The Servant of Two Masters and The Turn of the Screw Rotate Runs at Seattle Shakespeare Company

In January, the stage is never dark at the Center House Theatre as Seattle Shakespeare Company will present two plays in rotating repertory seven days a week. The Servant of Two Masters and The Turn of the Screw will run in rotating performances all month long. Originally written by Carlo Goldoni then translated and adapted by Jeffrey Hatcher and Paolo Emilio Landi, The Servant of Two Masters opens on Friday, January 9 (low-priced preview on January 8) and will run through February 1, 2009. Directed by Dan McCleary, The Servant of Two Masters is a collision course of clowning and a wonderful homage to American vaudeville performers.

The Turn of the Screw by Henry James and also adapted by Jeffrey Hatcher, will be directed by Rita Giomi and will open Tuesday, January 13 and run through January 31. The Turn of the Screw is a classic and chilling ghost story about a young governess who begins seeing ghosts and starts to question her own sanity.

Support for The Servant of Two Masters and The Turn of the Screw is provided by ArtsFund, the Washington State Arts Commission, Seattle Weekly, and 94.9 KUOW.

January marks the second season of performing plays in rotation for Seattle Shakespeare Company, and this year there is an added twist: two very different adaptations by prolific playwright Jeffrey Hatcher.

Hatcher is one of America's most produced playwrights. He authored the book for the Broadway musical, Never Gonna Dance. Off-Broadway he had several plays produced, including Three Viewings and A Picasso at Manhattan Theatre Club, Scotland Road and The Turn of the Screw at Primary Stages, Tuesdays with Morrie (with Mitch Albom) at Minetta Lane Theatre, Murder by Poe with The Acting Company, Neddy at The American Place Theatre, co-author of Work Song: Three Views of Frank Lloyd Wright at Arizona Theatre Company and Fellow Travelers at Manhattan Punchline. His plays - among them, Compleat Female Stage Beauty, Murderers, Mercy of a Storm, Smash, To Fool the Eye and Work Song (with Eric Simonson) - have been seen in hundreds of theatre's across the nation and around the world. Mr. Hatcher wrote the screenplays for Stage Beauty and Casanova, as well as authoring episodes of the Peter Falk series Columbo.

In The Servant of Two Masters, nationally-acclaimed director Dan McCleary takes Italian commedia dell'arte and gives it an updated spin. "Instead of clowning in the strictly traditional commedia stock characters, we're using the ‘American Commedia:' vaudeville and silent film," says McCleary. "You may recognize a few specific influences since the Commedia original has been re-inventing itself form theatre to vaudeville to silent films to talkies to sketch comedy to television sitcom."
In the play, a group of traveling tragedians arrive to perform The Merchant of Venice, only to find that the audience is expecting The Servant of Two Masters. Parts are quickly assigned and costumes fly as the actors play off audience contributions to create a play about a wise-cracking servant named Truffaldino and how he confuses everyone around him by moonlighting for two employers.

The cast of The Servant of Two Masters features Shawn Belyea (Master of Revels), Deborah Fialkow (Cross-dressing Leading Lady), Connor Toms (Good-Looking Leading Man), Wesley Rice (Curmudgeon of a Certain Age), Chris Ensweiler (a servant), Ben Burris (Deputy Master of Circus Revels), David Goldstein (Our Young Gallant), Emily Chisholm (Our Young Lady of Perpetual Despair), Kerry Ryan (a maid), Katjana Vadeboncoeur (Naughty Supporting Player), Stephen Grenley (Reluctant-to-Be-Supporting Player), Robertson Witmer (Deputy Master of Musical Revels).
In The Turn of the Screw, two actors in 90 minutes craft a taut atmosphere of sinister tension to tell the haunting tale of a young governess who begins seeing ghosts while caring for two children on an isolated English estate. The Turn of the Screw is Henry James' most popular work and Hatcher's adaptation provides the opportunity for two superb actors to hold an audience rapt in a mesmerizing grip of intrigue.

The cast of The Turn of the Screw features John Bogar and Jennifer Sue Johnson.
To purchase tickets to The Servant of Two Masters or The Turn of the Screw call the Seattle Shakespeare Company box office (206) 733-8222 or go online at www.seattleshakespeare.org.

Regular box office hours are Tuesday through Friday 1:00-6:00 PM. During performance weeks, in addition to regular hours, the box office opens one hour prior to curtain. Seattle Shakespeare Company performs at the Center House Theatre at Seattle Center.

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