Mark Kudisch: 'I have made a career of being the foil'

Mark Kudisch, set to star in the Washington area premiere of Ricky Ian Gordon's SYCAMORE TREES at the Signature Theatre, has said he has made a career of playing the jilted man who doesn't need to find love. As he put it, "I have made a career of being the foil."

Kudisch recently sat down with The Washington Post to discuss the production and his career in general. Of the type of character he likes to play, Kudisch says, "I like playing those characters that walk that very, very fine line of being really funny and not funny at all, at the same moment," he says. For example, "The fun for me in doing 'Golden Age' was to play the preening man, and yet [show that] his insecurity was always on the surface."

Many of his collaborators agree on Kudisch's talent. Composer Michael John LaChiusa, who worked with Kudisch on THE WILD PARTY and SEE WHAT I WANNA SEE, said, "There is that shadow to him that I just love. A little dark side; a little edginess. And also this comedic side to him that's just delightful. It hearkens back to the leading men you might see in some of Preston Sturges's movies."

To read the full article from The Washington Post, click here.

Previews will begin today at Virginia's Signature Theatre for the world premiere musical Sycamore Trees written by Ricky Ian Gordon, the award-winning composer of the opera The Grapes of Wrath and the musicals Dream True and My Life with Albertine. A starry Broadway cast portrays Gordon's own family story - complete with a tough Bronx-born father and former "Borscht Belt" singer/comedian mother - in a tale of two generations' struggles and triumphs in the decades from World War II through the 1990s.

The May 18 - June 13 production is directed by Steppenwolf Theatre member and acclaimed director Tina Landau and features seven outstanding Broadway actors: Farah Alvin (Nine, The Look of Love, Kuni-Leml), Marc Kudisch (9 to 5, Thoroughly Modern Millie, Bells Are Ringing; Signature's Witches of Eastwick, The Highest Yellow), Judy Kuhn (Les Misérables, Rags, She Loves Me; Signature's The Highest Yellow), Jessica Molaskey (Parade, A Man of No Importance), Matthew Risch (Pal Joey, Legally Blonde), Diane Sutherland (She Loves Me, 1776, Cats), and Tony Yazbeck (Gypsy, A Chorus Line, Irving Berlin's White Christmas). Tony Award winner Bruce Coughlin will provide orchestrations, with musical direction by Fred Lassen of Broadway's South Pacific and Dirty Rotten Scoundrels.

The Tony-Award® winning Signature Theatre is nationally known for its world premiere musicals and dramas, having produced 26 new works in its twenty-year history. Sycamore Trees is the second part of Signature's "American Musical Voices Project" sponsored by The Shen Family Foundation. The American Musical Voices Project is the largest single musical theater commissioning and producing initiative of any U.S. theater.

Working with Tina Landau on the creative team are Music Director/Conductor Fred Lassen, Orchestrator Bruce Coughlin, Scenic Designer James Schuette, Costume Designer Kathleen Geldard, Lighting Designer Scott Zielinski, Sound Designer Matt Rowe, and Production Stage Manager Kerry Epstein.

Tickets for Sycamore Trees range from $52 - $76 and are available by calling Ticketmaster at (703) 573-SEAT (7328) or visiting www.signature-theatre.org. Group discounts are available for parties of ten or more by contacting Jackie Carl at carlj@signature-theatre.org.

Performances of Sycamore Trees run from May 18 through June 13, 2010. The press performance is Sunday, May 30 at 7:00 pm. Show times are Tuesday and Wednesday at 7:30 pm, Thursday and Friday at 8:00 pm, Saturday at 2:00 pm and 8:00 pm, and Sunday at 2:00 pm and 7:00 pm. There are no performances of Sycamore Trees on Saturday, May 22 at 2:00 pm and Tuesday, June 1 at 7:30 pm.

Marc Kudisch (Sidney) SIGNATURE: The Witches Of Eastwick (Helen Hayes Award), The Highest Yellow (Helen Hayes nomination). BROADWAY: 9 to 5 (Tony and Drama Desk nominations), The Apple Tree, Chitty Chitty Bang Bang (Tony and Outer Critics Circle nominations), Assassins (Drama Desk nomination), Thoroughly Modern Millie (Tony, Drama Desk, and Outer Critics Circle nominations), Bells Are Ringing, The Wild Party, The Scarlet Pimpernel, High Society, Beauty & the Beast, Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat. OFF-BROADWAY: Lincoln Center: The Glorious Ones; Public Theatre: See What I Wanna See (Drama Desk nomination); New York City Opera: Pirates of Penzance, A Little Night Music; City Center Encores!: Girl Crazy, Broadway Bash, No Strings (Mike Robinson); The Thing About Men. REGIONAL: Los Angeles Opera: A Little Night Music. NATIONAL TOUR: Bye Bye Birdie. TV: Lifetime Network: Break In; ABC: Bye Bye Birdie; HBO: Sex & the City. Directorial credits include The Broadway Musicals of 1959 (2007), The Broadway Musicals of 1930 (2006), and The Broadway Musicals of 1963 (2004) in Scott Siegel's Broadway by the Year concert. EDUCATION: BFA in Theatre, Florida Atlantic University.

Signature Theatre's "American Musical Voices Project" is the largest single musical theater commissioning and producing initiative of any U.S. theater. Founded in May 2006 and funded by The Shen Family Foundation, the American Musical Voices Project demonstrates Signature's commitment to producing full productions of world premiere Musical Theatre Works. Through the AMVP, Musical Theater Composer Grants have been awarded to Ricky Ian Gordon, Michael John LaChiusa, and Joseph Thalken, providing each composer $25,000 a year plus health coverage for four years. Each of the grants includes a commission to create a new full-length musical to be produced at Signature Theatre during its 2009-2011 seasons. In April and May 2009 Giant by Michael John LaChiusa received its premiere at Signature Theatre. Ricky Ian Gordon's Sycamore Trees premieres in May 2010, and Joseph Thalken's musical, Wheatly's Folly, will premiere in March 2011. In July 2009, AMVP expanded to add a commission and production of a new musical by Adam Guettel to be performed during Signature's 2011-2012 season.

As part of the AMVP, Musical Theater Leadership Awards have been made to four individuals in recognition of their extraordinary influence on and contribution to the advancement of new musical theater, orchestrator Bruce Coughlin, composer Adam Guettel, singer/actress Audra McDonald, and director/musical director/orchestrator Ted Sperling.

In June 2008, the American Musical Voices Project added The Next Generation program. That year emerging composers Matt Conner, Adam Gwon, and Gabriel Kahane each received a commission to write new musicals for Signature Theatre and honorees Peter Foley and Marisa Michelson were given grants for the development of their musical ideas. In July 2009, the Theater launched "21/24 Signature Lab," three weeks of rehearsal and performances of new works by The Next Generation composers. Also announced as part of The Next Generation segment of the AMVP were two additional musical commissions awarded to Peter Foley and Marisa Michelson, as well as honoree grants given to Chris Miller and Scott Davenport Richards for the development of future musical ideas.

Recipient of the 2009 Regional Theatre Tony Award, Signature Theatre is a non-profit professional theater company dedicated to producing contemporary musicals and plays, reinventing classic musicals, and developing new work. Under the leadership of co-founder and Artistic Director Eric Schaeffer and Managing Director Maggie Boland, Signature has become renowned for combining Broadway-quality productions with intimate playing spaces. In addition to the finest talent from the DC metropolitan area and New York, Signature has been a home to such theater luminaries as John Kander and Fred Ebb, Cameron Mackintosh, Terrence McNally, and the company's signature composer, Stephen Sondheim. Since its founding in 1989, Signature has been nominated for 276 Helen Hayes Awards for excellence in the professional theater and has been honored with 70 Helen Hayes Awards, including Outstanding Musical in 1992, 1993, 1995, 1997, 2000, 2005, 2006, 2008, and 2009, and Outstanding Play in 1999.

Signature is partially supported by a grant from the Virginia Commission for the Arts and the National Endowment for the Arts and by a gift from Arlington County through the Arlington Commission for the Arts and the Cultural Affairs Division of the Department of Parks, Recreation, and Cultural Resources.

Signature Theatre is just nine minutes from downtown Washington, DC in Arlington's Shirlington Village. The new theater complex is located at 4200 Campbell Avenue (22206) off I-395 at the Shirlington exit. After the exit, blue Signature signs mark the way to the Theatre. Free parking is available in two adjacent public garages. Please note that Campbell Avenue is a new street and some GPS online mapping systems do not yet recognize Signature Theatre's address. 

Photo Credit: Genevieve Rafter-Keddy

 

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