Stageplays to Host THE OAKLAND SISTERS Benefit Reading

Stageplays Theatre Company (Stageplays) presents a 2-performance intimate benefit co-reading Sunday and Monday, February 28-29, 2016 to introduce its next world-premiere play, The Oakland Sisters, a new drama by two-time Emmy-winner, Harding Lemay.

The Oakland Sisters is a family drama about four sisters bound by love and dependence upon each other. Upon the death of their father, the sisters inherit equal shares in the family timber business. When the youngest sister marries a French Canadian Catholic, her husband is rejected by the domineering oldest sister -- whose irrational devotion to her younger sister leads to the destruction of the marriage and a custody battle over her children. The two middle sisters must choose whom to defend and whom to abandon.

Stageplays' Artistic Director Tom Ferriter directs a cast led by Elizabeth Stiles (Wicked, Grey Gardens, original Australian casts; The Boy from Oz; Into The Woods), Ben McHugh (Mama Mia, Hairspray, The Producers), Aubrey Mae Davis (Catch Me If You Can, Hairspray, Radio City Christmas Spectacular) Chandon Jones (The Crucible) Kerry McGann (The Bus, The Crazy Horse), Andrew David Rabensteine (Angels in America I & II, Gutenberg! The Musical) and Andrew Gelles (Skin in the Game, The Changeling). Maureen Van Trease (Assassins, Those Whistling Lads) provides accompaniment.

Harding Lemay, the former head writer for the NBC daytime serial "Another World", was story consultant for the ABC daytime serial "One LifeTo Live", and the creator and head writer of the serial Lovers and Friends. Plays written for the stage include Look At Any Man, The Little Birds Fly, The Joslyn Circle, Return Upriver, From A Dark Land (National Theatre of Romania), The Death of Eagles, The Off Season, Escape Route, Scrutiny, and The Heir Apparent.

The Oakland Sisters is being presented at Theater at St. Jean, a 200-seat Off Broadway venue, and former home to DiCapo Opera Theatre, located at Lexington Avenue and 76th Street, in Manhattan.

Performances are Sunday, February 28th at 7:00pm, and Monday, February 29th at 7:30pm. All seats $50.00 and benefit Stageplays Theatre Company's new play development program.

For tickets, go to Stageplaystheatre.com, upcoming events, The Oakland Sisters.

Stageplays Theatre Company (Stageplays) is a not-for-profit company formed in 1992 to develop and produce new plays and musicals for the American theatre which address the issues of our times. Since its founding, Stageplays has premiered seven plays and one musical in full production, introduced 65 new plays in workshop presentations, and held more than 350 readings of new plays by 128 established and emerging playwrights, composers and lyricists. To date, 49 plays have had U.S. premieres and nine have received European productions