Lyric Stage Announces
Five Mainstage Productions
For 2008-2009 Season

On the heels of the company's three back-to-back most successful seasons in its history, Lyric Stage Company of Boston has announced five of the seven mainstage productions of its 2008-2009 Season, which marks the 35th Anniversary of the company. The final two titles will be announced shortly.

The Lyric’s 2008-2009 Season will feature:

"Follies"
Music and Lyrics by Stephen Sondheim, Book by James Goldman, Directed by Spiro Veloudos
Featuring Leigh Barrett, Kathy St. George, Bobbie Steinbach, and Maryann Zschau.
It’s 1971 and a grand New York theater is about to be demolished to make way for a parking lot. Before the wrecking ball hits, impresario Dimitri Weismann hosts a reunion for his former Follies performers to celebrate their past glories. When two middleaged couples reunite, they are forced to consider the roads taken -- and not -- as they face reality and regret. Considered to be one of Sondheim’s greatest achievements, this score includes some of his best-known songs including “Broadway Baby,” “Losing My Mind” and “I’m Still Here.”

"Cat on a Hot Tin Roof"
By Tennessee Williams
Directed by Scott Edmiston
Featuring Producing Artistic Director Spiro Veloudos in his return to the stage as Big Daddy. Hypocrisy, greed and secret passions threaten to tear apart a wealthy Mississippi family on the evening of Big Daddy’s birthday. Eager to compete with brother-in-law’s growing brood, Maggie “The Cat” is desperate to provide her in-laws with an heir to the sprawling plantation,. However, she can’t break through her husband distraction by the bottle, memories of his late best friend and the mendacity that surrounds him.

"Grey Gardens"
Book by Doug Wright Music by Scott Frankel Lyrics by Michael Korie
New England Premiere
This hilarious and heartbreaking Tony-nominated musical tells the quirky story of Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis’ eccentric relatives, Big Edie Beale and her daughter Little Edie, who shared a dysfunctional and co-dependent relationship that dragged them from high society to a life of squalor and isolation as East Hampton’s most notorious recluses. Based on the famous documentary of the same name, this musical offers an interesting theatrical twist: the actress who portrays the mother in the first act takes on the role of the daughter thirty years later in the second. The New York Times called Grey Gardens “an experience no passionate theatergoer should miss.”

"Speech & Debate"
By Stephen Karam
Boston Premiere
Even though they attend the same high school, misfits Solomon, Diwata and Howie have never met. But when a shocking scandal involving one of their teachers brings them together, they form a speech and debate club to make their voices heard. As the unlikely trio negotiates adolescent trials of identity, sexuality and belonging, they combat pervasive adult hypocrisy and discover that their united voices are stronger than one. Variety said playwright Stephen Karam’s poignant, insightful and hilarious new black comedy is “bristling with vitality, wicked humor, terrific dialogue, and a direct pipeline into the zeitgeist of contemporary youth.”

"The Year of Magical Thinking"
By Joan Didion, based on her memoir
Featuring Nancy E. Carroll
New England Premiere
Joan Didion’s best-selling memoir recounts an almost unfathomable period in her life as she grappled with her husband’s sudden death and her daughter’s illness. This stage adaptation captures the compassion, humor and bewilderment of a fiercely intelligent woman as her world suddenly lurches from the ordinary to the unimaginable. Filled with raw candor, this “unmissable theatre” (Variety) is a love letter to a child and a tribute to an extraordinary, unconventional marriage, all told by a brilliant storyteller with a gift for the absurd.

Producing Artistic Director Spiro Veloudos, currently completing his 10th season with the Lyric, says he is particularly proud to have so many Boston-area professional actors and designers consider The Lyric Stage Company their artistic home. "They may not work here exclusively, but they return to The Lyric season after season. I've aimed to foster a creative environment that celebrates the community in which we have chosen to live and work. Of all of my accomplishments over the last ten years, nurturing this sense of community, is the one of which I am most proud.”

Season Ticket packages for Lyric Stage Company’s 2008-2009 Season are available in a variety of multi-show packages. For information, call 617-585-5678 or visit www.lyricstage.com.

Lyric Stage Company is located in the YWCA Building at 140 Clarendon Street, just off Boston’s Copley Square, between Stuart Street and Columbus Avenues.

-- OnStage Boston