Liza Mitchell
106 6th Street N., Jacksonville Beach, 249-0289, www.playersbythesea.org
Feb 13-28 A LESSON BEFORE DYING It’s 1948 in a small plantation community deep in the heart of Cajun country, and an innocent black man is found guilty of murder and sentenced to death. This disturbing injustice is the springboard for spiritual growth and redemption in Romulus Linney’s uplifting drama “A Lesson Before Dying” — a hauntingly beautiful adaptation of Ernest J. Gaines’ highly praised 1993 novel.
April 10-25 VANYA, SONIA, MASHA AND SPIKE Vanya and Sonia, middle-aged bitter siblings sharing a home in Bucks County, PA, are suddenly caught off guard when their imperious, celebrity of a sister Masha swoops in with her hot young boyfriend Spike, amid threats to sell the house. Add in the sassy maid, Cassandra (who can predict the future) and an aspiring actress Nina (whose presence irritates Masha) and you’re in for a night of pure laughter from Christopher Durang’s Tony Award Winning new play!
May 8-23 MARIE ANTOINETTE: THE COLOR OF FLESH Set during the turbulent years around the French Revolution, Elisabeth Vigee Le Brun, a beautiful social-climbing portrait painter, uses her affair with Count Alexis de Ligne, a left-leaning philanderer, to get a commission to paint the naive young Queen Marie Antoinette. While Elisa uses the Queen to further her career and Alexis uses the Queen to further his political goals, both learn to love the woman they’re exploiting.
June 5-20 AUGUST: OSAGE COUNTY When their alcoholic father suddenly disappears, the three grown daughters of pill-popping Violet Weston gather at the family home on the Oklahoma plains, toting a lifetime of grievances. Mother and daughters match wits and wills in this wildly-comic, plot-twisting Pulitzer Price and Tony Award winner.
July 17-Aug 8 AIDA In this rock and roll re-imagining of a classic love triangle: Aida, a Nubian princess, is captured by an Egyptian captain, Radames. He soon falls in love with her and saves her from a life of hard labor by giving her as a handmaiden to the Egyptian princess Amneris, his future bride. Set against a backdrop of loyalty, responsibility, betrayal and love, this is the story of three people forced to make difficult choices that will alter history forever.
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