WORLD PREMIERE April 1 - May 8, 2005 Segerstrom Stage by Richard Greenberg directed by Mark Rucker The Playwrights Circle, Honorary Producers Approximately two hours, including one 15-minute intermission. Part of the 8th Annual Pacific Playwrights Festival

Jeffrey (John de Lancie, left) and his wife Bess (Linda Gehringer) welcome home their son Thad (Terrence Riordan) from his trip to Europe. Photo by Ken Howard.

Playwright:
Richard Greenberg is the author of six previous SCR world premieres: The Violet Hour, Everett Beekin, Hurrah at Last, Three Days of Rain (Los Angeles Drama Critics Circle Award; Pulitzer Prize finalist; Olivier, Drama Desk and Hull-Warriner nominations), Night and Her Stars and The Extra Man. His most recent play, Take Me Out, travelled from London to New York in the first co-production of the Donmar Warehouse and The Public Theater, and transferred to Broadway in early 2003 where it won the Tony Award for Best Play. His other plays include The Dazzle (Outer Critics Circle Award, Lucille Lortel and John Gassner nominations), The American Plan, Life Under Water and The Author’s Voice. In 2001, his adaptation of Strindberg’s Dance of Death on Broadway, starred Ian McKellen, Helen Mirren and David Straithairn. He is a winner of the Oppenheimer Award and the first winner of the PEN/Laura Pels Award for a playwright in mid-career.

Recommendation and Resources:
The closest the playwright has come to flat-out comedy, it’s not all for laughs when Greenberg broadens his world to include nearly the entire family of man in one family, expressing what the human condition means for all of us. Adult themes and language. Warning:  This play contains no nudity.