The Last Five Years
Winding Road Theater Ensemble continues it’s third season with Jason Robert Brown’s landmark 2001 one-act musical, The Last Five Years. Playing January 6th through the 15th at the Cabaret Theatre at Arizona Theatre Company, and January 20th to the 22nd at St. Francis in the Foothills, The Last Five Years tells the story of Jamie Wellerstein, a rising novelist, and Cathy Hyatt, a struggling actress, through the five years of their relationship. The brilliance of this musical, aside from the music and lyrics, comes in the form Brown chooses to tell the story. Cathy sings through their failed relationship starting at the end and traveling backwards in time to the beginning, while Jamie begins with a song at the end of their first date and ends with his decision end their marriage. The only time the couple come together on stage is midway through the show, when their stories intersect for their wedding. Winding Road’s first musical stars two of Tucson’s premiere performers, Brian Levario and Ensemble member Amy Erbe, and directed by ensemble member Terry Erbe.
Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf?
Winding Road Theater Ensemble concludes it’s third season with an American classic, Albee’s masterpiece Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf? First performed on Broadway in 1962, this searing look at American life deals with how people create fantasies and illusions to cope with what their life has become and what happens when those masks get ripped away. George and Martha are a bitter, older couple coming home from a party at the university where George teaches. They invite a younger couple, Nick and Honey, over to celebrate Nick joining the faculty. As alcohol oils old tensions and new fears, the evening moves excruciatingly into morning as many truths come to light. Winding Road’s production of Albee’s play opens April 6th, 2012 at the Cabaret Theatre at the Temple of Music and Art and runs through April 22nd. Award-winning and critically acclaimed Tucson actresses Lesley Abrams and Amy Erbe play Martha and Honey respectively, while George and Nick will be played by two of Tucson’s most ubiquitous actors, Bill Epstein and Robert Anthony Peters.