NCTC to Stage Hit Comedy BUYER & CELLAR, Starring J. Conrad Frank

This spring, the hilarious Off-Broadway hit, Buyer and Cellar by Jonathan Tolins comes to NCTC, starring acclaimed performer and frequent NCTC collaborator, J. Conrad Frank, most recently at NCTC with his acclaimed performance in Charles Busch's Die Mommie Die!. Rebecca Longworth directs. In this uproarious comedy, an unemployed actor is thrust into a close relationship with Barbra Streisand when he is hired to watch over a mall of shoppes she has built in a cellar on her Malibu compound. Soon it begins to take a toll on his patience, his love life, and his view of people (who need people). As Entertainment Weekly declares, "This show will go down like 'butta'!"

Buyer & Cellar runs March 18 - April 24, 2016. Opening Night is Saturday, March 26, 2016 at 8pm. Tickets are $25-45 and available at nctcsf.org or by calling (415) 861-8972. Showtimes are Wednesday - Saturdays at 8pm, Sundays at 2pm. Special for Buyer & Cellar, there will be 3 additional Saturday matinees, April 2, 9, 16, all at 2pm. Robert Rushin will perform these additional performances.

Buyer & Cellar premiered in 2013 at Rattlestick Playwrights Theater, before transferring to the Barrow Street Theatre, where it played a hugely successful extended run, followed by a national tour, earning raves across the country:

"This play deserves a hearty, "Hello, gorgeous'", declares New York Daily News.

"It's a seriously funny and remarkably sustained slice of absurdist whimsy," raves The New York Times.

Playwright Jonathan Tolins 's other plays include The Twilight of the Golds (Broadway, Booth Theatre), If Memory Serves (Promenade), The Last Sunday in June (Rattlestick, Century Center) and Secrets of the Trade (Primary Stages). A collection of his plays has been published by Grove/Atlantic. His film work includes The Twilight of the Golds and Martian Child. For television, he was a writer for "Queer as Folk," The Academy Awards, The Tony Awards and "Partners." He was the author of Pushkin 200: A Celebration at Carnegie Hall, acted as script consultant on Walking with Dinosaurs: The Arena Spectacular, and co-wrote The Divine Millennium Tour and The Showgirl Must Go On for Bette Midler. He has written articles for Opera News, Opera Monthly, TheaterWeek, Time magazine and The Huffington Post, and is a panelist on the Metropolitan Opera Radio Quiz. He lives in Fairfield, Connecticut with his husband, the writer and director Robert Cary, and their children, Selina and Henry. He is a member of the Dramatists Guild and the Writers Guild of America.

J. Conrad Frank was last seen to acclaim on NCTC's stage in Charles Busch's Die Mommie Die!, for which he received a Theatre Bay Area Award nomination for Best Actor. Best known for his work as The Countess Katya Smirnoff-Skyy, Frank was named Best Drag Act 2008 by the San Francisco Bay Guardian and won the 2010 BATCC award for Best Actor in a musical (Katya...a Holiday Spectacular at NCTC). Other appearances at NCTC include The Divine Sister, The Temperamentals, and several Katya cabarets. Other regional theatre credits include Beadle Bamford in Sweeney Todd at Ray of Light Theatre, Mrs. Peacock in Clue at Boxcar Theatre, and Sylvia Fowler in Jungle Red for Artful Circle. On film, Frank appeared as Joan Crawford in the 2008 Billy Clift film Baby Jane and its sequel, Hush Up Sweet Charlotte.

The creative team of Buyer & Cellar includes scenic design by Devin Kasper, costume design by Wes Crain, lighting design by Keira Sullivan, sound design by Sara Witsch.

New Conservatory Theatre Center is San Francisco's premier LGBTQIA and allied performing arts institution and progressive arts education conservatory since 1981. NCTC is renowned for its diverse range of innovative, high quality productions, touring productions and shows for young audiences; its foundational anti-bullying work with youth and educators through YouthAware; and its commitment to nurturing emerging artists and playwrights to expand the canon of queer and allied dramatic work.

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