New Rep Announces THE LAST FIVE YEARS

New Repertory Theatre, in residence at the Arsenal Center for the Arts, is pleased to announce it will be producing Jason Robert Brown's award-winning musical The Last Five Years. The Last Five Years opens for the press on Monday, March 28, 2011 at 7:30pm and plays through Sunday, April 17, 2011 at the Arsenal Center for the Arts in the Black Box Theater.

"The Last Five Years is such an appealing and passionate show," states Kate Warner New Rep's Artistic Director. "Besides the incredible music and story, the characters are so real, and allow audience members to relate and connect personally with them."

Jim Petosa, director of The Last Five Years, comments, "Since its debut, The Last Five Years has attained a following of ardent admirers, and with good reason! The musical is an emotional gymnasium of opportunity for two actor/singers as it tells the story of a love won and then lost in this imaginatively structured tale where one character moves forward in time while the other moves backward. I'm delighted to join this team of creative theatre artists in bringing the story to life in the intimacy of the Black Box Theater."

The Last Five Years features New Rep favorite Aimee Doherty (New Rep's Darling Divas Deck the Holidays, Hot Mikado, Speed-the-Plow, Cabaret, tick, tick... BOOM!, The Wild Party, Ragtime, and Into the Woods) as Cathy and Mark Linehan who is making his New Rep debut as Jamie.

In this award-winning musical by Jason Robert Brown, audiences are taken on an intimate journey, witnessing both the birth and the unraveling of a young couple's five year relationship. Brown's alluring music interweaves the past and the present of a romantic and tumultuous love affair. Join Cathy and Jamie as they share their emotional stories through celebrated songs, such as "Still Hurting" "The Next Ten Minutes," and "Shiksa Goddess."

New Repertory Theatre presents provocative and intelligent works of both established and emerging playwrights in an intimate setting that involves and engages the audience. New Rep has earned a reputation for Dynamic Productions that honor the writers and feature talented professional actors from the New
England Theatre community as well as guest artists from around the U.S. New Rep has received Elliot Norton and IRNE Awards for outstanding acting, scenic design, directions, and production. Programming for New Repertory Theatre is supported in part by a grant from the Massachusetts Cultural Council.

ARTISTS

Aimee Doherty (Cathy) is excited to be back at New Rep having previously appeared in: Hot Mikado (Pitti-Sing), Speed the Plow (Karen), Cabaret (Sally Bowles), tick, tick...BOOM! (Susan), Wild Party (ensemble/Queenie u/s), Ragtime (Evelyn Nesbit), Into the Woods (Cinderella) and Darling Divas Deck the Holidays. Other Boston area credits include: Grey Gardens (Young Edie), Follies (Young Phyllis), See What I Wanna See (Kesa/the wife/an actress) and Adrift in Macao (Lureena) with the Lyric Stage Company of Boston; Annie (Grace) and Honk! (Ida) with Wheelock Theatre; The Pain and the Itch (Kelly) with Company One; Nine (Luisa), The Women (Peggy), Bubbly Black Girl... (Scarlet) and Company (Kathy) with SpeakEasy Stage of Boston; On the 20th Century (Anita) staring Alice Ripley with Overture Productions. Aimee has received IRNE acting nominations for her work in Cabaret, Speed-the-Plow, The Pain and the Itch, and Grey Gardens. In addition to acting Aimee, is a freelance environmental consultant with Doherty Environmental Consulting. Aimee will be appearing in The World Goes 'Round with New Rep in July.

Mark Linehan (Jamie) is thrilled to be making his New Rep début. Other Boston credits include: Follies (Lyric Stage Company), Crazy For You and Romeo and Juliet (Fiddlehead Theatre), Mame, The Music Man, and Hairspray (Reagle Music Theatre), Honk and Seussical (Wheelock Family Theatre), The Good War (Stoneham Theater), and The Best Little Whorehouse in Texas (Foothills Theatre). Mark also starred in the Papermill Theater's productions of West Side Story and Seussical. Mark will be appearing in Stoneham Theater's production of 42nd Street in May.

Jason Robert Brown (writer and composer) Jason's music has been heard all over the world. The Last Five Years was cited as one of Time Magazine's 10 Best of 2001 and won Drama Desk Awards for Best Music and Best Lyrics. He won a 1999 Tony Award for his score to Parade, a musical written with Alfred Uhry and directed by Harold Prince, which premiered at Lincoln Center Theatre in December 1998, and subsequently won both the Drama Desk and New York Drama Critics' Circle Awards for Best New Musical. Parade was also presented on a national tour in 2000, which Jason conducted. Jason's first musical, Songs for a New World, a theatrical song cycle directed by Daisy Prince, played Off-Broadway at the WPA Theatre in the fall of 1995, and has since been seen in more than two hundred productions around the world. Jason's newest musical, 13, written with Dan Elish and directed by Todd Graff, premiered at Los Angeles's Mark Taper Forum, and opened on Broadway in the spring of 2008. Jason is the winner of the 2002 Kleban Award for Outstanding Lyrics and the 1996 Gilman & Gonzalez-Falla Foundation Award for Musical Theatre. Jason's songs, including the cabaret standard "Stars and the Moon," have been performed and recorded by Audra McDonald, Betty Buckley, Karen Akers, Renée Fleming, Philip Quast, Jon Hendricks and many others. His first solo album, "Wearing Someone Else's Clothes," featuring his band The Caucasian Rhythm Kings, was named one of Amazon.com's best of 2005, and is available from Sh-K-Boom Records. His collaboration with singer Lauren Kennedy, "Songs of Jason Robert Brown," is available on PS Classics. Jason is also the composer of the incidental music for David Lindsay-Abaire's Kimberly Akimbo and Fuddy Meers, Marsha Norman's Last Dance, David Marshall Grant's Current Events, Kenneth Lonergan's The Waverly Gallery, and the Irish Repertory Theater's production of Long Day's Journey Into Night, and he was a Tony Award nominee for his contributions to the score of Urban Cowboy the Musical. His scores are published by Hal Leonard. He currently teaches musical theater performance and composition at the University of Southern California. Jason studied composition at the Eastman School of Music in Rochester, N.Y., with Samuel Adler, Christopher Rouse, and Joseph Schwantner. Jason is a proud member of the Dramatist's Guild and the American Federation of Musicians Local 802 & 47.

Jim Petosa (director) has been the artistic and educational leader of the Boston University School of Theatre since 2002, as well as Artistic Director of Maryland's Olney Theatre Center for the Arts since 1994. Mr. Petosa also serves as artistic director for the National Players educational touring company and as one of three artistic directors for the Potomac Theatre Project, a company devoted to the presentation of political works. As a guest artist, he has directed at the John F. Kennedy Center, Studio Theatre, Round House Theatre, and Rep Stage. Mr. Petosa also directed the Theater J production of Collected Stories, for which he received a 2001 Helen Hayes Award nomination for Outstanding Direction. He recently directed New Rep's production of Opus last spring. Other credits include: C.P. Taylor's Good (BCAP), Donald Margulies' Dinner with Friends (Olney), and A Question of Mercy (PTP/NYC). In 2009, Mr. Petosa established the Boston Center for American Performance, the professional production extension of the Boston University School of Theatre. Petosa has served on the faculty of The Catholic University of America, the University of Maryland-College Park, and the Heifetz International Music Institute at St. John's College. In 2008, Mr. Petosa was named Montgomery County's Outstanding Artist/Scholar at the Montgomery County Executive's Excellence in the Arts and Humanities Awards ceremony in Maryland. Mr. Petosa has served as director for the New York Theatre Studio, Theatre Matrix, and as performing arts coordinator for the Cathedral of St. John the Divine in Manhattan. A member of Actors' Equity Association and the Dramatists Guild, Mr. Petosa has served on the board of the Stage Directors and Choreographers Society, Catalyst Theatre, and Playwrights Forum. Educated at Catholic University of America.

Todd C. Gordon (musical direction) Having served as Music Director for Darling Divas Deck the Holidays, Sophie Tucker: The Last of the Red Hot Mamas, Hot Mikado, Cabaret (IRNE Nominee, Best Music Director), Gutenberg! The Musical, Dessa Rose, Side by Side by Sondheim, Lippa's The Wild Party (IRNE Nominee, Best Music Director), Ragtime (IRNE Award, Best Music Director), Into the Woods (IRNE Award, Best Music Director), The Threepenny Opera (IRNE Nominee, Best Music Director), and musical supervision for According to Tip, Todd is thrilled to be working on New Rep's The Last Five Years. He was seen as the onstage pianist for New Rep's Bill W. and Dr. Bob and has worked in the New England area on productions for the Lyric Stage Company, Publick Theatre, Gloucester Stage, Charles Playhouse/Second Stage, Stoneham Theatre, Brandeis Theatre Company, and Emerson Stage.

Tickets: Full Price $35 General Admission. Seniors $5 off full price.
Student rush $10. Call: 617-923-8487 or buy online at www.newrep.org.

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