Pill & Schreiber to Star in LaBute's 'reasons to be pretty' at MCC

MCC Theater has announced casting for the World Premiere of Neil LaBute's bristling new comic drama reasons to be pretty and Terry Kinney will direct.  The play marks Kinney's directorial return to the New York stage where he was last represented by Steppenwolf Theatre Company's Tony Award-winning revival of One Flew Over The Cuckoo's Nest.

The complete cast includes Piper Perabo (as Carly), Alison Pill (Steph), Thomas Sadoski (Greg) and Pablo Schreiber (Kent).

reasons to be pretty marks the sixth collaboration between MCC Theater and LaBute, who is MCC's Resident Playwright.  This new work puts a final, ferocious cap on a trilogy of plays that began with The Shape of Things and Fat Pig (which MCC also premiered).  Performances of the four-character play begin at the Lucille Lortel Theatre (121 Christopher Street) on May 14 and will continue through July 5, with an opening night set for Monday, June 2, 2008.

"America's obsession with physical beauty is confronted headlong in this brutal and exhilarating new play.  In reasons to be pretty, Greg's tight-knit social circle is thrown into turmoil when his offhanded remarks about a female coworker's pretty face (and his girlfriend's lack thereof) get back to said girlfriend.  But that's just the beginning.  Greg's best buddy Kent, and Kent's wife Carly also enter into the picture and the emotional equation becomes exponentially more complicated.  As their relationship crumbles, their friends are pulled into the fray and all are forced to confront a sea of deceit, infidelity and betrayed trust in their journey to answer that oh-so-American question: How much is pretty worth?" describe press notes.

Individual tickets will be available through www.ticketcentral.com or by calling (212) 279-4200 once an on-sale date for the general public has been announced.

MCC's current production, Grace, by Mick Gordon and AC Grayling and featuring Lynn Redgrave, ends its run this Saturday, March 8.

Piper Perabo (Carly) was seen in Jerry Bruckheimer's Coyote Ugly, Christopher Nolan's The Prestige and Because I Said So and First Snow. She recently finished filming Carriers and can next be seen in The Heaven Project, and South of the Border.

Alison Pill (Steph) recently starred in MTC's Off-Broadway hits Blackbird for which she received Outer Critics Circle and Drama League nominations and Mauritius.  She was nominated for a Tony Award for her Broadway debut in The Lieutenant of Inishmore and for a Lucille Lortel Award for On the Mountain.  She won a Drama Desk Award for Outstanding Ensemble in the U.S. premiere of The Distance from Here at MCC, and starred in an Off-Broadway run of None of the Above.  Recent film work includes Dan in Real Life, Dear Wendy, Confessions of a Teenage Drama Queen, Pieces of April and the upcoming Milk.  Television includes "The Book of Daniel" (NBC) and "Life With Judy Garland: Me and My Shadows."

Thomas Sadoski (Greg) has appeared on Broadway in Reckless (Manhattan Theater Club/Second Stage). Off-Broadway: This Is Our Youth, Gemini, All This Intimacy (Second Stage); Stay, Where We're Born (Rattlestick); The Joke (Studio Dante); The Mistakes Madeline Made (Naked Angels); Jump/Cut (The Women's Project); The General From America (Theater For A New Audience); Thunderbird (Cherry Lane).

Pablo Schreiber (Kent) received a Tony Award nomination for his Broadway debut in Awake and Sing! Other theater credits include Dying City, Mr. Marmalade, Manuscript, Sin: A Cardinal Deposed, Blood Orange and Julius Caesar (New York Shakespeare Festival).

For tickets and information visit www.MCCTheater.org.

Alison Pill (photo by Walter McBride / Retna Ltd)