Red Bull Theater's Starry SCHOOL FOR SCANDAL Opens This Sunday

This Sunday (April 24th) marks the opening of Red Bull Theater (Jesse Berger, Artistic Director) production of Richard Brinsley Sheridan's THE SCHOOL FOR SCANDAL, directed by Marc Vietor, starring Dana Ivey (Tony Award nominee for Butley, The Rivals, The Last Night of Ballyhoo, Sunday in the Park with George, Heartbreak House); Mark Linn-Baker (My Favorite Year, A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum, A Year with Frog and Toad, "Perfect Strangers"); Frances Barber (internationally renowned West End actress: King Lear and The Seagull with Ian McKellen at BAM, the Donmar's Julius Caesar at St Ann's Warehouse, "Doctor Who," Prick Up Your Ears, and the Pet Shop Boys musical Closer to Heaven); and Henry Stram (Titanic, The Grey Zone), along with Helen Cespedes, Christian Conn, Christian DeMarais, Jacob Dresch, Ramsey Faragallah, Ryan Garbayo, Bradley Gibson, Nadine Malouf, Ben Mehl, and Derek Smith ('Tis Pity She's a Whore, The Green Bird - Tony Award nomination).

THE SCHOOL FOR SCANDAL will have scenic design by Anna Louizos (School of Rock; The Mystery of Edwin Drood, In the Heights, High Fidelity - Tony Award nominations), costume design by Andrea Lauer (American Idiot, Bring It On, Brooklynite), lighting design by Russell H. Champa (China Doll, In the Next Room or The Vibrator Play, Julia Sweeney's God Said "Ha!"), sound and music by Greg Pliska (Sylvia, War Horse), original song by Gideon & Hubcap, hair & wig design by Charles G. LaPointe, with choreography by Paul McGill (The Legend of Georgia McBride, Hedwig and the Angry Inch). Stuart Howard served as casting director.

THE SCHOOL FOR SCANDAL will begin its limited engagement Friday April 8th at the Lortel Theater. In this comic masterpiece, Sheridan mercilessly dissects a social network of grotesques, gossips, lustful hypocrites and anonymous assassins of reputation who live in a world without privacy, morality or taste. After sixteen years abroad Oliver Surface returns home incognito to test the true characters of his nephews, Charles (a prodigal, apparently), and Joseph (a paragon, supposedly). Meanwhile he discovers his old friend Peter Teazle has wed a young country wife and is in marital purgatory, being victimized in print and society by a spiteful team of imbeciles and rumor-mongers - Fun for the whole family.

Performances are on now at The Lucille Lortel Theater (121 Christopher Street). Tickets may be ordered online at www.redbulltheater.com or by phone at (212) 352-3101. Tickets for preview performances (April 8th through 23rd) are only $60/$80 for Premium Seats; for performances after opening (April 25th though May 8th), tickets are $80 with Premium Seats available at $100. A limited number of seats for Opening Night Gala Benefit performances are available to the public for $80-$150 with premium seats available at $300.

Red Bull Theater's OBIE Award-winning Revelation Readings (Monday evenings at 7:30pm) presents monthly staged readings of rarely performed classic plays from all eras and cultures. With the Jacobean plays of Shakespeare and his contemporaries as the cornerstone of our mission, Red Bull Theater is dedicated to the exploration and creation of heightened language plays. Revelation Readings provides a unique opportunity to hear these plays performed by many of the finest actors in New York. Future Revelation Readings include Shakespeare's Coriolanus, Burney's The Woman Hater, Shakespeare's Hamlet, Congreve's The Way of the World, and the annual Short New Play Festival, with casts that include Arnie Burton (Irma Vep - Red Bull; Lives of the Saints); Chukwudi Iwuji (Henry VI Trilogy - Royal Shakespeare Company, Tamburlaine, King Lear); Arian Moayed (Bengal Tiger, The Humans), and Nick Westrate (Loot - Red Bull, Casa Valentina), among others.

Subsequent Readings include:

Monday May 2: Shakespeare's Hamlet, directed by Tom Ridgely, featuring Arian Moayed (Tony Award nomination, Bengal Tiger at the Baghdad Zoo); a co-presentation with Waterwell; this provocative dual-language adaptation of Hamlet is set in Arabia on the eve of the first World War and the arrival of the British.

Monday June 27: William Congreve's The Way of the World; do money and marriage mix? The pinnacle of riotous Restoration Comedies, Congreve's play is an unexpectedly moving tale of the trials and tribulations of true love and true riches.

Tickets for Revelation Readings are $42, with Premium Seats available at $64. Become a Member and save on both Readings and Productions! (For complete list of Readings and updated cast information, visit www.redbulltheater.com. Artists subject to change.)

Monday July 25th brings Red Bull's Sixth Annual Short New Play Festival, directed by May Adrales and Evan Yionoulis. Each year, the company selects new works of heightened language and classical themes from today's top established and emerging playwrights. Inspired this year by the theme of "Scandal," the hottest scribes of today will conjure wildly diverse tales, catapulting classical theater into the future. At the Lucille Lortel Theatre, 121 Christopher Street. Tickets will be only $20!

Red Bull Theater, hailed as "the city's gutsiest classical theater" by Time Out New York, is the not-profit Off-Broadway theater company specializing in plays of heightened language. With the Jacobean plays of Shakespeare and his contemporaries as its cornerstone, Red Bull Theater embraces the imagination of theatergoers through intimate, imaginative productions of great classic stories from all eras and cultures.

Red Bull Theater has previously staged productions of Pericles, The Revenger's Tragedy, Edward the Second, Women Beware Women, The Duchess of Malfi, The Witch of Edmonton, The Maids, The Dance of Death, Loot, The Mystery of Irma Vep, Volpone, The Changeling, and Tis Pity She's A Whore. The company's work has been hailed as "the most exciting classical theater in New York" (Time Out New York), "Dynamite!" (The New York Times), "Triumphant" (Associated Press), and "Proof that classical theater can still be surprising after hundreds of years" (Variety).

Red Bull Theater's work has been recognized with multiple Callaway, Drama League, Lucille Lortel, and OBIE Award nominations and Awards. The company has staged over 125 readings through its ongoing Revelation Readings ("Best Play Reading Series"-Village Voice), and has developed new plays of heightened language and classical adaptations through its Cockpit and In-the-Raw workshops. Red Bull reaches out to NYC students through Direct Address education programs. Post-play Bull Session discussions with scholars following selected Sunday matinees and Monday night Readings are free and open to the public.

Red Bull Theater offers Master Classes and Acting Intensives throughout the year. Taught by top working professionals including Kathleen Chalfant, John Douglas Thompson, Olympia Dukakis, Heidi Griffiths, and Patrick Page, Red Bull Theater's workshops cover a variety of disciplines, including auditioning, text, voice, clowning, stage combat, and acting Shakespeare. Classes are open to adults at all levels of training or experience. They range from one to six days with limited class sizes to allow one-on-one attention. You can enroll in any combination of classes, or take the whole series for a year-long training experience.

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