Harriet Harris, Simon Jones Lead Guthrie Theater's HAY FEVER, Opens 3/10

The Guthrie Theater today announced complete casting for its first-ever production of Hay Fever, Noël Coward's sensational and highly entertaining comedy of manners, playing March 10 – April 22, 2012, on the Wurtele Thrust Stage.

British director Christopher Luscombe (Shakespeare's Globe 2008 production and 2010 U.S. and U.K. tour of The Merry Wives of Windsor) makes his Guthrie debut directing this 1920s comedy of manners about a family whose theatrical excesses torment a group of unsuspecting visitors.

Television, film and stage actress Harriet Harris (Television: "Desperate Housewives" and "Frasier;" Film: "Nurse Betty," "Memento;" Guthrie: The Glass Menagerie, A Midsummer Night's Dream; Broadway: Thoroughly Modern Millie) will lead the cast as Judith Bliss-the matriarch of the peculiar Bliss family. Rounding out the unusual family are Simon Jones as the Bliss family patriarch David (Broadway: Blithe Spirit; Guthrie: Shadowlands, The Home Place), John Skelley as Simon (Guthrie: Charley's Aunt) and Cat Walleck in her Guthrie debut as Sorel.

About the show: "Hay Fever is set in the Bliss family's British country home. The eccentric Blisses - Judith (Harris), a recently retired stage actress, David (Jones), a self-absorbed novelist, and their two equally unconventional children (Skelley and Walleck) - live in a world where reality slides easily into fiction. Upon entering this world, the unfortunate weekend guests - a proper diplomat (Matt Sullivan), a shy flapper (Heidi Bakke), an athletic boxer (John Catron, Guthrie: A Christmas Carol) and a fashionable sophisticate (ChariTy Jones, Guthrie: A Christmas Carol, M. Butterfly) - are repeatedly thrown into melodramatic scenes wherein their hosts profess emotions and react to situations that do not really exist. The resulting comedic chaos ends only when the tortured visitors tiptoe out the door."

The farce also features the talents of Anna Hanson as Amy and Torsten Johnson as William. Barbara Bryne rounds out the cast as Judith's former dresser and current housekeeper, Clara-a role that she played on Broadway in 1985.

"It's very English," Luscombe said when asked about the play. "It's very pastoral, very much in the English comic tradition. What's exciting here is doing it with a fresh American cast. It's sophisticated, ironic, outrageous," continued Luscombe. "And the real star is Noël Coward."

The artistic team includes Janet Bird (Set and Costume Designer), Philip S. Rosenberg (Lighting Designer), Reid Rejsa (Sound Designer), D'Arcy Smith (Voice and Dialect Coach), Carla Steen (Dramaturg), Marcela Lorca (Movement), Chris A. Code (Stage Manager) and Michele Harms (Assistant Stage Manager).

Hay Fever begins preview performances on March 10, opens March 16 and continues through April 22, 2012, on the Wurtele Thrust Stage at the Guthrie Theater. Single tickets start at $24 and are now on sale through the Guthrie Box Office at 612.377.2224, toll-free 877.44.STAGE, 612.225.6244 (Group Sales) and online at www.guthrietheater.org.

The GUTHRIE THEATER (Joe Dowling, Director) was founded by Sir Tyrone Guthrie in 1963 and is an American center for theater performance, production, education and professional training. The Tony Award-winning Guthrie Theater is dedicated to producing the great works of dramatic literature, developing the work of contemporary playwrights and cultivating the next generation of theater artists. With annual attendance of nearly 500,000 people, the Guthrie Theater presents a mix of classic plays and contemporary work on its three stages. Under the artistic leadership of Joe Dowling since 1995, the Guthrie continues to set a national standard for excellence in theatrical production and performance. In 2006, the Guthrie opened its new home on the banks of the Mississippi River in Minneapolis. Designed by Pritzker Prize-winning architect Jean Nouvel, the Guthrie Theater houses three state-of-the-art stages, production facilities, classrooms and dramatic public lobbies. www.guthrietheater.org

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