Marg Helgenberger Stars in THE LITTLE FOXES, Beginning Tonight at Arena Stage

There are people who eat and there are those who get eaten. This fall, Arena Stage serves up Lillian Hellman's The Little Foxes, a delicious drama about family greed and betrayal. Emmy Award winner and Golden Globe nominee Marg Helgenberger, known for her 12 seasons as Catherine Willows on CBS's CSI: Crime Scene Investigation, stars as Regina Giddens under veteran director Kyle Donnelly, who has directed more than 20 productions at Arena Stage. The Little Foxes runs tonight, September 23, through October 30, 2016 in the Kreeger Theater.

As previously announced, the production features four-time Helen Hayes Award winner Edward Gero (Arena Stage's The Originalist) as Benjamin Hubbard and Jack Willis (Arena Stage's All the Way, Sweat) as Horace Giddens. They are joined by Gregory Linington (Arena Stage's Equivocation) as Oscar Hubbard and Tony Award nominee and Drama Desk Award winner Isabel Keating (Broadway's The Boy from Oz) as Birdie Hubbard.

The cast also features Stanton Nash (Boq in the Chicago production of Wicked) as Leo Hubbard, Megan Graves (Folger Theatre's A Midsummer Night's Dream) as Alexandra Giddens, James Whalen (Mosaic Theater's After the War) as William Marshall, Kim James Bey (Center Stage's Beneatha's Place) as Addie and David Emerson Toney (Arena Stage's All the Way) as Cal.

The Little Foxes is the first of two full productions as part of the Lillian Hellman Festival, which continues Arena Stage's tradition of showcasing the work of American Giants in the theater (following festivals for Arthur Miller, Edward Albee and Eugene O'Neill). Later in the season Arena Stage will produce Watch on the Rhine featuring Broadway veteran, four-time Academy Award nominee and Golden Globe Award winner Marsha Mason (The Goodbye Girl), as well as host staged readings, film screenings and panel discussions to explore and celebrate the iconic playwright, author and political activist.

"I have wanted to celebrate Lillian Hellman as an American Giant for a long time, and I can't think of a better way to kick off the Lillian Hellman Festival than with Kyle Donnelly directing a wonderful cast led by Marg Helgenberger," shares Arena Stage Artistic Director Molly Smith. "What a great combination of women artists. All of them fierce, fearless and talented."

"At this time in our country with all the talk of the wealthy one percent eating up everything, I am reminded of what Hellman says about the avaricious turn-of-the-century Hubbard family, 'There are people who eat the earth and eat all the people on it like in the Bible with the locusts,'" says Donnelly. "This makes The Little Foxes feel very timely while being ripping good entertainment."

Lillian Hellman (Playwright) was an American dramatist and screenwriter. Broadway credits include Watch on the Rhine, The Autumn Garden, Toys in the Attic, Another Part of the Forest, The Children's Hour and The Little Foxes. Her screenplay adaption of The Little Foxes, starring Bette Davis, received an Academy Award nomination in 1942. Her honors include two New York Drama Critics Circle Awards; a Gold Medal for Distinguished Achievement in the Theater from the Academy of Arts and Letters; and a National Book Award for An Unfinished Woman. As a teacher and scholar she was well-respected, and her political involvement was integral in the fight against fascism at home and abroad. Lillian will be remembered not only as an activist, playwright and memoirist, but as a woman who could overcome the hurdles of her time and succeed on her own terms.

Kyle Donnelly (Director)'s Arena Stage credits include All the Way; Other Desert Cities; Ah, Wilderness!; Well; The Women; Born Yesterday; She Loves Me; Polk County(Helen Hayes Award for Best Musical); Dancing at Lughnasa (Helen Hayes Award for Best Production); Misalliance; Tom Walker; Shakespeare in Hollywood; Lovers and Executioners; Summer and Smoke; and School for Wives while associate artistic director. Additional credits for Seattle Repertory; Steppenwolf; Huntington; La Jolla; Goodman; Williamstown Theatre Festival; Berkeley Repertory; McCarter; Eugene O'Neill Theater Center; Cape Cod Theatre Project; The Old Globe; American Conservatory Theater; Studio Theatre; Humana Festival and ALLIANCE THEATRE; and Give Me Your Answer, Do! (Roundabout). Awards include TCG's Alan Schneider Director Award. Kyle is a faculty member of the M.F.A. actor training program at the University of California, San Diego.

ABOUT THE CAST:

Kim James Bey (Addie) returns to Arena Stage after cutting her teeth in early productions of The Cherry Orchard, Six Characters in Search of an Author and understudy roles in the Lloyd Richards production of Joe Turner's Come and Gone and The Glass Menagerie with Ruby Dee, among others. A Center Stage regular, Kim appeared as Auntie Fola in Beneatha's Place. New York credits include Zooman and the Sign (Second Stage Theatre), Salt (Actor's Free Studio) and The American Plan (John Houseman). Regional credits include Delaware Theatre Company, Repertory Theatre of St. Louis, Cincinnati Playhouse in the Park, Cleveland Play House and McCarter Theatre. For TV, PBS' The Raisin Cycle. She holds an M.F.A. from Rutgers University, MGSA and B.F.A. from Howard University.

Edward Gero (Benjamin Hubbard)'s Arena Stage credits include Antonin Scalia in The Originalist and Mark Rothko in Red. He is a four-time Helen Hayes winner and 15-time nominee. Regional credits include Red and Gloucester in King Lear (Goodman); Papa/Sims in The Nether (Woolly Mammoth); Tommy in The Night Alive (Round House); the title role of Sweeney Todd (Signature Theatre); Scrooge in A Christmas Carol (Ford's Theatre); American Buffalo, Shining City and Skylight (Helen Hayes Award, Studio Theatre). In 30 seasons with Shakespeare Theatre Company, his 70 roles include Helen Hayes-winning turns in Henry IV, Richard II and Macbeth. Film/TV credits include House of Cards, TURN: Washington's Spies, Die Hard 2, Striking Distance and narrations for Discovery Channel and PBS. He is a Ten Chimneys 2015 Lunt-Fontanne Fellow and associate professor of theater, George Mason University.

Megan Graves (Alexandra Giddens) is thrilled to be appearing at Arena Stage for the first time. Previous D.C. credits include A Midsummer Night's Dream at the Folger Theatre; Passion Play and Clementine in the Lower 9 with Forum Theatre; Wild Sky at Solas Nua; The BFG (Helen Hayes Award) and Inside Out (among others) at Imagination Stage; and One Man, Two Guv'nors and The Cripple of Inishmaan at 1st Stage Theatre. Regionally, Megan has appeared as Molly in Peter and the Starcatcher at Virginia Repertory Theatre and as Julia in Two Gentlemen of Verona with the Virginia Shakespeare Festival. She received her BFA in Theatre from Shenandoah Conservatory.

Marg Helgenberger (Regina Giddens) is an Emmy Award winner and Golden Globe nominee. Her television credits include CBS's recent Under the Dome andIntelligence and 12 seasons as Catherine Willows on CSI: Crime Scene Investigation. Her breakout role as K.C. on China Beach won her an Emmy Award in 1990. On stage, Marg appeared in the 2013 Off-Broadway revival of The Exonerated and more recently in The Other Place (Barrington Stage Company). Her feature film roles include Erin Brockovich, Mr. Brooks, In Good Company, Species and Always, in addition to numerous made-for-television movies. Marg is a graduate of Northwestern University and currently resides in Los Angeles. She is an ambassador for the Race to Erase MS and Stand Up To Cancer foundations.

Isabel Keating (Birdie Hubbard) garnered a Tony Award nomination and won the Drama Desk Award for The Boy from Oz on Broadway. She also starred on Broadway in Hairspray, Enchanted April, Spider-Man, and Terrence McNally's It's Only A Play. Off Broadway credits include Primary Stages, Atlantic and Rattlestick. In Washington, Isabel won the Helen Hayes Award for Tom Stoppard's Indian Ink directed by Joy Zinoman at The Studio Theatre, where she began, appearing in The Rise and Fall of Little Voice and many others. Regional credits include Old Globe, Hartford Stage, Long Wharf and Williamstown. Television guest spots include The Path, Law & Order: Criminal Intent and voicing the Emmy Award-winning Judy Garland: By Myself. Among her films are James Schamus's just-released, acclaimed Indignation and The Nanny Diaries.

Gregory Linington (Oscar Hubbard) last appeared at Arena Stage in Equivocation (world-premiere co-production with Seattle Repertory and Oregon Shakespeare Festival). D.C. credits include The Taming of the Shrew, Othello, A Midsummer Night's Dream, The Tempest and Tartuffe (Shakespeare Theatre Company); The Night Alive (Round House); and Welcome Home, Jenny Sutter (Kennedy Center). New York credits include Throne of Blood (Brooklyn Academy Of Music) and The Unfortunates (Joe's Pub). Regional credits include Shakespeare Center of Los Angeles, Center Theatre Group, PCPA and Yale Repertory. Gregory was a company member at Oregon Shakespeare Festival (12 years) and Misery Loves Company in Prague (five years). Film/TV credits include Innocent Sleep, Harrison's Flowers, Grey's Anatomy, Shameless and The West Wing. He currently teaches at Shakespeare Theatre Company and is an adjunct professor at Georgetown University.www.gregorylinington.com

Stanton Nash (Leo Hubbard) last appeared in the D.C. area as Mozart in Amadeus (Center Stage). He has performed around the country, acting at Ensemble Studio Theatre, Denver Center, McCarter Theatre, Steppenwolf Theatre Company, Twin Cities Theater Company, Georgia Shakespeare and in the Chicago company of Wicked. He is a graduate of the University of Minnesota/The Guthrie's B.F.A. actor training program.

David Emerson Toney (Cal) returned to Arena Stage last season in All the Way, after beginning his career here nearly 40 years ago with more than 35 productions. Broadway credits include Julie Taymor's Juan Darien and A Free Man of Color, directed by George C. Wolfe. Regional credits include Lucio in Measure for Measure(Folger Theatre); The Persians and Othello (Shakespeare Theatre Company); Jacques in As You Like It (Utah Shakespeare Festival); Splash Hatch on the E Going Down (Yale Repertory Theatre); and the Fool in King Lear and West in Two Trains Running (Kansas City Repertory Theatre). In 2005 he received the Helen Hayes Award for Outstanding Supporting Actor for Two Trains Running (African Continuum Theatre Company). Toney is the Artistic Director of the Department of Theatre at the VCU School of the Arts, in Richmond, VA.

James Whalen (William Marshall) is happy to make his debut at Arena Stage in The Little Foxes. He was most recently seen in After the War with The Mosaic Theater Company. Some recent area credits include The Sisters Rosensweig at Theater J, NSFW at Roundhouse Theatre, Colossal at The Olney Theatre Center, Boeing Boeing at Rep Stage, Ghosts at Everyman Theatre and Shear Madness at The Kennedy Center, as well as Dracula for Actors Theatre of Louisville. TV and Film credits include A Beautiful Mind, VEEP and I Love You but I Lied.

Jack Willis (Horace Giddens)'s Arena Stage credits include All the Way, Sweat, Mother Courage and Her Children, Book of Days, Of Mice and Men and Agamemnon and His Daughters. Broadway credits include Julius Caesar, The Crucible, Art and The Old Neighborhood. Off-Broadway credits include The Resistible Rise of Arturo Ui, World of Mirth, The Iphigenia Cycle and Valhalla. He has appeared in more than 200 productions worldwide and been a company member at Oregon Shakespeare Festival, American Conservatory Theater, American Repertory Theater, Trinity Repertory Company and Dallas Theater Center. Film/TV credits include Toy Story 3, The Talented Mr. Ripley, The Cradle Will Rock, The Out-of-Towners, Love Hurts, I Come in Peace, Problem Child, Law & Order, Ed and Dallas. Jack was awarded a Lunt-Fontanne Fellowship through the Ten Chimneys Foundation.

The creative team for The Little Foxes includes Set Designer Mikiko Suzuki MacAdams, Costume Designer Jess Goldstein, Lighting Designer Nancy Schertler, Original Composition and Sound Design by Ryan Rumery, Wig Designer Anne Nesmith, Dialect Coach Mary Coy, Stage Manager Christi P. Spann and Assistant Stage Manager Kristen Mary Harris.

Post-Show Conversations - Connect with our shows beyond the performance at a post-show conversation with artists and staff-October 11 following the 7:30 p.m. performance; October 12, 18 and 26 following the noon performance; and October 27 following the 8:00 p.m. performance.

Tickets for The Little Foxes are $40-90, subject to change and based on availability, plus applicable fees. For information on savings programs such as pay-your-age tickets, student discounts, Southwest Nights and hero's discounts, visit arenastage.org/shows-tickets/single-tickets/savings-programs.

Tickets may be purchased online at arenastage.org, by phone at 202-488-3300 or at the Sales Office at 1101 Sixth St., SW, D.C.

Arena Stage at the Mead Center for American Theater, under the leadership of Artistic Director Molly Smith and Executive Director Edgar Dobie, is a national center dedicated to American voices and artists. Arena Stage produces plays of all that is passionate, profound, deep and dangerous in the American spirit, and presents diverse and ground-breaking work from some of the best artists around the country. Arena Stage is committed to commissioning and developing new plays through the American Voices New Play Institute. Arena Stage impacts the lives of over 10,000 students annually through its work in community engagement. Now in its seventh decade, Arena Stage serves a diverse annual audience of more than 300,000.

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