NATIVE GARDENS to be Presented at Westport Country Playhouse

Westport Country Playhouse will stage “Native Gardens,” a comedy about well-intentioned neighbors who become feuding enemies, playing February 18 through March 8. The comic Culture Clash is written by Karen Zacarías, who was recently hailed by American Theatre magazine as one of the 10 most-produced playwrights in the U.S. Director is JoAnn M. Hunter. “Native Gardens” is the fourth production in the Playhouse’s 2024-25 “Season of Laughter,” a slate of five shows from October through April, chosen specifically to energize the community with a welcoming sense of warmth, humor, and joy.
 
“We’re thrilled to present Karen Zacarías’ celebrated play ‘Native Gardens’ on the Playhouse stage,” said Mark Shanahan, Playhouse artistic director. “Zacarías’ brilliant comedy is a laugh-out-loud story that masterfully balances sharp wit with hilariously bad behavior even as it explores deeper issues about race, class, and what it truly means to be a good neighbor in modern America. Director JoAnn M. Hunter has assembled an extraordinary cast and design team, and we know audiences will be thoroughly entertained as we continue our ‘Season of Laughter’ with this wonderfully funny and timely tale.”
 
In “Native Gardens,” expectant parents Tania and Pablo Del Valle move in next door to longtime suburbanites Virginia and Frank Butley. A dispute over their yard’s property line spirals into an epic, flower-flinging war over taste, class, personal identity…and gardening. With Pablo’s upcoming office barbecue party threatening the Butleys’ plans for the future of their yard, can these couples ever learn to love their neighbor and mend the fences that separate them?
 
The cast includes Paula Leggett Chase as Virginia Butley (Broadway: “Tootsie,” “On the 20th Century,” “Bye Bye Birdie,” “Curtains,” “The Pajama Game,” “Dirty Rotten Scoundrels,” “Kiss Me, Kate,” “Damn Yankees,” “Crazy for You,” “A Chorus Line”; 2020 Drama Desk Featured Actress nominee for “The Unsinkable Molly Brown”; Tours: “A Chorus Line,” “Cabaret”; TV/Film: “The Sound of Music, Live”; @paulaleggett, www.paulaleggettchase.com); Linedy Genao as Tania De Valle (Native of Hamden, CT; first Latina performer to originate the leading role in an Andrew Lloyd Webber Broadway musical; named to Variety’s “Broadway Actors to Watch List”; Broadway: “Bad Cinderella” as Cinderella, “On Your Feet!,” “Dear Evan Hansen”; Off Broadway: “Women on Fire”; Tours: “Dear Evan Hansen”; Regional: “Passing Through,” “West Side Story,” “In the Heights”; TV/Film: “Death Saved My Life”; @linedygenao).
 
Adam Heller as Frank Butley (Westport Country Playhouse: Script in Hand playreading “The Outsider”; Broadway’s “Some Like it Hot,” “It Shoulda Been You,” “Elf,” “Caroline, or Change,” “Victor/Victoria,” “Les Misérables”; Off-Broadway’s “Merrily We Roll Along,” and others; Goodspeed’s “Fiddler on the Roof” - Connecticut Critics Circle Award/Best Actor), “Rags”; other regional theatre includes “Chicago”- St. Louis Theater Circle Award, “1776,” “Gypsy,” “Falsettos,” “The Chosen”; NYU/Tisch); and Anthony Michael Martinez as Pablo Del Valle (Off-Broadway: Classic Stage Co., 59E59, Vineyard Theatre, New Ohio, The Flea, Theatre Row. Regional: Great Lakes Theatre, Idaho Shakespeare,  more; Film/TV: “After Forever” Amazon Prime series; MFA: Shakespeare Theatre Company’s Academy for Classical Acting in DC; resident teaching artist for Red Bull Theater, Classic Stage Co., New York Theatre Workshop; www.anthonymichaelmartinez.net; IG anthony.m.martinez).
 
Playwright Karen Zacarías’s award-winning plays include “The Copper Children,” “Destiny of Desire,” “Native Gardens,” “The Book Club Play,” “Legacy of Light,” “Mariela in the Desert,” “The Sins of Sor Juana,” and the adaptations of “Just Like Us,” “Into the Beautiful North,” and “How the Garcia Girls Lost Their Accent.” Her musical “Chasing George Washington” premiered at The Kennedy Center for Performing Arts. She is the author of 10 renowned TYA musicals, including “Ella Enchanted: The Musical.” She is one of the inaugural resident playwrights at Arena Stage, a core founder of the Latinx Theatre Commons, and founder of the award-winning Young Playwrights’ Theater (YPT). YPT was cited by the Obama administration as one of the best arts-education programs on the nation. Zacarías was voted 2018 Washingtonian of the Year by Washingtonian Magazine for her advocacy work involving the arts. She has a BA with distinction from Stanford University and a Masters in creative writing from Boston University. Born in Mexico, Zacarías now lives in Washington D.C. with her husband and three children.

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