Eugene O’Neill’s Pulitzer Prize-winning masterpiece ANNA CHRISTIE, a gripping drama of a woman torn between the expectations of men and the secrets of her past, gets a timely retelling under the direction of Peter Richards. This modern adaptation begins previews on December 2nd, opens on December 8th and plays a limited engagement through December 17th at The Wild Project (195 East 3rd Street, between Avenues A and B). Tickets are $15 and can be purchased at https://web.ovationtix.com/ or by calling OvationTix at 866-811-4111.
ANNA CHRISTIE tells the story of a young woman’s struggle for redemption and a chance at a new life. Harboring a troubling secret from her past, Anna reunites with her father – a captain, a master of the sea, and a man she hardly knows. When Anna meets a shipwrecked young sailor and the two fall in love, she finds she can no longer hide her past from the two men in her life. As the secret gets revealed, the bonds of love are tested. A powerful and relevant retelling of O’Neill’s classic, the play continues to challenge our understanding of honor and dignity.
ANNA CHRISTIE has been a long-time favorite for the director Peter Richards, who was taken by two poignant and timely themes of the O’Neill’s play: the idea of a woman asserting control over her own life despite the societal restraints, and the conflict of the “old” and “new” as represented by differences between Anna’s views and those of two foreign-born men in her life. “This is a strongly feminist play. When the curtain falls, Anna’s father and her lover no longer take it for granted that a woman should subordinate herself to a man,” says Richards. ”The two men have to overcome the old ways of seeing the world, while Anna thinks like the quintessential American: she believes in redemption, in second chances, in reinvention, and in opportunity. This conflict between old and new-world thinking is very much alive in America today,” he further explains.
The cast consists of accomplished stage and film actors who include: Therese Plaehn (A Supposedly Fun Thing I’ll Never Do Again, The Public Theater; TV: Mr. Robot), Stephen D’Ambrose (Broadway national tour of August: Osage County; Film: Factotum), Ben Chase (Film: 2016 EMMY-winning HBO documentary Jim: The James Foley Story; TV: Mysteries of Laura, Difficult People), Tina Johnson (Broadway: State Fair; Off-Broadway: Anthem, Baryshnikov Arts Center), and Scott Aiello (Regional: Steppenwolf Theatre Company; TV: Person of Interest, Blue Bloods).
The show features set design by David M. Barber, lighting design by Scott Bolman, sound design by Mark Van Hare and costume design by Moria Sine Clinton.
Playing schedule for ANNA CHRISTIE is as follows: Tuesday through Saturday at 7:30pm, with added performances on Sunday, December 4, at 5pm and Monday, December 12, at 7:30pm.
Peter Richards (Director) is a director, actor, and producer known for his wide array of interests, ranging from the classics through contemporary American plays to experimental and devised theatre. Richards has received critical praise for his adaptations of the classics, including a 2015 site-specific production of Chekhov’s The Seagull, set at a farm in Maine, and a staging of Julius Ceasar in LA that employed local residents as a Greek chorus. Richards’ ventures into contemporary playwriting include the staging of the Pulitzer-nominated drama The Dying City by Christopher Shinn and the Obie-winning play The Aliens by Annie Baker. Among his theatrical avant-garde projects are numerous shows with Conni’s Avant Garde Restaurant (an ensemble of which he is a founding member), presented in New York at The Ohio Theater and The Bushwick Starr. He also directed a 2013 play 400 Parts Per Million with Blessed Unrest (The Interart Theatre, NYC) and directs educational theater projects at Bates College in Maine. His acting credits include: stage: Gone by Charles L. Mee (59E59 Theaters); From the House of the Dead, Boris Godunov, and Hamlet at The Metropolitan Opera; TV: Law and Order: SVU, As the World Turns. Richards holds an MFA degree in Acting from Harvard University and a BA in Social Studies from Harvard College.