Jeffrey Bean, James Belcher and More Set for NOVEMBER at Alley Theatre, Now thru 9/23

Alley Theatre Artistic Director Gregory Boyd announces the cast and creative team for the Alley Theatre's production of November. November, by David Mamet and directed by Sanford Robbins, begins performances tonight, August 24, opens officially Wednesday, August 29, and runs through Sunday, September 23 on the Neuhaus Stage.

As the 2012 Presidential election campaign continues, David Mamet's November offers audiences a fiendishly funny, over-the-top, no-holds-barred take on American politics. Unfolding in one day, just days before a national election and with poll numbers "lower than Gandhi's cholesterol," President Charles Smith, the most corrupt and inept buffoon to sit in the Oval Office, sets his sight on a second-term. With his usual acerbic wit and edgy social commentary, Mamet's latest masterpiece is a gleeful cornucopia of corruption and political incorrectness full of shady backroom schemes like Thanksgiving turkeys awaiting pardon and an American Indian lobbyist who wants to turn Nantucket into a gambling resort that will leave you laughing out loud. Recommended for mature audiences due to language and thematic content.

November features Alley Theatre Resident Actors Jeffrey Bean as President Charles Smith, James Belcher as The Representative of the National Association of Turkey and Turkey Products, Elizabeth Bunch as Clarice Bernstein, David Rainey as Dwight Grackle, and Todd Waite as Archer Brown.

November includes scenic and lighting design by Kevin Rigdon and costume design by Blaire Gulledge with sound design by Pierre Dupree.

Tickets to November start at $25. All tickets to November are available for purchase at alleytheatre.org, at the Alley Theatre Box Office, 615 Texas Avenue, or by calling 713.220.5700. Groups of 10 or more can receive special concierge services and select discounts by calling 713.220.5700 and asking for the group sales department.

David Mamet is the author of the plays: Race, Keep Your Pantheon, School, November, Romance, Boston Marriage, Faustus, Oleanna, Glengarry Glen Ross (1984 Pulitzer Prize and New York Drama Critics Circle Award), American Buffalo, The Old Neighborhood, A Life in the Theatre, Speed-the-Plow, Edmond, Lakeboat, The Water Engine, The Woods, Sexual Perversity in Chicago, Reunion and The Cryptogram (1995 Obie Award). His translations and adaptations include: Faustus and Red River by Pierre Laville; and The Cherry Orchard, Three Sisters and Uncle Vanya by Anton Chekov. His films include: The Postman Always Rings Twice, The Verdict, The Untouchables, House of Games (writer/director), Oleanna (writer/director), Homicide (writer/director), The Spanish Prisoner (writer/director), Heist (writer/director), Spartan (writer/director) and Redbelt (writer/director). Mr. Mamet is also the author of: Warm and Cold, a book for children with drawings by Donald Sultan, and two other children's books, Passover and The Duck and the Goat; Writing in Restaurants, Some Freaks, and Make-Believe Town, three volumes of essays; The Hero Pony and The China Man, a book of poems; Three Children's Plays, On Directing Film, The Cabin, and the novels The Village, The Old Religion and Wilson. His most recent books include the acting books, True & False and Three Uses of the Knife. Glengarry Glen Ross was awarded the Tony® Award for Best Revival of a Play in 2005.

Jeffrey Bean (Charles Smith) is in his 18th season as an Alley Company Artist and has appeared in over 100 Alley productions since 1989. Recently he has appeared in Agatha Christie's Black Coffee as Dr. Carelli, The Seagull as Sorin, Ether Dome as Dr. Charles Jackson, Amadeus as Salieri, August: Osage County as Bill Fordham, Peter Pan as Smee, Boeing-Boeing as Robert and The 39 Steps as Man #2. Previous Alley highlights include The Farnsworth Invention as David Sarnoff, Mauritius as Philip, Cyrano de Bergerac as Cyrano, The Scene as Charlie, Doubt as Father Flynn, Subject to Fits as Prince Myshkin, Much Ado About Nothing as Benedick, Journey's End as 2nd Lieutenant Trotter, The Pillowman as Michal, Hapgood as Ridley, Twelfth Night as Feste, The Importance of Being Earnest as Algernon, Billy Bishop Goes to War as Billy Bishop, Gross Indecency as Oscar Wilde, Arms & the Man as Bluntschli, The Crucible as Deputy Gov. Danforth, The Foreigner as Charlie Baker and Stones in His Pockets as Charlie Conlon, et al. Broadway credits include Bells Are Ringing as Francis and Amadeus as Kappelmeister Bonno. Television credits include Law & Order; Law & Order: Special Victims Unit and All My Children. He is a graduate of Southern Methodist University's Meadows School of the Arts and a Princess Grace Award winner.

James Belcher (The Turkey Representative) is in his 24th season at the Alley Theatre. As an Alley Company Artist, he has appeared as Sir Claud Amory/Inspector Japp in Agatha Christie's Black Coffee, Shamreyev in The Seagull, Ether Dome, Baron Van Swieten in Amadeus, Charlie Aiken in August: Osage County, Cecco in Peter Pan, Major Metcalf in The Mousetrap, Fritz Engelhardt in Intelligence-Slave, Judge Omar Gaffney in Harvey, Joe Stoddard in Our Town, Leslie Gorrell in The Farnsworth Invention, Milan/Waiter in Rock 'n' Roll, Mr. Stanley in The Man Who Came to Dinner, The Rev. Samuel Gardner in Mrs. Warren's Profession, Ligniere and The Capuchin in Cyrano de Bergerac, Brabantio in Othello, Teddy Brewster in Arsenic and Old Lace, Squire Trelawney/Bailiff/Job O'Brien in Treasure Island, Heck Tate in To Kill a Mockingbird, Lebedev in Subject to Fits, Antonio in Much Ado About Nothing, Sir Wilfred Robarts in Witness for the Prosecution, The Colonel in Journey's End, Dave Moss in Glengarry Glen Ross, Judge Hawthorne in The Crucible, Sir Claud Amory in Black Coffee, Captain Lesgate in Dial "M" for Murder, Victor in Our Lady of 121st Street, Antonio in Twelfth Night and Scrooge in A Christmas Carol for five seasons. He has a BFA in Drama Production from the University of Texas at Austin and a MFA in Directing from the University of Houston. In 1999, he received a BackStage West Garland Award for his role as Peter in the Alley's production of The Zoo Story.

Elizabeth Bunch (Clarice Bernstein) has appeared in more than 30 shows at the Alley Theatre since 2002 and recently served as Assistant Director for The Seafarer and Amadeus. Performances include Elizabeth Wells in Ether Dome, Eliza Doolittle in Pygmalion, Karen in August: Osage County, Wendy in Peter Pan, Boeing-Boeing, Harvey, The 39 Steps, Our Town, The Farnsworth Invention, Mauritius, Cyrano de Bergerac, Othello, The Lieutenant of Inishmore, The Scene, Doubt, Death on the Nile, Treasure Island, Steel Magnolias, Proof and Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf? New York theatre credits include The Voice of the Turtle produced by The Keen Company and The Mint Theater, The Water Children at Playwright Horizons, Museum with The Keen Company, The Light Outside with Bat Theater Company, and New World Rhapsody, The Motel Plays, and The Hospital Plays at HB Playwrights Foundation. Other theatre includes Little Foxes at The Denver Center, A Midsummer Night's Dream at The Guthrie Theater, Goosebumps, a national tour produced by Feld Entertainment. Stella in A Streetcar Named Desire, Viola in Twelfth Night, Juliet in Romeo and Juliet, Isabella in Measure for Measure, Big Love and Arcadia with Bread Loaf Acting Ensemble. Television appearances include Law & Order: Special Victims Unit. Elizabeth is a graduate of New York University's Tisch School of the Arts.

David Rainey (Dwight Grackle) is in his 13th season as an Alley Company Artist. Recent roles include Ben in What We're Up Against, Mrs. Dilber/Jacob Marley in A Christmas Carol, Rogers in And Then There Were None, Giuseppe Bonno in Amadeus, Noodler/Cookson in Peter Pan, Constable Warren in Our Town, Harlan Honn/Lennox in The Farnsworth Invention, Sterling in Mauritius, Nasty Interesting Man/Lord of the Underworld in Eurydice, Cuigy in Cyrano de Bergerac, the title role in Othello, Ebenezer Scrooge in A Christmas Carol, Steward in Death on the Nile, Tom Robinson in To Kill a Mockingbird, Paryfon Rogozhin in Subject to Fits, Master Jacques in The Miser, Ariel in The Pillowman, Giles Cory in The Crucible, David Keaton in The Exonerated, Lincoln in Topdog/Underdog for which he received a Best Actor Award by the Houston Press, Best Actor Nominations by the Jeff Awards in Chicago and Black Theatre Alliance Awards in Chicago, Lenny in Of Mice and Men and Donald in You Can't Take It With You. He has performed with The National Actors Theatre, Joseph Papp Public Theatre, Manhattan Theatre Club, The Acting Company, New York Shakespeare Festival, Berkeley Rep with Theatre de la Jeune Lune, Steppenwolf Theatre Company, Hartford Stage Company, Dallas Theatre Center, Guthrie Theatre, Crossroads Theatre Company, Repertory Theatre of St. Louis, among others. Film and television credits include Cosby, Law & Order, Vengeance Unlimited, As the World Turns, One Life to Live, Lowball, North Starr, Hell Swarm, Starforce, Multifacial, and The 'M' Word. He holds degrees from Eastern New Mexico University and Juilliard, where he received the Drama Division's highest honor, the Michel and Suria Saint-Denis Prize. He is Artistic Director of The Landing Theatre Company; is on the drama faculty of the University of Houston-Downtown; and also teaches professional acting classes.

Todd Waite (Archer Brown) is in his 12th season as an Alley Company Artist. Most recently seen in Noises Off as Frederick Fellowes, he has appeared in over 60 productions including four Christmas seasons of the one-man show: The Santaland Diaries.Other shows include: Pygmalion as Henry Higgins, Sherlock Holmes as Sherlock Holmes, Rock 'n' Roll as Jan, The Goat or Who is Sylvia? as Martin, Arsenic and Old Lace as Mortimer Brewster, Hapgood as Kerner, Deathtrap as Sydney, Art as Ivan, Stones in His Pockets as Jake, The Devil's Disciple as Burgoyne, The Mousetrap as Christopher Wren, and The 39 Steps as Richard Hannay. Previously, Mr. Waite spent six seasons with the renowned Shaw Festival, played Enjolras in the Canadian premiere of Les Miserables, and guest-starred on all major U.S. and Canadian networks. Awards include the Critic's Choice Award for Intimate Exchanges at Dallas Theater Center, and a Best Actor nomination for his performance in the world premiere of The Coronation Voyage. He has directed several Canadian premieres and was the resident director for Cirque du Soleil's 'O' in Las Vegas. A recipient of the Lunt-Fontanne Fellowship for master actor/teachers, Mr. Waite holds a BFA in Acting and a MFA in Directing, and is currently an adjunct professor for both the University of Houston's Graduate Program in Theatre Education and BFA Theatre Program. His private students attend Juilliard, Yale, The Royal Scottish Academy, The Stella Adler School, as well as Stage Door, Interlochen, and Houston's High School for the Performing Arts.

Sanford Robbins (Director) directed the 2003 Alley production of You Can't Take It with You. He is the founder and Producing Artistic Director of the Resident Ensemble Players (REP) in Delaware. Theatres for which he has directed include the Oregon Shakespearean Festival, Utah Shakespearean Festival, Indiana Repertory Theatre, Illinois Shakespeare Festival, Los Angeles Shakespeare Festival, and American Players Theatre, as well as multiple productions for the Milwaukee Repertory Theatre, where he served for several years as a resident director and remains a frequent guest director, most recently for Cyrano de Bergerac and Lombardi. He has directed the international premieres of Sam Shepard's plays for The National Theatres of several foreign countries, including Buried Child for the Moscow Art Theatre Studio and The National Theatre of Cyprus. His production of Shepard's The Tooth of Crime received the Thalia Award for Best Production in Finland, an award won the previous year by Ingmar Bergman. Mr. Robbins also serves professional theatres as a text and verse speaking coach for Shakespeare and other classic plays, including for the Alley Theatre's 2004 production of Hamlet. He is the founder and Director of Training for the University of Delaware Professional Theatre Training Program (PTTP), which is ranked by U.S. News and World Report as one of the top 10 theatre training programs in America and by Hollywood Reporter as one of the 25 best theatre training programs in the English-speaking world. Sandy has taught acting, voice, verse speaking, and period style at Carnegie-Mellon University, Los Angeles City College, and The American Academy of Dramatic Arts.

Kevin Rigdon (Scenic and Lighting Design) is an Associate Director for Design for the Alley Theatre. For the Alley, he has created scenic, lighting, and costume designs for more than 50 productions, including What We're Up Against, The Seagull, The Monster at the Door, August: Osage County, A Behanding in Spokane, St. Nicholas, Intelligence-Slave, Mrs. Mannerly, Our Town, The Crucifer of Blood, Mauritius, Secret Order, The Unexpected Guest, Underneath the Lintel, The Lieutenant of Inishmore, The Scene, Death on the Nile, The Clean House, Subject to Fits, Orson's Shadow, The Pillowman, Glengarry Glen Ross, The Crucible, After the Fall, Life X 3,Topdog/Underdog, Proof, The Greeks, Twelfth Night, In the Jungle of Cities, among manyothers. He has designed the Broadwayproductions of One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest, The Old Neighborhood, Buried Child, The Rise and Fall of Little Voice, The Song of Jacob Zulu, A Streetcar Named Desire, The Grapes of Wrath, Our Town, Speed-the-Plow, Glengarry Glen Ross, The Caretaker and Ghetto. His Off-Broadway credits include Oleanna, Distant Fire, Ricky Jay and His 52 Assistants, Orphans, Balm in Gilead, And a Nightingale Sang…, Edmond and True West. His designs have been seen in the London productions of Waiting for Godot, You Never Can Tell, American Buffalo, The Man Who Came to Dinner, Speed-the-Plow, The Grapes of Wrath and Orphans. He has designed more than 110 productions for Steppenwolf Theatre in Chicago, and has designed for organizations including The Peter Hall Company, The Kennedy Center, American Repertory Theatre, The Goodman Theatre, The Center Theatre Group, The Festival of Sydney, and The Cameri Theatre of Tel-Aviv, among others. He is the recipient of two Tony Award nominations, two American Theatre Wing Design awards, and seven Joseph Jefferson awards among many others. Kevin is the Moores Professor of Theatre and head of graduate design at the University of Houston.

Blair Gulledge (Costume Design) previously designed And Then There Were None, Intelligence-Slave, Mrs. Mannerly, The Crucifer of Blood, and Underneath the Lintel at The Alley Theatre as well as Smudge with The Landing Theatre Company, Charley's Aunt with The Unity Theatre, A Brave No World for The Kennedy Center, Comedy of Errors for the Illuminations summer series in Manteo ,N.C., Breaking the Code with The University of Colorado, and A Christmas Carol with Casper College. Blair has also assisted in costume design at The Santa Fe Opera and Goodspeed Musicals. She has produced costume crafts with The Santa Fe Opera, The North Carolina Shakespeare Festival, and Chautauqua Opera. Blair holds a MFA from The University of North Carolina School of the Arts. Over the past five years she has enjoyed a position as a resident costume design assistant with the Alley Theatre, facilitating the design process in over 20 shows.

Pierre Dupree (Sound Design) is the Sound Supervisor at the Alley Theatre, where he has previously designed And Then There Were None, August: Osage County, A Behanding in Spokane, The Mousetrap, Intelligence-Slave, The Crucifer of Blood, The Man Who Came to Dinner, The Santaland Diaries, and Secret Order.

CAPTIONED PERFORMANCE
Sunday, September 2, 2:30 p.m.
The Alley Theatre offers access services for our deaf or hard of hearing and sight-impaired patrons. Audio Description is provided for each Hubbard Stage production and Open Captioning is offered for every Hubbard Stage and Neuhaus Stage production. To ensure that your seats will accommodate your needs, please call the box office 713.220.5700 when ordering tickets to this performance. Discounted tickets are available for groups of 10 or more.

TALKBACK
Tuesday, September 4, 7:30 p.m.
Members of the cast return to the stage following the performance to take questions from the audience. TalkBacks are led by a member of the Alley Artistic Staff.

 

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