A.R.T. to Present THE LIGHT PRINCESS, Beginning 12/7

Following previous season's sold-out holiday hits, The Snow Queen, Hansel and Gretel, the A.R.T. Institute, in association with the Loeb Drama Center, brings back the enchanting musical, The Light Princess, by Lila Rose Kaplan with music by Mike Pettry, directed by Allegra Libonati, with choreography by Jeff and Rick Kuperman. Performances will be held at the Loeb Drama Center, 64 Brattle Street, Cambridge from December 7 through January 4, 2015.

Tickets to all performances are $15 and can be purchased by calling 617.547.8300 or online at http://americanrepertorytheater.org

Based on George MacDonald's fairy tale, this delightful musical tells the story of a young princess cursed to live without gravity. She floats through life unburdened by cares or sorrow, constantly soaring through high winds and avoiding low trees. If her parents, the King and Queen, don't help her come back to earth by her 16th birthday, the curse will be permanent.

Lila Rose Kaplan and Mike Pettry's innovative and original adaptation of the classic story is brought to life with gravity defying ensemble choreography and delightful costumes. Featuring graduate acting students from the A.R.T. Institute for Advanced Theater Training, this energetic and interactive show is sure to be a holiday treat for the whole family. The set design is by Julia Noulin-Merat, costume design by Arthur Oliver, lighting design by Porsche McGovern, and sound design by Aaron Mack.

Lila Rose Kaplan writes bittersweet comedies and modern myths that delve into the mysteries of human relationships. Her play Wildflower made its Off-Broadway debut in 2009 at Second Stage Uptown and was published by Dramatists Play Service. Her other works include We All Fall Down, Home of the Brave, 100 Planes, Entangled, Bureau of Missing Persons, and Tink. Her plays have been seen and/or developed at Second Stage, Arena Stage, La Jolla Playhouse, The Old Vic, Chalk Rep, Perishable Theatre, The Kennedy Center, Ensemble Studio Theatre, Center Theatre Group, Theatreworks, PlayPenn, The Lark, among others. Awards include The National Science Award in Playwriting, The International Women's Playwriting Award, The Shank Playwriting Fellowship, and the I.J. Kapstein Award in Playwriting. In 2010, She was selected as an Old Vic/New Voices T.S. Eliot Exchange Playwright and one of her short plays debuted at the Old Vic in London.

Mike Pettry is a New York based composer/lyricist and musician. He is a 2012 ASCAP Foundation Harold Adamson Lyric Award winner, and a 2007 Jonathan Larson Award winner. Musicals written include Hardcore West Virginia (2012 ASCAP Musical Theatre Workshop with Stephen Schwartz), The Time Travelers Convention, Long Distance, World of Heroes, The Wonderful World of Zidney (featured highlight at Kennedy Center Page to Stage Festival), and Flipside (2007 NYU Frederick Loewe Award winner). Mike's songs have been performed all over the country and in the UK. Muzz Skillings of Living Colour produced several of Mike's songs for the Lin McEwan album "When I Wake...". Mike's solo album "The Voices In My Head" is available on iTunes, as is the original cast album of The Time Travelers Convention. He also wrote the score for the film The Promise of New York (Big Muddy Film Festival Audience Choice Best Documentary).

Allegra Libonati is the Resident Director at the A.R.T., where her previous credits include The Light Princess, Hansel and Gretel and The Snow Queen. She is the Resident Director for The Donkey Show, and Assistant Director for Prometheus Bound, Death and the Powers: The Robots' Opera, Best of Both Worlds, and the Tony Award winning revival of Hair on Broadway. At OBERON she directed the food/performance event Once in Hell: Dante's Inferno in 10 Dinner Courses, the cabaret, Matchmaker Matchmaker, I'm Willing to Settle: A Musical Guide to Internet Dating, and the Circus spectacle, Speakeasy Circus, with the Boston Circus Guild. She directs outdoor musicals and Shakespeare productions at the Summer Theater of New Canaan, including Hairspray, Carousel, Twelfth Night, Romeo and Juliet, The Taming of the Shrew, A Midsummer Night's Dream, and Henry IV, Parts 1 and 2, also produced on Theater Row, NYC. Other favorite NYC and regional productions include The Island, Life Is a Dream, The Just Assassins, The Accidental Death of an Anarchist, and The Illusion. She studied Commedia dell'arte performance at the Accademia Dell'Arte in Arezzo, Italy, and is a graduate of Tisch School of the Arts and CMU.

Rick and Jeff Kuperman are a directing and choreography team for stage and screen. Their theater and dance works have been seen across New York City at Ars Nova, HERE Arts Center, the Ailey Citigroup Theater, the New Ohio Theatre, Steps on Broadway, Dixon Place, The Living Theatre, NY Fringe, Theater for the New City, The Cutting Room, and Symphony Space. They've also directed and choreographed at PST in Princeton, NJ. Their award-winning films have been screened internationally, across North America, Europe, and South America. The brothers are recent graduates of Harvard and Princeton, respectively.

The A.R.T./MXAT Institute for Advanced Theater Training at Harvard University was established in 1987 by the American Repertory Theater (A.R.T.) as a training ground for the professional American theater. It is a two-year, five-semester training program for young theater professionals, operated in association with the Moscow Art Theater School (MXAT). The wide range of courses given by the international faculty offers students unique preparation for the multi-faceted demands of the professional theater. Each year, approximately twenty-three carefully selected students are admitted for a full-time, two-year, five-term program of study in acting, dramaturgy, or voice pedagogy. The Institute accepts inquisitive student artists, whose talent, enthusiasm, intelligence, and cultural curiosity can pioneer and lead the theater of the future.

The Loeb Drama Center, located at 64 Brattle Street, Harvard Square, Cambridge, is accessible to persons with special needs and to those requiring wheelchair seating or first-floor restrooms. Deaf and hard-of-hearing patrons can also reach the theater by calling the toll-free N.E. Telephone Relay Center at 1.800.439.2370.

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