Category: gloucester

Robert Walsh, Artistic Director Jeff Zinn, Managing Director

WORLD PREMIERE MUSICAL OPENS

GLOUCESTER STAGE’S 39th SEASON

Gloucester Stage Company opens its 39th season of professional theater on May 11 with the world premiere of Madame Defarge, Wendy Kesselman’s new musical inspired by Charles Dicken’s classic A Tale of Two Cities. The world premiere musical runs from May 11 through June 2 at Gloucester Stage Company, 267 East Main Street, Gloucester, MA. A passionate re-imagining of Dickens’ infamous Madame Defarge illuminates this new musical by Wendy Kesselman. Set against the turmoil of the French Revolution, two men similar in face but separate in fate weave a story of sacrifice and salvation all driven by Madame Thérèse Defarge battling oppression with longings for love, freedom, justice, and revenge. Directed by Ellie Heyman in her Gloucester Stage debut, the cast features GSC veterans Jennifer Ellis as Madame Therese Defarge, the woman whose revenge sparked a revolution; Benjamin Evett as her husband Ernest Defarge; and Broadway veteran Rockport’s Wendy Waring as Miss Pross; along with GSC newcomers Broadway’s John Hillner as Monsieur Le Marquis; Boston Conservatory’s Sabrina Koss as Lucie; Jason Michael Evans as Sydney Carton; Rob Karma Robinson as Doctor Manette; Matthew Amira as Charles Darnay; Marissa Simeqi as Little Lucie; and John Shuman as Mr. Lorry. Massachusetts based playwright Kesselman wrote the book, music and lyrics for this untold story of Madame Defarge, New York’s Christopher Berg provides the musical arrangements, Mindy Cimini, is the music director and Asher Denburg is the associate musical director for this world premiere production.

Besides her Tony-nominated new adaptation of The Diary of Anne Frank, Wendy Kesselman’s plays include My Sister in This House; The Executioner’s Daughter; The Notebook; The Foggy Foggy Dew; The Last Bridge; I Love You, I Love You Not; Maggie Maagalita; Merry-Go-Round; The Shell Collection; My Sister in This House, A Re-imagined Version (Deaf West Theatre); The Graduation of Grace and Spit. She has written the book, music and lyrics for The Juniper Tree, A Tragic Household Tale; Becca and The Black Monk, A Chamber Musical. A member of the Dramatists guild, among other honors she has received the Susan Smith Blackburn Prize, the AT&T Onstage Award, The New England Major Award for Outstanding Creative Achievement in the American Theatre, the first annual Playbill award, the Roger L. Stevens Award, the Jane Chambers Playwriting Award, the Lecomte du Noüy Annual Award, Meet the Composer Grants, a Massachusetts Cultural Grant and Guggenheim, McKnight and NEA Fellowships. Her screenplays include Sister My Sister (adapted from My Sister in This House), directed my Nancy Meckler, with Joely Richardson, Julie Walters and Jodhi May; I Love You, I Love You Not (adapted from her play of the same name), directed by Billy Hopkins, with Jeanne Moreau, Claire Danes and Jude Law; and Mad or in Love for Fox 2000. She won a WGA Award for her screen adaptation of John Knowles’ A Separate Peace, directed by Peter Yates. The CD of her chamber musical The Black Monk will be released Fall 2018.

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