SORDID LIVES, FALSETTOS, VICTOR/VICTORIA and More Set for Pandora Productions' 2017-18 Season; Cast Announced!

Pandora Productions has announced the 2017-2018 Season, which centers around the stories of family. The season includes: Sordid Lives; Falsettos; Harbor; Victor/Victoria and Die, Mommie Die! (full show descriptions, performance dates, directors, cast as well as composers, lyricists and playwrights are listed below!).

Casting for the season is now complete and Pandora Productions, in the spirit of our community theatre roots, is proud that all roles have been cast with unique actors. Every role this season will be played by an actor not seen otherwise in the season. This, we believe, increases the visibility of actors who might not have a chance at a role and opens up our productions to a whole new audience. Louisville is blessed with so many talented actors and Pandora is proud to be a part of such a thriving arts community and excited to feature the talents of as many as possible, some new to us, for the 2017-2018 Season. (*denotes an actor new to Pandora Productions)

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We open our season with the hilarious, over-the-top comedy Sordid Lives by Del Shores under the leadership of Guest Director Jason Cooper.

Performances: September 14, 15, 16, 21, 22, 23 @ 7:30 p; 17 @ 5:30 p; & 24 @ 2:00 p

Peggy has died in a motel room under questionable circumstances. As sisters Latrelle and LaVonda cope with this tragi-scandal, they reconsider the plight of Peggy's flamboyant transvestite son, their Brother Boy, whom Peggy slapped into an insane asylum 20 years ago. Meanwhile, Latrelle's son Ty, a New York-based actor, faces the prospect of "coming out" to his mother, LaVonda's best friend Noleta, waxes furious about husband G.W.'s infidelity, Brother Boy tries to pacify a power-mad therapist intent upon his "de-homosexualization," as Peggy's sister Sissy, the sweet moral center of the piece, struggles with severe cigarette withdrawal.

SISSY Rena Cherry Brown*

NOLETA Jessica Tanselle*

LATRELLE Susan McNeese-Lynch

LA VONDA Glenna Godsey*

TY Jake Minton*

G.W. Craig Nolan Highley*

WARDELL Mike Slaton

ODELL John Aurelius*

JUANITA Jessica Sharpenstein*

BROTHER BOY Shane Whitehead

DR. EVE Jennifer Poliskie

BITSY MAE Mandi Elkins Hutchins

REV. BARNES Eric Sharp

PEGGY Emily Miller*

Pandora's Artistic Director returns to Direct William Finn and James Lapine's Falsettos. A seamless pairing of March of the Falsettos and Falsettoland, acclaimed off-Broadway musicals written nearly a decade apart, Falsettos won 1992 Tony Awards for best book and best musical score.Returning after a successful collaboration with Drury on Hedwig & The Angry Inch are Michael Vettraino as Musical Director and Alfred Dale Jones, Jr. as Choreographer.

Performances: November 9, 10, 11, 16, 17, 18 @ 7:30 p; 12 @ 5:30 p; & 19 @ 2:00 p

Marvin struggles to create a 'tight knit family' out of his eclectic array of core relationships after he leaves his wife and young son to live with another man. His ex-wife marries his psychiatrist, and Marvin ends up alone. Two years later, Marvin is reunited with his lover on the eve of his son's bar mitzvah, just as AIDS is beginning its insidious spread and he is forced to reckon with his own views on love, responsibility, and what it means to be a man. At once an intimate family drama and neurotic urban comedy, but also a keenly observed meditation on the new American Family.

MARVIN Alex Cooper
TRINA Lauren McCombs
JASON Roman Tate*
WHIZZER Andrew Newton
MENDEL Ken Robinson
CHARLOTTE Hannegan Roseberry*
CORDELIA Nicole Casteel*

With the new year, Pandora brings the best of off-Broadway with Harbor by Chad Beguelin. Drury directs this serio-comedy with performances: January 11, 12, 13, 18, 19, 20 @ 7:30 p; 14 @ 5:30p; & 21 @ 2:00 p

Ted and Kevin are a newly-wed couple whose seemingly idyllic life in an affluent subset of the Hamptons is disrupted when Kevin's estranged, ne'er-do-well sister Donna and 15-year-old niece Lottie arrive unannounced at their Sag Harbor home. The bonds between kith and kin are strained and Kevin and Ted's already uneven relationship is tested when the cash-strapped Donna reveals she is pregnant and begins pressuring the couple into raising her child themselves. Alternately biting and touching, this comedy is about the constantly shifting nature of the meaning of family.

KEVIN Jacob Cooper

TED David Galloway

DONNA Lauren Argo

LOTTIE Brooklyn Durs*

In a rare appearance, the company's Artistic Director takes the stage as Pandora pushes her own boundaries, bursting into Spring 2018 with the ambitious Victor/Victoria. This musical with book by Blake Edwards, music by Henry Mancini & Frank Wildhorn, lyrics by Leslie Bricusse & Frank Wildhorn will be guided by Guest Director James Bohr with Musical Direction by Phillip Morgan and Choreography by Frank Goodloe.

Performances: March 15, 16, 17, 22, 23, 24 @ 7:30 p; 18 @ 5:30 p; & 25 @ 2:00 p

Life's complications are both hilarious and touching when refined soprano Victoria finds herself down on her luck in Paris. On the brink of starvation, she is rescued by Toddy who gets a brilliant idea: dress Victoria as a man, and pass her off as a female impersonator. Victoria finds success in her new role, only to fall in love with King Marchan, who in turn, is terrified to find himself falling for a man, and refuses to be believe that "Victor" is a man. Hired detectives, spurned business associates, a crazed showgirl and a sweet bodyguard serve to make Victoria's life a whirlwind of complications.

VICTOR/VICTORIA Julie Allen*

TODDY Michael J. Drury

KING Brent Gettelfinger

NORMA Amanda Kyle Lahti

SQUASH Bryce Wiebe

LABISSE Brad Lambert

CASSELL Rusty Henle

SAL Andy Epstein

RICHARD Isaiah Hein*

DANCERS & ENSEMBLE: Erin Jump*, Marcia Ziegler*, Leila Toba*, Maggie Patton, Paula Lockhart*, Jenna Ryan*, Isaiah Hein*, Andy Epstein, Jonathon Porter, Elliott Talkington*, Gerry Robertson & Sean Patrick

And finally, rounding out the season is another Charles Busch classic, Die, Mommie Die! Directed by Drury with performances: May 10, 11, 12, 17, 18, 19 @ 7:30 p; 13 @ 5:30 p; & 20 @ 2:00 p

Ex-pop singer, Angela, is trapped in a hateful marriage with film producer Sol Sussman. Desperate to find happiness with her younger lover, an out of work TV actor Tony, Angela murders Sol with the aid of a poisoned suppository. Greek tragedy meets Hollywood kitsch as Angela's daughter, Edith, convinces her emotionally disturbed brother, Lance, that they must avenge their father's death by killing their mother. Lance slips some LSD into her after-dinner coffee which reveals some surprises and a twist ending that has the dirty laundry of the Sussman family aired out once and for all.

ANGELA Jack Wallen*

SOL Sean Childress

TONY Michael Lee Stein

BOOTSIE Laura Ellis

EDITH Sabrina Spalding

LANCE Eli Lucas*

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All shows in the 2017-2018 Season will be performed at Pandora Productions' home, The Henry Clay Theatre in the Henry Clay building located at 604 South Third Street, 3rd Floor, Downtown Louisville.

Single tickets are available for $20 in advance and $22 day of show and can be obtained online at www.PandoraProds.org, or via phone at 502.216.5502.

Subscriptions for the 2017-2018 Season are now available: Regular $90, Senior/Student $80 for a 5-show season and represents a 20% savings off the single ticket pricing. Subscribers enjoy free exchanges and first choice on special events. Subscriptions will be available through the run of Sordid Lives.

Pandora Productions was founded in Louisville, Kentucky, in 1995 and represents the transformational power of theatre. Its mission is to entertain, engage and inspire its audiences, 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. Please visit http://PandoraProds.org for more information.

Michael J. Drury, Pandora Productions Producing Artistic Director,has worked as a professional actor for 30+ years throughout the Midwest and is no stranger to Louisville area audiences having appeared with Stage One: Louisville's Children's Theatre, Derby Dinner Playhouse, Music Theatre Louisville, CenterStage, Theatre [502] and the Stephen Foster Drama Association, with whom he also toured Japan and was chosen to remake the official cast recording. He has directed numerous productions at Derby Dinner, Louisville Repertory Company, Clarksville Little Theatre and the Shelby County Community Theatre, in addition to adjudicating at theatre festivals including The Kentucky Theatre Association and The Southeastern Theatre Conference.

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