Classic Comedy BLITHE SPIRIT Set to Haunt Firestone Stage

A hauntingly good time is to be had as Firestone Theatre continues its adventurous new season with the laugh-out-loud comedy Blithe Spirit. The Noel Coward farce, legendarily written over five days, features an other-worldly love triangle between a man, his wife, and his deceased wife. Performances will be held at 7:30 p.m. on November 16, 17, and 18, 2017. Tickets are $5.00 in advance, $10.00 at the door, and $13.00 for reserved, VIP seating. Tickets are available online at BrownPaperTickets.com, by mail-in form, and in the school commons from 11:00 a.m. to 1:00 p.m. on school days starting Monday, November 13, 2017. Tickets will also be available at the door on the night of performance.

Blithe Spirit offers up the fussy, cantankerous novelist Charles Condomine, re-married but haunted (literally) by the ghost of his late first wife, the clever and insistent Elvira, who is called up by a visiting "happy medium," one Madame Arcati. Coward claimed to have written the play in just five days while on a trip to Wales during the early days of World War II. The play opened a mere six weeks later at the Piccadilly Theatre on July 2, 1941. Blithe Spirit ran a London record-setting 1,997 performances. The play's initial Broadway run at the Morosco Theatre began on November 5, 1941. Blithe Spirit was made into a major motion picture in 1945.

The cast of Blithe Spirit is led by seniors Kayleigh Anthony (Edith), Bree Chambers (Ruth Condomine), Emiliano Diaz Capt (Charles Condomine), Makyia Johnson (Madame Arcati), and Gracie Thanasiu (Elvira Condomine). The cast also includes junior Brandon Meeker (Dr. George Bradman) and sophomore Morgan Bedilion (Mrs. Violet Bradman).

Blithe Spirit is under the direction of the school's theatre director, Mark A. Zimmerman. The student production team is led by seniors Kayleigh Anthony (publicity), Dalila Bogdan (stage manager) and Caroline Pali (lighting design, scene shop foreman). Other members include juniors John Kraus (costume design) and Jillian Davis (scenic design); sophomores Hannah Burford (property design), Alexandria Meyer (sound design), Parker Thompson (assistant stage manager) and Isabella Vacarro (hair and make-up). Mr. James Welch serves as the technical director and Ms. Elynmarie Kazle serves as the production manager.

Upcoming productions at Firestone Community learning Center include Silent Sky by Lauren Gunderson and It's a Wonderful life: A Live Radio Playby Joe Landry. Silent Sky, directed by Elynmarie Kazle, will be presented December 8 and 9, 2017, in the school's planetarium. It's a Wonderful life: A Live Radio Play, directed by Rachel McCann, will be presented on December 15 and 16, 2017, in the classroom theatre. The One-Act Play Festival, All in the Timing by David Ives, will be presented January 18, 19, and 20, 2017, in the classroom theatre. All Second Stage productions as well as Blithe Spirit, are part of Firestone Theatre subscription series. Single tickets for all theatre performances are available online at BrownPaperTickets.com

Firestone Theatre is the award-winning play-production component of the Akron School for the Arts housed at Firestone High School. Firestone Theatre was named an "Outstanding School" by the Educational Theatre Association in 2013. The curricular track of Firestone Theatre is accessible to all rising ninth-grade students via open enrollment and a formal audition.

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