Works by Edward Albee, Sarah Ruhl and More Set for Custom Made Theatre's 2012-13 Season

For its 14th season of never playing it safe, Custom Made Theatre Company announces a line-up of eye-opening and audacious plays. Three are San Francisco Premieres, and one is a Bay Area Premiere.

Working from the intimate and accessible Gough Street Playhouse, 1620 Gough Street (at Bush) in San Francisco, Custom Made will delight audiences once again, starting with Edward Albee's dark and devious comedy, The Play About the Baby. Gough Street Playhouse is housed in the historic Trinity Episcopal Church.

The Main Season

The Play About the Baby by Edward Albee (San Francisco Premiere)

Directed by Brian Katz
Sept 7- Oct 7

If you have no wounds, how can you know if you're alive? In The Play About the Baby, a young couple who are madly in love with each other, have a child - the perfect family - that is, until an older couple steal the baby. Through a series of mind games and manipulations, they call into question both couples' sense of reality and fiction, joy and sorrow in this devastating black comedy, which many say is Albee's own absurdist take on Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf?

Features: Richard Aiello, Linda Ayres-Frederick*, Anya Kazimierski, and Shane Rhoades.
Opens: Sept 11at 8:00pm
Previews: Sept 7-8 at 8:00pm, Sept 9 at 7:00pm
Runs: Thru Oct 7, Thurs-Sat 8:00pm; Sun 7:00pm
General Admission $30
Students/Seniors/TBA members $25
Previews $15-$20

Superior Donuts by Tracy Letts (San Francisco Premiere)

Directed by Marilyn Langbehn
Nov 2-Dec 2

Tracy Letts, who won the 2008 Pulitzer Prize for his epic, family drama August: Osage County, has shifted gears with this entertaining comedy. In the Chicago north-side neighborhood of Uptown, Arthur Przybyszewski runs the donut shop that has been in his family for sixty years. More content to spend the day smoking weed than running his business, Arthur hires a shop assistant, the young African-American Franco Wicks, who has both an unpublished novel and unpaid gambling debt. Their relationship is the crux of this heart-warming play, set in the heart of one of Chicago's most diverse communities, that explores the challenges of embracing the past and the redemptive power of friendship.

Previews Nov 2-4
Special Monday Opening - Nov 5
Runs Nov 8- Dec 2

Why Torture is Wrong, and the People who Love Them by Christopher Durang (Bay Area Premiere)

Directed by Claire Rice
Jan 11-Feb 10

Why Torture Is Wrong, and the People Who Love Them tells the story of a young woman in crisis: Is her new husband, whom she married when drunk, a terrorist? Or just crazy? Or both? Is her father's hobby of butterfly collecting really a cover for his involvement in a shadow government? Does her mother go to the theater frequently to seek mental escape, or is she just insane? Add in a minister who directs porno, and a ladylike operative whose underwear just won't stay up, and this black comedy will make us laugh all the way to the waterboarding room.

Previews Jan 11-13
Opens Jan 15
Runs Jan 18-Feb 10

Eurydice by Sarah Ruhl (San Francisco Premiere)

Directed by Katja Rivera in collaboration with Brian Katz and Daunielle Rasmussen
March 15-April 14

In Eurydice, Sarah Ruhl reimagines the classic myth of Orpheus through the eyes of its heroine. Dying too young on her wedding day, Eurydice must journey to the underworld, where she reunites with her father and struggles to remember her lost love. With contemporary characters, ingenious plot twists, and breathtaking visual effects, the play is a fresh look at a timeless love story. Custom Made presents a new look at this MacArthur Award-winning and Pulitzer finalist's breakthrough play.

Previews March 15-17
Opens March 19
Runs March 21-April 14

Prelude to a Kiss by Craig Lucas

Directed by Stuart Bousel
May 17-June 16

After a whirlwind courtship, Rita and Peter marry. Following their storybook wedding, an elderly man congratulates Rita with a kiss. But it is no ordinary kiss. By a quirky twist of fate, the kiss effects a soul switch and Rita finds herself living in the old man's body, and the old man in hers. Written in the aftermath of the AIDS crisis, Craig Lucas' charming, funny and poignant adult fairytale challenges our assumptions of beauty, the limits of love, and the meaning of commitment.

Previews May 17-19
Opens May 21
Runs May 23-June 16

Tickets: Individual shows $25-$32. Or by subscription. 510-207-5774; www.custommade.org. General Admission Subscriptions: Opening Night - $125; Full Season (5 plays) - $95; Partial Season (3 plays) - $75; Seniors, Students, Theatre Bay Area Members; Full Season (5 plays) - $75; Partial Season (3 plays) - $55.

The Custom Made Theatre Co., at the Gough Street Playouse,1620 Gough St. (at Bush), San Francisco, CA 94109. Gough Street Playhouse is attached to the historic Trinity Episcopal Church. (415) 798-2682, www.custommade.org.

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