FIVE PRESIDENTS Begins Tonight at Bay Street Theater

Bay Street Theater has announced that FIVE PRESIDENTS, the new play by Emmy Award-winning writer Rick Cleveland (Six Feet Under, The West Wing, and House of Cards), will extend its run for an additional week due to popular demand. The production will now run from tonight, June 23-July 19.

FIVE PRESIDENTS is a funny and incisive new drama is about the meeting of America's most exclusive club - the ex-presidents. Obliged to gather together on the day of Richard Nixon's funeral, four "exes" and one "current" vent frustrations, revisit old grievances, and reveal the toll that it takes on any person foolish enough to seek the highest office in the land.

Bay Street Theater is also pleased to announce the cast and full creative team of FIVE PRESDIENTS. Mark Clements directs. The cast stars John Bolger (Twelve Angry Men, South Pacific, Macbeth), Mark Jacoby (Ragtime, Show Boat, Sweeny Todd), Martin L'Herault (Godspell, Of Mice and Men, The Merchant of Venice), Reese Madigan (Cat on a Hot Tin Roof, Death of a Salesman), Steve Sheridan (Curb Your Enthusiasm, The Drew Carey Show), Britt Whittle (30 Rock, Glass Menagerie).

The production team includes Todd Edward Ivins (Set Designer), Jesse Klug (Lighting Designer), Brian Jerome Peterson (Sound Designer), Mary Folino (Costume Designer), Lauren Wilde (Makeup Designer), and Richelle Harrington Calin (Production Stage Manager).

This production was originally produced at the Arizona Theatre Company and the Milwaukee Repertory Theater and was commissioned by Milwaukee Repertory Theater.

A "Pay What You Can" performance will be on June 23 at 7 pm. "PWYC" tickets are limited and will be available at the Box Office beginning at 11 am on June 23. Previews are sponsored by Peconic Landing.

STUDENT SUNDAY MATINEES returns this summer for the Mainstage Season, High School and College students can receive (1) FREE admission for the 2pm Sunday performance of FIVE PRESIDENTS. Photo ID must be shown.

"30 UNDER 30" also returns this year. If you are under the age of 30, you can attend the Mainstage performance for just $30. Photo ID must be shown.

Returning this year is TALKBACK TUESDAY with Bay Street's Artistic Director, Scott Schwartz, and members of the FIVE PRESIDENTS cast following each Tuesday performance except for preview week.

Rick Cleveland (playwright) an Emmy-winning writer/ producer whose television credits include The West Wing, Six Feet Under, Mad Men, Nurse Jackie, and House of Cards. Mr. Cleveland's stage play Jerry and Tom was adapted into a feature film and was an official selection at both the Sundance and Toronto Film Festivals, and he cowrote the screenplay for the motion picture adaptation of John Grisham's Runaway Jury, which starred John Cusack, Rachel Weisz, Gene Hackman and Dustin Hoffman. Mr. Cleveland performed his one man show My Buddy Bill at the Berkshire Theatre Festival, Goodman Theatre in Chicago, Victory Gardens Theater in Chicago, Geffen Playhouse in Los Angeles, and won the Best Solo Performance Award at the HBO Comedy Arts Festival in Aspen in 2006. He also performed the piece at the 92nd Street Y in New York City for a one-hour Comedy Central special in 2007. As a playwright, Mr. Cleveland has earned playwriting grants and fellowships from the National Endowment for the Arts, the Rockefeller Foundation and the Kennedy Center's Fund for New American Plays. He was invited to the National Playwrights' Conference at the Eugene O'Neill Theater Center twice, in 1991 and 1993, and is a Founding Member of American Blues Theatre, Chicago's second oldest ensemble-based theatre company, as well as a Founding Member of the Ojai Playwrights Conference. He received his MFA from the University of Iowa's Playwrights' Workshop in 1995. Several of his plays have been published by Samuel French and Dramatists Play Service, and have been produced around the country, as well as in the U.K., Germany, Scotland, Moscow, Mexico City and Istanbul. Mr. Cleveland has been a freelance commentator for NPR's All Things Considered as well as a contributor to Huffingtonpost.com, and as a freelance journalist his writing has appeared in the Chicago Tribune, the Los Angeles Times and Outside Magazine.

Mark Clements (Director) Mark is proud to make his Bay Street debut with Five Presidents. Mark began his tenure as Milwaukee Rep's Artistic Director with the 2010/11 season. He is an award-winning international theater director whose work has appeared in over 100 major theaters throughout Europe and the United States. Recent productions include: Five Presidents, The Color Purple, The History of Invulnerability, End of the Rainbow, Ragtime, Clybourne Park, Assassins, Othello, Next to Normal, Death of a Salesman, Bombshells and Cabaret at The Rep; Oliver!, Born Yesterday, Great Expectations, LES MISERABLES (2008 Barrymore Award - Best Production of a Musical) and Of Mice and Men (2007 Barrymore Award - Best Director and Best Production of a Play), all for Walnut Street Theatre, Philadelphia; The Milliner (Off -Broadway, World Premiere), CSC, New York; My Fair Lady, Copenhagen; The Browning Version (Barclays/TMA Regional Theatre Award) at Derby Playhouse and Blunt Speaking (World Premiere), Chichester Festival Theatre U.K. and Lucille Lortel Theatre, New York. Other productions include: Speaking in Tongues (U.S. Premiere), Roundabout Theatre Company; Speaking in Tongues (European Premiere; Barclays/TMA Best Director Nomination), Hampstead Theatre, London; Creator/Director - Soul Train, West End and three U.K. national tours; and the U.K. national tours of The Glass Menagerie, The Gingerbread Lady and Love & Marriage, all for Bath Theatre Royal productions. Mark served as an Associate Artistic Director for Moving Theatre Company, the production company founded by Vanessa and Corin Redgrave. He has also been Associate Director for New End Theatre and New Players Theatre, both in London, Royal Theatre in Northampton and Torch Theatre in Wales. Additionally, Mark served as Artistic Director of the award winning Derby Playhouse in the U.K. from 1992 to 2002. He serves on the National Advisory Board for the Lunt-Fontanne Fellowship Program at Ten Chimneys.

John Bolger (Gerald Ford) Mendelssohn's Midsummer Night's Dream, Baltimore Symphony Orchestra, Marin Alsop conductor; Outside Mullingar, Good People, Twelve Angry Men, Lips Together Teeth Apart, George St. Playhouse; South Pacific, National Tour; Dirty Dancing, National Tour; The Real Thing, Anthony and Cleopatra, The Old Globe; Richard the III, Hartford Stage; Light Up the Sky, The Roundabout; That Face, MYC; Twelfth Night, As You Like It, Macbeth, The Sea Plays, Ages of Man, Willow Cabin Theatre Co. TV: The Blacklist, Elementary, Person of Interest, Royal Pains, The Black Donnelly's, Law and Order, Sex and the City, NYPD Blue, General Hospital. Film: The Union, Black and White, Just Looking, Parting Glances.

Mark Jacoby (George Herbert Walker Bush) happily returns to the Bay Street, having previously appeared here in Rumble in the Ring. His Broadway roles include Walter Hobbs in Elf, Judge Turpin in Sweeney Todd, Padre Perez in Man of La Mancha, Father in Ragtime, Gaylord Ravenal in Show Boat (Tony, Outer Critics, and Joseph Jefferson Award nominations), Baron von Gaigern in Grand Hotel, and Vittorio Vidal in Sweet Charity (Theatre World Award). Also in New York: Critical Darling for The New Group, Sitting Pretty for The Hypothetical Theatre, and Enter the Guardsman for The Vineyard Theatre (Drama Desk nomination). Mark played The Wizard of Oz in the First National Tour of Wicked and was seen regionally in The Play's the Thing (Shakespeare Theatre of New Jersey), Life x 3 (Repertory Theatre of St. Louis), Sleuth (Maltz-Jupiter Theatre), Fiddler on the Roof (Walnut Street Theatre/ Barrymore Award), The Visit (Goodman and Signature Theatres/ Helen Hayes Nomination), and Nine (Joseph Jefferson Award) as well as in the World Premieres of The Nutty Professor (Southern Stage Productions), Secondhand Lions (Fifth Avenue Theatre), and Leading Ladies (Alley Theatre, Cleveland Playhouse). On TV, Mr. Jacoby has been seen on all 3 Law & Order's and by viewers of New York's now-lost soap operas on The Guiding Light, As the World Turns, One Life to Live, and All My Children.

Martin L'Herault (Jimmy Carter) is happy to be making his Bay Street Theater debut! Previous New York credits include Jimmy Bulkeley in Bonus Army and New York Comedy Repertory Ensemble (Founding Member). Regional credits include Jacob Smith in Sleep in Safety: The Death of Octavia Hatcher (Jenny Wiley Theatre); Lee in True West and George in Of Mice and Men (The Gard Theatre); Bob Ewell in To Kill a Mockingbird (Children's Theatre of Madison); Pseudolus in A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum and Jesus in Godspell (Dobama West); and Launcelot Gobbo in The Merchant of Venice (Wisconsin Shakespeare Festival). Television credits include Judge Chillingworth on A Crime to Remember and Philip Bates on I'd Kill for You. Lifetime credits include Father of Kimberly L'Herault. martinlherault.com

Reese Madigan (Special Agent Michael Kirby) Reese Madigan is thrilled to be back at Bay Street having appeared as John in David Mamet's A Life in the Theater, directed by Bob Kalfin . B'way: Abe Lincoln in Illinois, Lincoln Center, Holiday, Circle in the Square; Off B'way : Richard II, Richard III, Henry IV parts 1 &2, Troilus and Cressida (workshop), The Public Theatre; Night and Her Stars, Manhattan Theatre Club, Adult Entertainment, Variety Arts, and The Appearance of Impropriety, Judith Anderson Theatre. Regional credits: Reese is proud to be an Associate Artist at The Milwaukee Repertory Theatre, where he's appeared in 14 plays from Cat on a Hot Tin Roof (Brick), Death of a Salesman (Biff), to Venus in Furs, (Thomas); Actors Theatre of Louisville; Arena Stage; The Shakespeare Theatre; CENTERSTAGE, Baltimore (The Hostage, She Stoops to Conquer, Rosencrantz and Guildenstern..., 'Tis Pity She's A Whore), Cincinnati Playhouse, Virginia Stage Company, Arizona Theatre Company, San Jose Rep, Contemporary American Theatre Festival, Shakespeare on the Sound, Door Shakespeare, Next Act Theatre, Renaissance Theatreworks; Indiana Rep. Recent TV: Elementary, The Black Box. Film: American Shaolin. Many thanks to Mark.

Steve Sheridan (Ronald Reagan) Steve is delighted to be appearing for the first time at Bay Street Theater in Five Presidents. Steve is an alumnus of Chicago's famed theater, The Second City, where he wrote and performed in a number of hit shows, including Jean-Paul Sartre and Ringo (Joseph Jefferson Award nomination). His stage work in Los Angeles garnered him awards from LA Weekly and Drama-Logue for both acting and playwriting. Film credits include Nothing in Common and Vice Versa. His television work includes appearances on Curb Your Enthusiasm, The Drew Carey Show and Malcolm in the Middle. Steve studied theater at Dartmouth College.

Brit Whittle (Bill Clinton) New York: The Mnemonist of Dutchess County (World Premiere), Attic Theater Company at Theater Row, Lifeline (World Premiere), Abingdon Theatre Company, Lyric is Waiting (World Premiere), kef productions, Wonderful World Attic Theater Company at Theater Row, JB 78th Street Theater Lab. Regional: Five Presidents (World Premiere) at Milwaukee Rep and Arizona Theater Company, North of the Boulevard and One Night at Contemporary American Theater Festival (WV), June Moon, Dulcy, and Theophilus North Dorset Theatre (VT), Grapes of Wrath, The Laramie Project Alliance Theatre. Art, God of Carnage Gulfshore Playhouse (FL), Cobb Riverside Theatre Company (FL), Laughing Stock, Enchanted April, To Kill a Mockingbird Asolo Theatre (FL). Vincent in Brixton, Glass Menagerie Banyan Theater (FL). TV: American Odyssey, Younger, The Blacklist, Believe, The Carrie Diaries, Law & Order: SVU, Blue Bloods, Mercy, 30 Rock, All My Children, One Life to Live, Guiding Light, As the World Turns Film: The Adjustment Bureau, Say Yes Quickly, Red Rover, Odessa, December Thaw, and House of Lords.

The 2015 Mainstage Season is sponsored in part by New York State through the generosity of Assemblyman Fred Thiele and State Senator Kenneth P. LaValle; the New York State Council on The Arts, a State Agency; Town of Southampton; The Harold and Mimi Steinberg Charitable Trust; The Shubert Foundation; and fully or partially funded by the Suffolk County Executive's Office. Preview weeks for all three productions are sponsored by Peconic Landing. Also support from Beach Magazine. Support for new work comes from The Scott Schwartz New Development Fund and the Joseph Stein New Musical Fund.

To purchase a tickets for Five Presidents, log on to www.baystreet.org or call the Box Office at 631-725-9500. For more information about Bay Street Theater log on to www.baystreet.org.

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