ATC Presents WAIT UNTIL DARK, Now thru 11/30

Wait Until Dark is a roller-coaster for the stage, a chilling edge-of-your-seat thriller pitting a deeply sinister con man against an unsuspecting but sharp-witted young blind woman. Written by Frederick Knott, newly adapted by Jeffrey Hatcher, and directed by Arizona Theatre Company (ATC) Artistic Director David Ira Goldstein, Wait Until Dark comes to the Herberger Theater Center, tonight, Nov. 13-30.

Wait Until Dark, a 1966 Broadway hit and 1967 Oscar-nominated movie classic starring Audrey Hepburn and Alan Arkin, is a classic tale of mystery, terror and suspense. A Greenwich Village apartment becomes the setting of a suspenseful game of cat and mouse when a group of thuggish con men manipulate and terrorize the recently blinded Susan over a mysterious doll hidden inside, waiting until dark to play out this classic stage thriller's chilling conclusion. Can the vulnerable Susan muster her resources to outmaneuver her tormentors, turn her disability to advantage and survive?

The newly adapted script moves the action from the mid-1960's to 1944 as America fought in World War II, heightening the stakes for all the characters and placing the story in a world that reflects associations with the terse, lean language of the period and the play of light and shadows of film noir. "It resonates onstage in a nefarious and chilling shadowland of light and dark, good and evil," wrote the Rochester Democrat and Chronicle of this ATC co-production with Geva Theatre Center, where it recently ran to rave reviews and standing ovations.

"Alfred Hitchcock made the film of Frederick Knott's other major play, Dial M for Murder. In Wait Until Dark we have a woman in peril (Susan), the sudden importance of a mundane prop (the refrigerator) and the use of a McGuffin (the doll...!), all Hitchcockian tropes that work on us in a psychologically insinuating way," Goldstein said. "The play is about darkness and light - about the hidden and the seen - qualities we strongly associate with film noir and the classic Hollywood movies of that era. It gave my marvelous design team and actors wonderful opportunities. But Jeffrey has done much more than simply move the time period by inserting 1940's references. He has also boiled down the language into the terse, lean dialogue of the period films. And, being Jeffrey, he has added a healthy dose of wit to the play."

Wait Until Dark is designed with noirish flair by returning ATC designers Vicki Smith (Sets), Marcia Dixcy Jory (Costumes), Don Darnutzer (lights) and Brian Jerome Peterson (Sound). The fight director is Adriano Gatto, original music is by Jonathan Snipes, dramaturg is Jean Gordon Ryon and the stage manager is Timothy Toothman.

Making their Arizona Theatre Company debuts in Wait Until Dark are Craig Bockhorn (Broadway's On Golden Pond, Prelude to a Kiss and TV's Law & Order, The Michael J. Fox Show and Boardwalk Empire) as Carlino; Ted Koch (Broadway's The Pillowman, Death of a Salesman with Brian Dennehy, Cat on a Hot Tin Roof and TV's The Good Wife and Gossip Girl) as Roat; Brooke Parks (Yale Repertory Theatre's Hamlet with Paul Giannani and several seasons at Oregon Shakespeare Festival) as Susan; Peter Rini (Broadway productions of Proposals, A View from the Bridge, TV's Orange is the New Black, Blue Bloods and SMASH!) as Mike, and Lauren Schaffel (feature films Revenge of the Green Dragons, Admission and CBS's Still Standing) as Gloria. Remi Sandri (ATC's productions of Sherlock Holmes and the Adventure of the Suicide Club, The Kite Runner, The Great Gatsby, and Pride and Prejudice) returns to ATC as Susan's husband, Sam.

The 2014-15 season is sponsored by I. Michael and Beth Kasser.

ATC follows Wait Until Dark with Murder for Two, Dec. 31-Jan. 18, 2015; the world premiere of Five Presidents, Feb. 2-22; Romeo and Juliet, March 26-April 12; and A Weekend with Pablo Picasso, April 3-May 17.

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