80th Anniversary Tribute to the Group Theatre
Leonard Nimoy Thalia at Symphony Space |
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Estelle Parsons, Lois Smith, George Bartenieff, Marsha Warren of the Paul Green Foundation, Tony Award winner Frances Sternhagen, and more will be joining the ReGroup ensemble onstage for this celebration.
80 years ago, a group of some of the most talented young actors, directors and writers this country has ever produced opened their first show. They came together not to better their careers but to better the theatre. Even 80 years ago, people were bemoaning the state of modern theatre. Instead of joining in the complaining, this group did something about. Their history has been well documented in Harold Clurman's The Fervent Years and Wendy Smith's Real Life Drama, but never has their story been told through the powerful plays they chose to produce.
For the first time ever, the 23 plays presented by the famed Group Theatre will be woven together into an evening celebrating The Group's 80th Anniversary as a fundraiser for the ReGroup Theatre Company. Legends of the stage will join the acclaimed ReGroup ensemble to present these plays along with the history of the Group in this one night only event.
Though The Group turned out some of the top actors, directors and teachers, including Lee Strasberg, Stella Adler, Elia Kazan, John Garfield, and Sanford Meisner to name a very few, they also worked with some of the greatest American dramatists. They aimed to present plays that weren't mere entertainment but "propaganda for a better life." Most remembered for the 6 plays of Clifford Odets, such as Golden Boy and Awake and Sing, The Group also presented works by John Howard Lawson, Paul Green, Kurt Weill, Dawn Powell, Sidney Kingsley and many more. Though most of them have been forgotten over the years, many due to the blacklist, these Great Depression era stories are once again extremely relevant. Several of the plays that will be represented during the tribute, including Nellise Child's Weep for the Virgins, Robert Ardrey's Casey Jones, and Irwin Shaw's Retreat to Pleasure have never been published, so this is a rare chance to get a glimpse of a piece of American Theatre History.
VIP tickets are available and will include a wine reception with the artists after the show.
