People’s Light & Theatre Company presents CINDERELLA, by Kathryn Petersen, with music and lyrics written by Michael Ogborn, from November 19, 2008 – January 4, 2009 on the Main Stage. Pete Pryor directs. People’s Light & Theatre is located at 39 Conestoga Road, Malvern. For tickets call 610.644.3500 or visit www.peopleslight.org. ING is the show’s corporate sponsor and TARGET is the Family Discovery Series sponsor.

Dramaturg Lee Devin says, “Pantos are exuberantly larger than life. They use familiar stories to form the basis for exaggeration, variation and topical social commentary, as well as outrageous jokes and rollicking songs and dances.”

This is People’s Light’s fifth “Panto” style show, a tradition borrowed from England, where almost every town has a Panto during the holiday season. Pantos are a mix between a “fractured fairy tale” and a variety show.

CINDERELLA incorporates traditional Panto standards, including audience participation (in the form of cheering the heroes and booing the villains), candy passed out to audience members, and a “silly song” that inspires an audience sing-along.

“With our holiday Panto,” adds Artistic Director Abigail Adams, “we’ve developed a tradition that both we and our audiences love. All ages get a kick out of it. Just like the best plays for all ages, there is something for everybody.”

Some regular Panto cast members return this year in key roles. Erin Weaver and company member Susan McKey are the evil stepsisters, Tom Teti plays the father, Christopher Patrick Mullen is the prince’s valet, and Mark Lazar is the “Grand Dame” in the role of the fairy godmother. Michael Ogborn returns as composer and lyricist and has written nine original songs.

After appearing in last year’s Panto TREASURE ISLAND, Pete Pryor returns to make his directorial debut at People’s Light & Theatre Company.

CINDERELLA previews on Wednesday, November 19th and Thursday, November 20th at 7pm. The show opens on Saturday, November 22nd at 7pm and runs through January 4th. Tickets are now on sale and cost $29 - $48, with special discounts available for students, seniors, and groups of 10 or more. Audiences are encouraged to join the artists after each Thursday night performance to discuss the production.

Subscriptions to the 2008-2009 Season are still available at a significant savings! See five shows for as little as $110 or choose just four shows for as little as $92. Shows include: Cinderella (November 19, 2008 – January 4, 2009); The Day of the Picnic (January 28 – February 22, 2009); A Tale of Two Cities (March 11 – May 3, 2009); Doubt: A Parable (June 3 – 28, 2009); and End Days (July 8 – August 2, 2009). For information, tickets, and subscriptions, please call the box office at 610-644-3500 or visit www.peopleslight.org.

Subscriptions to the TARGET Family Discovery Series are still available. Subscriptions for children ages 17 and under are $50 or $56—a savings of up to 34% off single ticket prices! The three-show subscription includes: Cinderella (November 19, 2008 – January 4, 2009); A Tale of Two Cities (March 11 – May 3, 2009); and Eggs (April 23 – May 24, 2009).

Special performances and discounts, in addition to discount meal packages and talk-backs with the artists are available for groups of 10 or more. For more information or to purchase group tickets, call 610.647.1900, ext. 134 or email group@peopleslight.org.

KEY BIOS

Kathryn Petersen (Playwright) is an Artistic Associate at People's Light and a member of the resident acting company. She has appeared in over sixty productions regionally, most recently appearing in Kid Simple with Azuka Theatre and The Tempest at Arcadia Stage. Kathryn is also a produced and published playwright. People's Light has produced several of her plays; most recently Arthur's Stone, Merlin's Fire—The Making of a King (2003) and then three Pantos, Jack & the Beanstalk (2005), Robin Hood (2006) and Treasure Island (2007). Kathryn is an Assistant Professor of Theater at Arcadia University and is currently pursuing an MFA in Playwriting at Temple University.

Michael Ogborn (Composer) was born and raised in Philadelphia, PA, and currently makes his home in New York City. A graduate of DeSales University, he made his Off-Broadway debut in 1993 with the critically-acclaimed musical revue Box Office of the Damned, featuring then “newcomer” Kristen Chenoweth. His work has been produced at the Arden Theatre Company (Baby Case – winner of four Barrymore Awards including Outstanding Music and Best Musical of the Year – and Café Puttanesca), The Wilma Theater, and 1812 Productions in Philadelphia; The Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts in Washington, D.C.; the City Theatre in Pittsburgh, PA; the Horizon Theater in Atlanta, GA; the Diversionary Theater in San Diego, CA; Theater LaB in Houston, TX; and Radio City Music Hall in New York, NY. As a “Piano Man” he received Philadelphia Magazine's 1992 Best of Philly Award for a Cabaret Performer, a Mid-Atlantic Emmy Award in 1993 for the PBS music video Soldiers in the Sky, and in 2003 the Harrington Award for Outstanding Creative Achievement given by BMI Musical Theater Workshop. He is currently at work with playwright Michael Hollinger on the musical Tulipomania, commissioned by the Arden Theatre Company. Another project in the works includes A Tour of the Ruins. Mr. Ogborn is a proud member of the Dramatists Guild Inc., the BMI Musical Theater Workshop, and the owner of Leydensong Music Co. Other produced works include Fishwives ('81), Earbeds ('83), The Vagabond Age ('84), Oh, Antigone! ('86), Pinocchio: A Real Boy ( '87), C'est la Guerre! ('89), Ozone-a-thon ('96), Regalia ('97), Jungle Book (‘00), Mary, Don’t Ask ! (‘03) and The USED faces of 2004.

Pete Pryor (Director) is returning to People's Light & Theatre where he performed the role of Captain Smilenot in last year's Treasure Island. This tenth collaboration at PLTC marks his debut as a director for this company. Pete is the Co-Founder of 1812 Productions, for whom he directed the Barrymore-nominated Recent Tragic Events and The Four of Us. He is the recipient of two Barrymore awards and two Independence Foundation Fellowships. Some regional credits include: Lantern Theatre Company (Othello, Richard III); Arden (BFG); Wilma (Pillowman, Road); Theatre Exile (Rounding Third and Full Figured); Azuka (The Boys); Delaware Theatre Company (ART); Philadelphia Theatre Company (Sylvia) and PLTC (Treasure Island, Humble Boy, The Foreigner). International credits include: O'Casey Theatre Company of Northern Ireland (The Plough and the Stars). Film and television: Lebanon, The Cellar, Felix Melman, Surrender Dorothy, The In Crowd, Hack and The Starship Akuno. Last May he completed a development workshop of his first play, Beautiful Boy. He is the Artist-in-Residence at The Pathway School.

Elena Bossler (Sudsy Squirrel) is returning to People’s Light & Theatre Company once again, now as a very recent graduate of Temple University. She recently performed with the company in Six Characters in Search of an Author, as well as in Anne of Green Gables as Ruby. Elena just finished up Anna Bella Eema as Anna Bella with Gas and Electric Arts. She has previously worked with PTC, Wilma (PYP), Hedgerow, Brat Productions, Allen’s Lane Theatre Company, the City of Maples Repertory Theater in Macon, Missouri, and the Adi Theater in New Delhi, India where she toured a one-woman show last January. She is also the 2008-2009 Teaching Apprentice for Philadelphia Young Playwrights.

Kim Carson (Ella Opfinder) is returning to PLTC, where she has been seen in Six Characters in Search of an Author, Anne of Green Gables, and The Crucible. Other recent credits include Side by Side by Sondheim—Walnut Street Theatre, Fantasticks!—Mum Puppettheatre (Barrymore nomination for Outstanding Leading Actress in a Musical), and Beauty Is—Hotel Obligato. Other credits include Arden Theatre Co., 11th Hour Theatre Co., and Pennsylvania Shakespeare Festival.

Jeffrey Coon (Prince Aiden of Sargasso) last appeared at PLTC in Falsettos. He has performed locally at Walnut Street Theatre, Arden Theatre Company, Philadelphia Theatre Company, Prince Music Theater and many others. Favorite roles include: Che (Evita), Billy Bigelow (Carousel), Harold Hill (The Music Man) and Franklin Shepard (Merrily We Roll Along). Next is Stanley in A Streetcar Named Desire at Walnut Street Theatre.

Chris Faith (Big Gus) is returning to People’s Light after appearing in Treasure Island last season. He has performed Off-Broadway in The Secret Garden and Like It Is at the York Theatre. He has played opposite Linda Eder in The Seduction of Sheila Valentine at the Lenape Regional Performing Arts Center. Locally he has appeared at the Wilma Theater, the Arden Theatre Company, 1812 Productions, Mum Puppettheatre, Pennsylvania Shakespeare Festival, Act II Playhouse and the Bristol Riverside Theatre. Chris is a multiple Barrymore Award nominee, including for Best Actor in a Play. He co-hosted the 2006/07 Barrymore Awards ceremony alongside Greg Wood. Chris holds an MFA in Acting from Brandeis University, and he and his wife, Reina, own and operate Dance Arts Collaborative, a children's performing arts school.

Maggie Fitzgerald (Flea) Maggie is a seventh grade student at Rosemont School of the Holy Child. She is back for her third year at PLTC (Getting Near to Baby—Barrymore nominated, Treasure Island and The Giver). She returns after spending the summer and fall at the Walnut Street Theatre as Eponine with a Broadway cast in Les Misérables and as Violet in State Fair. Maggie has performed in various roles at the Media and Hedgerow Theatres, her last as the lead in Carol and Bill Luttrell’s musical Red Robbie’s Christmas Story. She has performed as Fan in Alan Menken’s musical The Christmas Carol and as Nygana in South Pacific.

Andrew Kane (Tom Cat) is making his People’s Light debut. Recent credits include Twelfth Night, Cyrano de Bergerac (Pennsylvania Shakespeare Festival), and the Barrymore-nominated cast of Go, Dog. Go! (Arden Theatre Company). Upcoming: The Complete Works of William Shakespeare (Abridged) with Theatre Horizon and Hamlet with the Lantern.

Mark Lazar (Hazel Opfinder) is a company member celebrating his twelfth year with PLTC. In addition to spending the last four holiday seasons in a dress, he includes Sherlock Holmes & The Case of the Jersey Lily, Twelfth Night, The Foreigner, The Crucible, The Miser, Arthur’s Stone, Merlin’s Fire, Born Yesterday, The Little Foxes, Camping with Henry and Tom, and Hearts, among some of his recent favorites here. He is an eleven-season veteran of The North Carolina Shakespeare Festival, spending the 1990s there as a Resident Company Member, performing Shakespeare, the other classics, and ten Christmas Carols as Ebenezer Scrooge, while spending many off-seasons at The Charlotte Repertory Theatre. A founding member and ten-year veteran of the acting company at The Madison Rep, Mr. Lazar performed regularly with nearly all of Wisconsin’s professional theatres. Mark and his wife Elaine now live near Valley Forge, along with their thirteen-year-old black lab, Ralph. Up next at People's Light: A Tale of Two Cities. And once again this holiday season, Mark is performing the voice of Ebenezer Scrooge for First State Children’s Theater’s live Public Radio Broadcast (and re-broadcasts) of Charles Dickens’ A Christmas Carol.

Susan McKey (Poisianna Loosestrife) has appeared in all four previous holiday Pantos. She has been a company member here since 1988, and last year was seen as Evelyn Trelawnee in Treasure Island, Miss Lucy Wainwright in Getting Near to Baby, and Lillie Langtry in Sherlock Holmes & The Case of the Jersey Lily. She will end this season as Sylvia in End Days. Susan is a Barrymore Award winner, part of the "Freedom Rising" company at the National Constitution Center, a native Cape Codder, mother of two children (Griffen, 9, and Ella Marie, 5), and wife to Benjamin Lloyd.

Christopher Patrick Mullen (Barnaby, The Valet) is graduate of DeSales University and a member of the Resident Ensemble of Artists here at PLTC, where he has appeared in Getting Near to Baby, Crispin: The Cross of Lead, Splittin’ the Raft, Twelfth Night, Robin Hood, The Crucible, Jack & the Beanstalk, The Miser, Julius Caesar, and The Tempest, among other productions. Regional credits include: Assassins, Irma Vep, As You Like It, Around the World in 80 Days, The Imaginary Invalid, Hamlet, The Glass Menagerie, Macbeth, Romeo and Juliet, and Charlie’s Aunt (Pennsylvania Shakespeare Festival), Two Gentlemen of Verona, Hamlet, Taming of the Shrew, Dracula: The Journal of Jonathan Harker, and A Midsummer Night’s Dream (Orlando-UCF Shakespeare Festival). Other regional and NY credits include: The Pavilion, Hedda Gabler, The Stinky Cheese Man, Much Ado about Nothing, Hyde in the Shadows, The Seven Year Itch, and Doughboy. On television he has played a couple of bad guys on NBC’s Law & Order. Chris is a founding co-artistic director of QUINNOPOLIS, NY. He lives in Pennsylvania with his wife, Erin.

Kimberly Rehfuss (Baroness Lucretia Loosestrife) has appeared on Broadway in Taboo, Off-Broadway in The Vagina Monologues, in The Radio City Christmas Spectacular as Mrs. Claus, and performed with the Muppets in the Sesame Street DVD, A Magical Halloween Adventure. In Philly Kimberly has performed with 1812 Productions (Perfectly Marvelous, Box Office of the Damned, various cabarets), Act II Playhouse (Harry Chapin: Remember When the Music), Prince Music Theater (The Snow Queen), and Society Hill Playhouse (Lafferty’s Wake, Schoolhouse Rock Live!).

Tom Teti (Oliver Opfinder) appeared last season in Theophilus North and Treasure Island. Earlier this year he appeared at Two River Theater in A Murder, A Mystery, and A Marriage and in Philadelphia’s PlayPenn Festival. He also performed narration and wrote text for a concert for Chamber Music Now! in April. He is producer and director of the Reading Writer’s event for the Center for Literacy. He teaches acting at Hedgerow Theatre.

Erin Weaver (Invasia Loosestrife) has been in every People’s Light Panto, including her performances as Jamie Hawkins in Treasure Island (Barrymore nomination), Robin in Robin Hood, Jack in Jack & the Beanstalk (Barrymore nomination) and Princess Rosa in Sleeping Beauty. Other People's Light credits include The Miser (Marianne) and Jungalbook (Perchy, Chil and others). Erin recently played Emily in Our Town, as well as Mary in A Murder, A Mystery, and A Marriage, both at Two River Theater Company where she was awarded Best Actress for both performances by the NJ Star Ledger. Other credits include: Mary in A Murder, A Mystery and A Marriage (Barrymore nomination) at the Delaware Theatre Company, Miranda in The Tempest at the Folger Shakespeare Theatre in DC, Syncopation as well as Mary's Wedding (Barrymore nomination) at Act II Playhouse, Into the Woods at the Arden Theatre, and An Artist’s Workshop with Azuka Theatre Collective. Erin is an honors graduate from the University of the Arts and a Master’s Candidate through NYU for theatre education.

WHAT:
CINDERELLA by Kathryn Petersen, music and lyrics by Michael Ogborn

WHEN:
November 19, 2008—January 4, 2009 at the Main Stage

WHERE:
People’s Light & Theatre Company
39 Conestoga Road, Malvern, PA 19355

PRICES:
Tickets are $29—$48, with special discounts available for students, seniors, and groups of 10 or more.

GROUPS:
Meal and ticket packages are available for groups of 10 or more at Places! Bistro, an on-site restaurant. Call Adria Charles for more information at 610.647.1900, ext. 134 or email group@peopleslight.org.

CONTACT:
For tickets or information call the box office at 610.644.3500 or visit www.peopleslight.org

PRODUCTION TEAM:
By Kathryn Petersen
Music and lyrics by Michael Ogborn
Directed by Pete Pryor
Scenic Design by James F. Pyne, Jr.
Costume Design by Rosemarie E. McKelvey
Lighting Design by Paul Hackenmueller
Music Direction by David Ames
Assistant Direction/Choreography by Samantha Bellomo
Video Design by Jorge Cousineau
Dramaturgy by Elizabeth Pool
Stage Management by Kate McSorley
Sound Design/Production Management by Charles T. Brastow

CAST:
Mark Lazar - Hazel Opfinder (The Dame)
Tom Teti - Oliver Opfinder (Father)
Kim Carson - Ella Opfinder (Cinderella)
Kimberly Rehfuss - Baroness Lucretia Loosestrife (Stepmother)
Erin Weaver - Invasia Loosestrife
Susan McKey - Poisianna Loosestrife
Jeffrey Coon - Prince Aiden of Sargasso
Christopher Patrick Mullen - Barnaby, The Valet
Chris Faith - Big Gus
Elena Bossler - Sudsy Squirrel
Andrew Kane - Tom Cat
Maggie Fitzgerald - Flea