Theresa Rebeck, unstoppable theater machine
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This has been a busy few weeks for playwright Theresa Rebeck.
On Friday, her play ‘Mauritius’ opened at the Pasadena Playhouse to mostly strong reviews. (Read Los Angeles Times theater critic Charles McNulty’s review here.) Later this month, Rebeck’s novel ‘Three Girls and Their Brother’ will come out in paperback. In between, she found time to write an essay for The Times’ Playwrights on Writing series in which she criticized the current theater trend away from plot and structure.
No rest for the brave, apparently. Now, casting has been announced for Rebeck’s latest play, ‘Our House,’ which will open June 9 at Playwrights Horizons in New York. The reality-show satire tells the story of three housemates whose mounting irritation with each other explodes into violence. Their plotline intersects with the rise of an ambitious female journalist who sleeps with the network boss to further her career.
‘Our House’ will feature Christopher Evan Welch, Morena Baccarin, Jeremy Strong, Stephen Kunken and Mandy Siegfried. Michael Mayer (‘Spring Awakening’) will direct.
I saw ‘Our House’ at its world premiere at the Colorado New Play Summit last year. The press notes said the play was inspired by several pop-culture phenomena — namely CBS’ ‘Big Brother’ and the marriage of Les Moonves and Julie Chen. But Rebeck downplayed them when I asked her about it later. Instead, she said she drew directly from her own frustrating TV experience as a writer for shows such as ‘NYPD Blue’ and ‘Law & Order: Criminal Intent.’
As much as ‘Our House’ satirizes the reality show business — you could call it the ‘Network’ of our times — Rebeck confessed that she loves ‘American Idol.’ In fact, she said she makes a point of watching the Fox hit show with her children, Cooper and Cleo, at their home in Brooklyn.
Rebeck told Colorado audiences last year that the ending for ‘Our House’ wasn’t completely fine-tuned and that she would work on it more before it opens in New York. Stay tuned.
— David Ng
