Portia Joins Cast of MTC's 'RUINED' 5/26

Manhattan Theatre Club is pleased to announced that Drama Desk Award nominee Portia will join the cast of RUINED, the Pulitzer Prize winning play by Lynn Nottage, on Tuesday, May 26 at MTC at New York City Center - Stage I (131 West 55th Street).

Portia will assume the role of ‘Mama Nadi,' which is currently played by Saidah Arrika Ekulona. Ekulona will play her final performance as ‘Mama Nadi' on Sunday, May 17. Ekulona is departing RUINED to fulfill an earlier professional commitment.

Portia received a Drama Desk Award nomination for Outstanding Featured Actress in a Play for Stephen Belber's McReele. She also appeared in the acclaimed production of Stephen Adly Guirgis' Our Lady of 121st Street for which she received Lucille Lortel, Drama League, and AUDELCO Award nominations.

During the week beginning Monday, May 18, until Portia assumes the role on May 26, Victoire Charles, the current standby for ‘Mama Nadi' will play the role.

RUINED is the most acclaimed new play of 2009, having received the 2009 Pulitzer Prize for Drama, the Best Play award from the New York Drama Critics Circle, two Lucille Lortel Award including Outstanding Play, the Outer Critics Circle Award for Outstanding Off-Broadway Play, a Theatre World Award, a Clarence Derwent Award, five Drama Desk Award nominations including Outstanding New Play, and two Drama League nominations including Distinguished Production of a Play.

Tickets for the Manhattan Theatre Club and Goodman Theatre co-production of RUINED are currently on sale through June 28 at MTC at New York City Center - Stage I (131 West 55th Street).

From Lynn Nottage, the Obie Award-winning author of such plays as Fabulation and Intimate Apparel and director Kate Whoriskey (The Piano Teacher, Fabulation), comes this haunting, probing work about the resilience of the human spirit during times of war. Set in a small mining town in Democratic Republic of Congo, this powerful play follows Mama Nadi (Portia), a shrewd businesswoman in a land torn apart by civil war. But is she protecting or profiting by the women she shelters? How far will she go to survive? Can a price be placed on a human life?

Tickets for RUINED are available via New York City Center Box Office (131 West 55th Street), CityTix® (212-581-1212) and www.nycitycenter.org.
Tickets for RUINED are $75.

PORTIA (Mama Nadi).Theatre credits include Zooman and the Sign (Signature Theater Co.), The Member of The Wedding (The Young Vic.), McReele (Roundabout), The Treatment (The Culture Project), No Child... (TheaterWorks), Something You Did (Primary Stages), Frankie & Johnny (Hartford Stage Company), Ride Down Mt. Morgan (Broadway), Our Lady of 121st St. (dir. Philip Seymour Hoffman), Merchant of Venice (dir. Peter Sellars). Television: "Ugly Betty," "Lipstick Jungle," "30 Rock," "Law & Order," "Law & Order: CI," "Rescue Me," "Whoopie!" Features: The Greatest, The Messenger, Please Give, Synecdoche New York, and Freedomland. Portia is a member of AEA; the LAByrinth Theater Company.

 

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