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MainStage Productions

Showtime: 8pm   •   Dinner Served: 7pm   •   Balcony Seating Begins: 7:30pm
--- Sunday Matinee ---
Showtime: 2pm   •   Dinner Served: 1pm   •   Balcony Seating Begins: 1:30pm

Presented By...

This is the play that has as its genesis in the events of the famous Scopes trial. One of the most outstanding dramas of our time, the NY Times said, "The portrait it draws of an explosive episode in American culture, vigorously written by Jerome Lawrence and Robert E. Lee, remains as fresh as it ever was. One of the most stirring plays in recent years retains its folk flavor and spiritual awareness in an Arena Stage production. Bursting with vitality... Literature of the stage!" ~ Cast List ~

A Bad Year for Tomatoes
by John Patrick
Auditions: September 19-20, 2011 at 7 p.m.
Performances: November 4-6, 10-13, 2011.

The production is a hilarious success dealing with the very funny misfortunes of a famous television actress who seeks to "get away from it all" in a small New England town. ~ Cast List ~

Presented By...

RLT will be the first community theater in Arkansas to present Hairspray, which has delighted audiences by sweeping them away to 1960's Baltimore, where the 50's are out--and change is in the air. Loveable plus-size heroine, Tracy Turnblad, has a passion for dancing, and wins a spot on the local TV dance program, "The Corny Collins Show." Overnight she finds herself transformed from outsider to teen celebrity. ~ Cast List ~

No Sex Please, We're British
by Alistair Foot and Anthony Marriot
Auditions: February 13 and February 15, 2012
Performances: April 13-15, 19-22, 2012

The grandfather of all hilarious, British farces, No Sex Please, We're British is has continued to play since premiering in London in 1971. A young bride who lives above a bank with her husband, who is the assistant manager, innocently sends a mail order off for some Scandinavian glassware. What comes is Scandinavian pornography. The plot revolves around what is to be done with the veritable floods of pornography, photographs, books, films and eventually girls that threaten to engulf this happy couple. The matter is considerably complicated by the man's mother, his boss, a visiting bank inspector, a police superintendent and a muddled friend who does everything wrong in his reluctant efforts to set everything right, all of which works up to a hilarious ending of closed or slamming doors. ~ Cast List ~

God of Carnage
by Yasmina Reza; translated by Christopher Hampton
Auditions: April 16-17, 2012 at 7 p.m.
Performances: June 1-3, 7-10, 2012

The 2009 Tony Award winner for Best Play is an explosive comedic drama exploring the dynamics of two couples who meet over drinks to discuss an episode of bullying perpetrated by the child of one set of beleaguered parents, God of Carnage examines the explosive underbelly of a seemingly 'civilized' strata of modern society--or, as some have said, "when liberals go bad."

Presented By...

Premiering in 1975 and the hit of the 1997 Broadway season in a production that originated at City Center's Encore! series, Chicago won six Tony Awards including Best Revival and later the Academy Award as Best Picture of the Year. ~ Cast List ~

2ndStage Diversity Unites Series

Showtime: 8pm   •   Sunday Matinee: 2pm

Wit
by Margaret Edson
Performances: January 6-8, 2012

Vivian Bearing is a professor with terminal ovarian cancer whose life revolves around learning and teaching. Throughout her eight rough cycles of chemotherapy treatment, she accepts her illness on an intellectual level, but never an emotional one until she is in extreme physical pain, about to die. She views her situation a learning experience and often hides behind her wit, giving the play its name. ~ Cast List ~

Why Torture is Wrong, and the People Who Love Them
by Christopher Durang
Performances: April 27-29, 2012

Political humor gets turned upside down with this raucous and provocative satire about America's growing homeland 'insecurity'. Why Torture is Wrong, and the People Who Love Them tells the story of a young woman suddenly in crisis: Is her new husband, whom she married when drunk, a terrorist? Or just crazy? Or both? Is her father's hobby of butterfly collecting really a cover for his involvement in a shadow government? Why does her mother enjoy going to the theater so much? Does she seek mental escape, or is she insane? Honing in on our private terrors both at home and abroad, Durang oddly relieves our fears in this black comedy for an era of yellow, orange, and red alerts.

The Rant
by Andrew Case
Performances: June 15-17, 2012

An African-American teenager is fatally shot on his front porch in a crime-ridden neighborhood of New York City. Hysterical and wrought with grief, the boy's mother accuses the police of murdering her son. A woman of Persian ancestry, whose job it is to investigate police misconduct, begins to find contradictions in the stories presented by both the mother and various eye-witnesses, including an African-American policeman on the scene. The "men in blue" close ranks around their beleaguered colleague. Accusations of racism and sexism poison the investigation and the audience is led down a Rashomon-like journey in which the truth appears to be less and less accessible, while the world hurries to form opinions based on uninformed assumptions.

Special Presentations

See Below for Showtimes

An Evening with Oren Safdie November 6, 2011 at 7:30pm
Reception at 7pm including hors d'oeuvres and complimentary beverages

Oren Safdie, Canadian-American-Israeli playwright and screenwriter, and the son of architect Moshe Safdie, has offered a staged reading of his Off-Broadway 2003 hit Private Jokes, Public Places at Rogers Little Theater (RLT), Sunday, November 6, 7:30 p.m. Safdie is visiting Northwest Arkansas for the celebratory opening of Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art.

Mr. Safdie graduated with a Master's in Architecture from Columbia University. He also received an MFA from Columbia University in Fiction Writing. While at Columbia he studied with playwright Romulus Linney.

His plays include The Bilbao Effect, West Bank, UK, The Last Word..., Jews & Jesus, Fiddler Sub-Terrain, Hyper-Allergenic, Broken Places, Laughing Dogs, La Compagnie and Private Jokes, Public Places which debuted at the Malibu Stage Co. and went on to play in New York at La MaMa ETC, before transferring to the Center of Architecture for a 5 month run. It also received productions at Tarragon Theatre in Toronto, Welfleet Harbor Actor's Theatre in Boston, the Aurora Theatre in Berkeley, California, The New End Theatre in London, England, and the National Theatre of Romania in Timisoara.

Presented By...

A Christmas Story returns to RLT just in time of the holidays with a delightful stage version of everyone's favorite Christmas movie--"you'll shoot your eye out, Ralphie!" Humorist Jean Shepherd's memoir of growing up in the midwest in the 1940s follows 9-year-old Ralphie Parker in his quest to get a genuine Red Ryder BB gun under the tree for Christmas. Ralphie pleads his case before his mother, his teacher and even Santa Claus himself, at Goldblatt's Department Store. The consistent response: "You'll shoot your eye out." All the elements from the beloved motion picture are here, including the family's temperamental exploding furnace; Scut Farkas, the school bully; the boys' experiment with a wet tongue on a cold lamppost; the Little Orphan Annie decoder pin; Ralphie's father winning a lamp shaped like a woman's leg in a net stocking; Ralphie's fantasy scenarios and more. ~ Cast List ~

Coming Soon...