Sarah Rudinoff to Star in Lisa Kron's WELL at Seattle Repertory Theatre

Why is it that some people stay sick while others become well? And how do we find the road to recovery? These questions are explored in the acclaimed comedy Well, coming to Seattle Repertory Theatre February 10 - March 5, 2017 (opening night is February 15, 2017) in the Bagley Wright Theatre. Tickets are on sale now through the Seattle Rep Box Office at 206.443.2222 and online at seattlerep.org.

Well follows a woman whose struggles with chronic allergies go awry when her mother and fellow actors weigh in on her health and happiness. Lisa Kron, the multi-talented humorist, performer, playwright, and Tony Award-winning writer, and lyricist behind the recent Broadway hit Fun Home devised the comedyandtakes us on a surprising and complicated journey-which is most definitely not about her mom. But, of course, it is about her mother, and her mother's extraordinary ability to heal a changing neighborhood, despite her inability to heal herself. In this "solo show with people in it," Kron asks the provocative question: "Do we create our own illness?" The answers she gets are much more complicated than she bargained for as the play spins dangerously out of control into riotously funny and unexpected territory.

Beloved Seattle actor Sarah Rudinoff portrays Lisa Kron in this comedy production. Rudinoff has been making theatrical work in Seattle for 20 years and is thrilled to be back at Seattle Rep where she was last seen in Jeffrey Hatcher's Murderers (2007). Rudinoff recently performed as Smitty in How to Succeed in Business Without Really Trying at The 5th Avenue Theatre and won the 2016 Gregory Award for Best Supporting Actress for the role.

"I grew up white on a small island in Hawaii and was often the only white kid in my class or in Girl Scouts or in the neighborhood," Rudinoff comments. "I relate deeply to Lisa's complicated feelings about growing up in a racially integrated neighborhood. It has been exciting to take a look at that complicated history, not to mention, the play is just really smart and funny. I am so grateful to get to work on it."

ABOUT THE ARTISTS:

Lisa Kron (Deviser) has been writing and performing theatre since moving to New York from Michigan in 1984. Her work has been widely produced on and off-Broadway, regionally, and internationally. Her play In the Wake was named a best play of 2010 by Time Out New York and Backstage, and was included in the "Best Plays Theater Yearbook 2010-2011." It received Lortel and GLAAD Media Award Nominations for Best Play and was a finalist for the Susan Smith Blackburn award. Her play Well was named one of the year's best plays by The New York Times, the Associated Press, the Newark Star Ledger, Backstage, and the Advocate, and was included in the "Best Plays Theater Yearbook of 2003-2004." It ran on Broadway in 2006, and received two Tony nominations. Her play 2.5 Minute Ridereceived an Obie Award, an L.A. Drama-Logue Award, and a GLAAD Media Award, and was named best autobiographical show of 1999 by New York Press. 101 Humiliating Stories was nominated for a Drama Desk Award and was included in Lincoln Center's Serious Fun! Festival in 1993. Lisa is a founding member of the Obie- and Bessie-Award-winning collaborative theatre company The Five Lesbian Brothers, whose plays include The Secretaries and Oedipus at Palm Springs. Honors include playwriting fellowships from the Lortel and Guggenheim Foundations, Sundance Theater Lab, and the Lark Play Development Center, the Cal Arts/Alpert Award, a Helen Merrill Award, and grants from the Creative Capital Foundation and New York Foundation for the Arts. She served as resident playwright at the American Voices New Play Initiative at Arena Stage. Lisa is on the playwriting faculty of the Yale School of Drama and serves on the Council of the Dramatists Guild of America.

Braden Abraham (Director) serves as Artistic Director at Seattle Rep. His directing credits for the Rep include Rebecca Gilman's Luna Gale, Arthur Miller's A View From The Bridge, Laura Schellhardt's The Comparables, Edward Albee's Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf?, Samuel D. Hunter's A Great Wilderness, Anna Ziegler's Photograph 51, Tennessee Williams' The Glass Menagerie, Bruce Norris' Clybourne Park, Michael Hollinger's Opus, Harold Pinter's Betrayal, Melissa James Gibson's This, Laura Schellhardt's The K of D, an urban legend, Breakin' Hearts and Takin' Names by Kevin Kling and Simone Perrin, and My Name is Rachel Corrie, adapted by Alan Rickman and Katherine Viner. Other directing credits include Marya Sea Kaminski's Riddled (Richard Hugo House), Tommy Smith's White Hot (Marxiano Productions, West of Lenin), Laura Schellhardt's The K of D, an urban legend (Pistol Cat Productions, FringeNYC Encore Series, Illusion Theater), Paul Mullin's The Ten Thousand Things (Washington Ensemble Theatre), and Vincent Delaney's Kuwait (Theatre Schmeater). He has developed plays around the country with The O'Neill Playwrights Conference, Ojai Playwrights Conference, The Denver Center, The William Inge Theater Festival, Portland Center Stage, The Playwrights' Center, and Perseverance Theater. He has been a guest artist at Stanford University, Gonzaga University, the University of Idaho, and Seattle University. Braden holds a B.A. from Western Washington University.

Seattle Rep was founded in 1963 and is currently led by Artistic Director Braden Abraham and Managing Director Jeffrey Herrmann. One of America's premier not-for-profit resident theatres, SeattleRepertory Theatre has achieved international renown for its consistently high production and artistic standards, and was awarded the 1990 Tony Award for Outstanding Regional Theatre. With an emphasis on entertaining plays of true dramatic and literary worth, Seattle Rep produces a season of plays along with educational programs, new play workshops, and special presentations.

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