‘The Man Who Came To Dinner’—

Stray Kats Theatre Company To Debut With

First Performance On December 10

The Stray Kats Theatre Company, a not-for-profit theatre company, will present its inaugural season at Edmond Town Hall’s Alexandria Room, 45 Main Street in Newtown.

The upcoming season of staged readings is designed to introduce the company to the community and build an audience before venturing into fully mounted productions. Each evening will include a talk-back with the company, and coffee and dessert by Andrea’s Pastry Shop of Newtown. Programs will begin at 7:30, and tickets are $25 per performance or $140 for the full season of six programs.

The theatre’s mission includes the presentation of contemporary classics, old-time radio scripts and new works. The 2010-11 season will open on Friday, December 10, with a staged reading of George S. Kaufman and Moss Hart’s The Man Who Came to Dinner.

The Man Who Came to Dinner ran for 739 performances on Broadway. The main character of Sheridan Whiteside is based on Alexander Woolcott, a newspaperman, critic and radio personality who once reviewed an unfortunate lady’s book of poetry called And I Shall Make Music by saying “Not on my carpet, lady.”

Moss Hart had dinner at his house with Woolcott and recalled it as the “worst evening of my life.” When he relayed the incident to collaborator George S. Kaufman, he said, “Imagine if he broke his leg and had to stay with me.” The partners looked at each other and a new great play had been born.

The Stray Kats Theatre Company will consist of professional Connecticut actors appearing courtesy of Actors Equity Association(*) and some very talented local actors working on a Repertory Company model.

The cast of The Man Who Came to Dinner includes (subject to change) Newtown residents Patrick Kearney*, Mary Boucher*, Deana Zimmerman, Brenna Calderara and Dan Zimmerman; New Haven residents Tom Zingarelli* (as Sheridan Whiteside) and Joan Grant*; Norwalk residents Norman Allen* and Chris Cafaro; Stratford resident Nadine Willig*; Weston residents: Chilton Ryan*, Sean Hannon* and Barbara Rhoades*; and from Westport, David Rogers.*

The Artistic Director of Stray Kats is Kate Katcher. The Newtown resident is an actor, writer and director who debuted on Broadway in Fiddler on the Roof opposite Zero Mostel and repeated the role of Tzeitel opposite Herschel Bernardi, directed by Jerome Robbins. Her recent credits include roles on Nurse Jackie and the new Comedy Central series Jon Benjamin Has a Van.

Ms Katcher is also the creator of the husband-and-wife webisodes A Nice Drive and Planning Ahead in which she appears opposite real-life husband Don Striano.

The 2010-11 Stray Kats season of staged readings will continue, on Friday evenings, with Phillip Rapp’s The Bickersons on January 10; Kent Brown’s In the Middle of Nowhere, February 11; Arthur Miller’s The Price, March 11; Fibber McGee & Molly, April 8; and Christopher Demos Brown’s Our Lady of Allapattah, May 6.

Tickets are available at StrayKatsTheatreCompany.org or by calling 203-514-2221.

For further information, contact Kate Katcher at 203-514-2221 or katcher@earthlink.net.