Northern Stage Presents Classic ‘The Man Who Came to Dinner’

Northern Stage will present the wacky family comedy "The Man Who Came To Dinner," Dec. 11-Jan. 4 at the Briggs Opera House in White River Junction.

Written by George S. Kaufman (who wrote "A Night At the Opera" and others for the Marx Brothers) and Moss Hart (author of dozens of Broadway shows and director of the original Broadway productions of "Camelot" and "My Fair Lady"), this classic of the American theater tells the wildly adventurous tale of a famous but ornery radio personality who takes over an Ohio household at Christmas time.

Directed by Northern Stage Associate Artistic Director Robert Jay Cronin, the play stars Broadway veteran Robert Ousley as Sheridan Whiteside, the world’s worst holiday houseguest. After he slips and falls outside an Ohio home, the famous radio personality must stay to recover. Along the way, he turns the household into comic chaos, complete with singing, tap-dancing children. Favorite holiday carols, fast-moving comedy and an unbelievable cast of characters make this play an outstanding event for the whole family.

Ousley comes to Northern Stage with a long list of stage credits, including the original Tony Award-winning Broadway production of "Sweeney Todd" with Angela Lansbury; the recent Tony Award-winning revivals of "Kiss Me Kate" and "Showboat;" "Othello, starring Christopher Plummer and James Earl Jones; "Threepenny Opera" with Sting; "City of Angels;" and the late Richard Harris’ five-year world tour of "Camelot."

The cast also includes professional actors Ian Blackman and Shannon Polly, as well as returning Northern Stage favorites, including John Hayden, Amber Dow, Kevin Carter, M. Carl Kaufman, Brad Bass, and Kathleen Wallace.

Kaufman was from Pittsburgh, where he wrote stories and plays for his high school literary magazine before entering law school. Pleurisy forced him to abandon higher education, after which he worked as a typist, a clerk, and a salesman. In New Jersey, working for a ribbon company, he sent humorous essays to the Passaic Herald and then to the New York Tribune, eventually rising to a spot as drama reporter for the paper.

By 1937 Kaufman was a successful writer and director of a succession of hit plays, musicals, and films. Despite his extraordinary success on Broadway, he was terrified of failure and kept his day job as drama critic at the Times. His collaboration with Hart has been likened to that of Gilbert & Sullivan.

Hart was a penniless 25-year-old in 1929, with one ambition: to be a Broadway playwright. Sam Harris, a highly successful Broadway producer, linked him up with Kaufman, one of the most successful playwrights in the country, and the two created a mega-hit with "Once In A Lifetime." Over the next 10 years, they wrote seven more shows together. Four were long-running hits, and the others were successes that other playwrights would have been pleased to claim. "You Can’t Take It With You" won them the Pulitzer Prize.

The Briggs Opera House is handicapped-accessible. For information or tickets, call 296-7000.

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