Pandora Productions Announces May Lineup Beginning With BENT 5/7

Pandora Productions is pleased to announce its upcoming repertory theatre lineup for May with two captivating productions that will conclude the 2008-2009 Pandora season.

Pandora's revival of Bent opens Thursday evening, May 7. Bent is an unforgettable, raw, and emotional look at the upside down world of homosexuality throughout all classes of society during World War II. While the many who were too poor or too naïve ended up in concentration camps, others used their money or their power to stay out of harm's way. Lead character Max occupies a middle spot in this spectrum between resistance and collaboration, as he tries to survive against all odds, even enduring the travails of a concentration camp, all the time undergoing a profound transition and the realization that one cannot always change one's luck through sheer willpower. Bent debuted in London's West End in 1979 and at the time was the first acknowledgment popular culture made about gay men as victims of the Holocaust. In the three decades since, it has helped pave the way for more historical research and documentaries to be released about the fate of homosexuals under Nazi Germany.

Bent is directed by Michael Drury with Phil Howell as Max, and features Alden Sowder, Corey Macon Long, Dan Canon, James Butterfield, Brent Gettelfinger, J.C. Nixon, Tim Kitchen and Adam Caperton. Performances on May 7, 8, 9, 10, 22, 24 at 7:30 p.m., and Sunday, May 10 at 2:00 p.m.

I Am My Own Wife, the riveting Pulitzer Prize-winning story of author Doug Wright's interviews with Charlotte von Mahlsdorf, a real-life German transvestite caught up in the great European dramas of the 20th century, opens Thursday evening, May 14. Über-survivor Charlotte, born as Lothar Berfelde, a man, lived through the Nazi regime and its replacement in East Germany, the Soviet-dominated Communist dictatorship, openly as a transvestite. An almost-obsessive predilection to collect the mementos of her life (and others') throughout the years, Charlotte Went on to run a small, yet fantastic museum of memorabilia in what is now the former East Berlin. A one man tour de force, the play premiered in 2003 at Playwrights Horizons in New York. It opened on Broadway later that year and won the 2004 Tony Award for Best Play.

Directed by Rand Harmon of Specific Gravity Company, I Am My Own Wife stars Roger Fristoe, former film and theatre critic for The Courier-Journal. Fristoe is the first local actor to perform I Am My Own Wife, a full-length, two-act play considered to be one of the most challenging vehicles for an actor in contemporary American theater. In addition to playing Charlotte and the playwright, Fristoe performs more than 30 other roles ranging from a Texan journalist to a German victim of Stasi imprisonment and the zany host of a madcap TV show. Fristoe spent three years studying this project and his research took him to Mahlsdorf, which had been part of Eastern Berlin before the infamous wall was torn down. There he was able to walk the streets where Charlotte had gathered her precious antiques and to speak with people who had known her. Fristoe also visited Charlotte's beloved Grunderzeit museum, where he could view her priceless furniture collection, listen to her record collection on early Edison sound machines and see the bed in which she slept. Performances on May 14, 15, 16, 17, 21, 23 at 7:30 p.m. and Saturday,

May 16 at 2:00 p.m.

Both shows will be performed at the Historic Henry Clay Bunbury Theatre, 604 South Third Street, Downtown Louisville. Running time for each show is approximately 2 hours with intermission. Tickets may be purchased in advance for $15 by visiting www.PandoraProds.org or calling 502.216.5502; $17 day of show.

Pandora Productions, founded in Louisville, Kentucky in 1995, represents the transformational power of theatre. Its mission is to entertain, engage and inspire its audience, the community, and the greater human communities by presenting bold, cutting-edge theatrical productions that reveal the commonality of all people while investigating the diversity of human nature, particularly the nature of sexual orientation, through artistic expression. Pandora Productions is a 501(c)3 tax exempt organization that benefits largely from the generosity of the community. Donations are encouraged and welcomed, in any amount, whether one dollar or a thousand. Please visit www.PandoraProds.org for more information.

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