Featured in Williams’ The Night of the Iguana
McGRATHPR.com – Abrahamse and Meyer Productions from Cape Town, South Africa stages Tennessee Williams’ drama The Night of the Iguana in a new production inspired by Japan’s traditional Noh theater during the 2019 season of Provincetown Tennessee Williams Theater Festival at The Provincetown Theater from September 26 through 29. Directed by Fred Abrahamse, the production features South African stage star Marcel Meyer and Everett Quinton, a longtime member of the Ridiculous Theatrical Company.
In Williams’ vision of madness, endurance, and grace, considered amongst the finest of plays he’s written, the earthy widow Maxine Faulk runs a hotel at the edge of a Mexican cliff overlooking the Pacific Ocean. On a rainy and turbulent night, the hotel becomes a sanctuary for the defrocked Reverend Shannon, terrorized by his loss of faith. Shannon has rerouted and held hostage a tour group from a West Texas women’s college. They’re joined on the jungle cliff by a family of grotesque Nazi vacationers, an iguana tied by its throat under the veranda, and a self-described New England spinster whose 97-year-old grandfather is “the world’s oldest living and practicing poet.”
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Boston-based performing artist Gail Phaneuf performs in the role of Maxine. Festival audiences will remember Phaneuf as Leona in the Festival’s 2016 production of Williams’ Small Craft Warnings – a performance which New York Times critic Charles Isherwood described as “supremely funny… a whirlwind of comic energy tinged with pathos: a bit Blanche DuBois [and] a dash of the blowzy Maxine from The Night of the Iguana.”
Gail Phaneuf is an award-winning playwright, composer, producer and director hailing from Boston Massachusetts. Her teen musical The Love Note was produced in an off-Broadway run at Actors Temple Theatre in NYC, and continues to be produced at schools, regional theaters and theater camps. (thelovenote.com) MONSTERS! A Midlife Musical Meltdown is a collaboration with Broadway lyricist Ernie Lijoi. The comic musical was a finalist in the Rod Parker Playwriting Competition, kicking off developmental readings in Boston and New York City. MONSTERS! premiered as a full production at CentAstage in Boston, subsequently produced at the Deertrees Theatre in Harrison Maine, and at The Regent Theatre in Arlington. (monstersthemusical.com) Phaneuf’s latest creation is a song cycle entitled Memorize You, which premiered in Boston, now available for production. (gailphaneuf.com/news-and-memorize.html)
Phaneuf is the founder of G.P. Productions in Boston, and a former president of The Boston Playwrights’ Platform, where several of her plays were first produced. Her new screenplay, The Hidden Women of Rosie’s Place is slated for production in Boston.
Abrahamse and Meyer Productions previously produced Hamlet and Sweet Bird of Youth at the Festival in 2017, as well as Desire Under the Elms in 2016, The Milk Train Doesn’t Stop Here Anymore and The Day on Which a Man Dies in 2015, The Lady Aoi in 2014, and Kingdom of Earth in 2013.
Founded in 2006, Provincetown Tennessee Williams Theater Festival honors playwright Tennessee Williams by presenting his classic and undiscovered plays, the work of his peers, and new work inspired by Williams’ creative vision worldwide. The Festival contributes to the cultural wealth of Provincetown by celebrating Williams’ connection to Cape Cod, his evolving international importance and his avant-garde spirit.
The Night of the Iguana
Provincetown Tennessee Williams Theater Festival
Provincetown Theater, 238 Bradford Street, Provincetown
Thursday Sept 26, 4:00 pm – 7:00 pm
Friday Sept 27, 1:00 pm – 4:00 pm
Friday Sept 27, 7:30 pm – 10:30 pm
Saturday Sept 28, 2:00 pm – 5:00 pm
Saturday Sept 28, 8:00 pm – 11:00 pm
Sunday Sept 29, 2:00 pm – 5:00 pm
Tickets: $45, $22.50 for students, groups of 6+ take 20% off with code GROUP19*
For more information or tickets to The Night of the Iguana, The Provincetown Tennessee Williams Theater Festival, or The Provincetown Theater, visit twptown.org.
