promises. She returned to the stage in 1981 for an American tour of They're Playing Our Song and the following year made her big-screen debut in Grease 2 alongside Michelle Pfeiffer. By 1983 she was back on the New York stage, starring as Peppermint Patty in a production ofSnoopy The Musical and appearing opposite Farrah Fawcett in the tough dramaExtremities.

Television guest appearances followed before she once more went back to her stage roots. She spent several weeks in 1990 touring the United States in an extravaganza called Jerry Herman's Broadway Years, before starring as Miss Adelaide in a US and subsequently world tour of Guys and Dolls that ran for nearly two years. In 1996 she was in Dublin, playing alongside Millicent Martin and Dave Willetts in a production of Stephen Sondheim'sFollies, and she starred as Mama Rose in a University of Richmond staging of Gypsy.

For the 2006 festive season, she made an appearance in the British stage premiere of Irving Berlin's White Christmas: The Musical, an adaptation of the classic 1954 Bing Crosby movie. She reprised her role the following year for runs at the Edinburgh Playhouse and Millennium Centre in Cardiff before picking up the robes of the Wicked Witch of the West for a 2008 Christmas production of The Wizard of Oz at Salford's Lowry Theatre.

She toured the UK in 2009 in a production of Hugh Whitemore's play Pack of Lies, which co-starred Jenny Seagrove and Simon Shepherd, and in July that year paid tribute to her mother with a special recording for Radio 2 of Friday Night is Music Night. Lorna Luft and Friends, staged at London's Mermaid Theatre, also included John Barrowman, Frances Rufelle and Linzi Hateley.

Lorna has maintained a concert career alongside her other performances, and has won huge critical acclaim for her shows at such prestigious venues as the Hollywood Bowl, the London Palladium and Madison Square Gardens. She surprised audiences at Carnegie Hall in 2006 when she made a guest appearance to duet with Rufus Wainwright on the song "After You've Gone," providing a dramatic finale to his tribute concert Rufus Does Judy. Lorna's multi-media production, entitled Songs My Mother Taught Me, toured the UK in 2007 and was released as an album the same year, co-produced by Barry Manilow and Lorna's Scottish husband, Colin R. Freeman.

In 1998 Lorna wrote a family memoir entitled Me and My Shadows, which was adapted as an Emmy award-winning television mini-series. She's also a tireless campaigner for charity, not least since being diagnosed with breast cancer herself in 2012. Vowing to fight the disease, Lorna is committed to being an avid fighter and fundraiser. This year, Lorna has been back on the cabaret scene with a new solo show entitled Accentuate the Positive, as well as guest-starring in An Evening of Movies and Musicals.

For more information, visit www.whitechristmasthemusical.com or follow on Facebook a www.facebook.com/IBWCOnTour.