Interplayers Theatre - Professional & Lively Entertainment for Theater Lovers in Spokane, WA

Interplayers

Current Season

Current & Upcoming Plays

'ART'

by Yasmina Reza, translated by Christopher Hampton
Directed by Reed McColm

March 11 - March 27, 2010

The 1998 Tony Award winner for Best Play returns to the IPT stage by "popular demand" as the Subscribers' Choice.

Director Reed McColm asks, "How much would you pay for a white painting?"

'ART' is a story about art and friendship that tackles the age-old question: “What is art?”

Directed by Reed McColm and starring Jack Bannon, Patrick Treadway and Roger Welch, “ART” is a rare drama that makes a splash.

“ ... filled from first curtain to ending with a dazzling array of language.”

- Iris Fanger, Christian Science Monitor

“It’s an actor’s dream, a nonstop cross-fire of crackling language, serious issues of life and art expressed in outbursts that sound like Don Rickles with a degree from the Sorbonne. Brilliantly translated by Christopher Hampton, ... [it] takes that yawny old bore, the play of ideas, and jolts it to life - Jack Kroll, Newsweek

First week: Thurs., March 11, 7:30 PM (preview); Fri., March 12, 8 PM (reception following at IPT); Sat., March 13, 8 PM (reception following at Europa); and Sun., March 14, 2 PM.
Second week: Wed., March 17, 7:30 PM; Thurs., March 18, 7:30 PM; Fri., March 19, 8 PM; and Sat., March 20, 2 PM and 8 PM.
Final week: Wed., March 24, 7:30 PM; Thurs., March 25, 7:30 PM; Fri., March 26, 8 PM; and Sat., March 27, 2 PM and 8 PM.

Get tickets at the IPT box office, (509) 455-PLAY, open most weekdays from noon to 4 PM and one hour before curtain, or at ticketswest.com and 1-800-325-SEAT.

Special rates available for students, seniors, military and fundraising groups.

Now showing in the theatre's Gellhorn Gallery: Works of the Spokane Potters Guild.

To order tickets please call 455-PLAY (7529), 325-SEAT (7328), 1-800-325-SEAT (7328) or visit TicketsWest to purchase tickets online.

Eleemosynary

by Lee Blessing

April 15 - May 1, 2010

Three singular women, representing three generations of one family, share delicate relationships.

To order tickets please call 455-PLAY (7529), 325-SEAT (7328), 1-800-325-SEAT (7328) or visit TicketsWest to purchase tickets online.

Psychopathia Sexualis

by John Patrick Shanley

May 13 - May 29, 2010

It's a fiercely funny farce about "men and their befuddlements" — great for Spring!

To order tickets please call 455-PLAY (7529), 325-SEAT (7328), 1-800-325-SEAT (7328) or visit TicketsWest to purchase tickets online.

Past Plays

by William Inge
Directed by Scott A Smith

September 14 - October 1, 2006

A classic comedy about the relationships formed between bus passengers stranded at a roadside diner outside of Kansas City during a snowstorm. The play focuses on the kindling romance between a nightclub chanteuse and a headstrong cowboy, as well as the poignant lives of the others waiting out the storm.

Featuring Ellen Travolta and Jack Bannon

Single tickets go on sale August 1st.

Rating: PG

Good Morning World How Are You

Directed by Esta Rosevear

October 5 - October 6, 2006

Benefit Show for Interplayers Theatre, created by Esta and William Rosevear

A view of today's world through the eyes of Mark Twain and Will Rogers and a cautionary tale, The Last Flower, by James Thurber. These stories and quips will enlighten audiences as to the timelessness of the worries and woes of our world. A multi-media presentation of images, light and sound leading to a culmination of Thurber's The Last Flower. "In it you will find his faith in the renewal of life, his feeling for the beauty and fragility fo life on earth," E.B. White.

Featuring: Maynard Villers, Tony Caprile, Jaime Mathis, Dan Anderson

Rating: G

by Stephen Mallatratt

October 12 - October 28, 2006

A lawyer obsessed with a curse he believes has been cast over him and his family by the spectre of a Woman in Black, engages a skeptical young actor to help him tell his terrifying story and exorcise the fear that grips his soul. As they reach further into his darkest memories, they find themselves caught up in a world of eerie marshes and moaning winds.

Rating: PG-13

by Ken Ludwig

November 9 - November 25, 2006

The show that brought Carol Burnette back to Broadway! An acting couple, not exactly the Lunts, are on tour in Buffalo. Fate has given these thespians one more shot at starring roles and director Frank Capra himself is en route to Buffalo to catch their matinee performance. Hilarious misunderstandings pile on madcap misadventures, all of which are magnified by Charlotte's deaf mother who manages the theatre.

Rating: PG

by Alfred Uhry

January 18 - February 3, 2007

Set in the Deep South, just prior to the civil rights movement. Having recently demolished another car, Daisy, a rich woman is informed that she must rely on the service chauffeur, Hoke, a thoughtful black man. Daisy immediately regards Hoke with disdain and in turn, Hoke is not impressed with, he believes, her latent prejudice. In a series of scenes spanning 25 years, the two, despite their differences, grow ever close to each other.

Rating: G

by Richard Alfieri

March 1 - March 17, 2007

When Lily, an attractive Florida retiree, signs up for six dance lessons in six weeks, it doesn’t look like she’ll last the course. But an unlikely relationship develops between the prudish widow and her cynical and equally lonely tutor. Michael knows all the dance moves, but perhaps Lily can teach him a thing or two about life.

Rating: PG-13

by Arthur Miller

April 5 - April 21, 2007

Two brothers meet after a sixteen-year estrangement. The old family furniture is to be disposed of, and a wise old Jewish dealer has come to buy the furniture. Miller works up to the showdown scene slowly where the siblings feel each other out before the basis of their long alienation and bitterness emerges into short, blunt, enraged accusations. A taut, exciting scene reveals the characters, including strengths and weaknesses to each other.

Rating: PG

by Craig Volk
Directed by Ann Whiteman

May 10 - May 26, 2007

"Sparky and the Fitz" is a comedy based on a retirement-age love triangle. The story centers on the everyday relationship between the husband (Sparky) and the wife (Fitz). It sees Fitz is teetering on the edge of a huge decision if she should stay with the status quo and let the years continue to roll on by or jump into another relationship with the UPS man. How she makes her final choice is a hilarious final scene.

The Rainmaker by Richard Nash

September 13 - September 29, 2007

At the time of a paralyzing drought in the West, a father and his two sons are just as worried about the daughter becoming an old maid as they are concerned about their dying cattle. The truth is...she is a plain girl. The brothers try every possible scheme to marry her off, but without success. Nor is there any sign of relief from the dry heat, when suddenly from out of nowhere, a smooth talking stranger appears who claims to be a rainmaker.

Kelly Quinnett, Jonathan Rau and members of the Bus Stop cast star in this partnership with Lake City Playhouse.

October 18 - November 3, 2007

Same Time Next Year

By Bernard Slade
Directed by Esta Rosevear

Interplayers Theatre presents the acclaimed and ageless comedy Same Time, Next Year, made famous on Broadway and by Alan Alda and Ellen Burstyn in the movie. National stage star, Beth Hallaren, joins local favorite, Cameron Lewis (Singin' in the Rain), in this delightful story of two persons whose lives entwine over 25 years, to provide happy moments, human emotion and ultimately, wisdom

November 21 - December 8, 2007

GRACE AND GLORIE

By Tom Ziegler
Directed by Ellen Crawford

Between an illiterate 90-year old woman dying of cancer and an urbane Harvard educated MBA volunteering for hospice, which do you think needs saving? Cultures and generations hilariously collide when an illiterate but saavy ninety-year-old mountain woman is visited by the Harvard-educated transplanted New Yorker who is assigned as her hospice volunteer. Ellen Crawford, Nurse Lydia Wright of “ER” and “The Fitz” of last season’s “Sparky and The Fitz” will direct, with veteran L.A. actresses Brady Rubin and Karen Kalensky in the title roles. It is a very funny and touching piece, full of revelation and hope: a perfect show for the holiday season.

Special Thanksgiving night preview performance--$10. "... a crowd pleaser." -- NY Times

December 17 - December 23, 2007

A Reduced Christmas Carol
By Ann Whiteman

Three hilarious shortened versions of the Charles Dickens classic. Make this holiday hilarity at Interplayers one of your season's traditions. We're looking forward to a returning cast that includes four incredible Spokane actors. The whole family will love it. Audience Participation!

An $8 December special event!

January 17 - February 2, 2008

On Golden Pond
By Ernest Thompson
Directed by Maynard Villers

The love story of Ethel and Norman Mayer. The retired professor and wife return to their summer home on Golden Pond for the 48th year, when they are visited by their divorced daughter and dentist fiancé, who then go off to Europe, leaving behind a teenage son. Lessons are learned by all in sometimes deeply moving moments of the play. "On Golden Pond is a work of rare simplicity and beauty," - NY Daily News. (Maynard Villers directed the Interplayers hit, "Driving Miss Daisy" last season.)

Rights pending.

February 28 - March 15, 2008

The Clean House
By Sarah Ruhl

Directed by Karen Kalensky
(All My Children, SNL)

A 2005 Pulitzer finalist, the play takes place in the home of a married couple, both doctors, who have hired a housekeeper named Matilde. She is a comedian who cares more for the perfect joke than about house cleaning. She becomes friends with an eccentric sister of the lady of the house. The wildly funny play is a whimsical look at class, comedy, and the true nature of love. "A rich work about big themes from a young playwright with an original and audacious voice." - Variety.

March 27 - April 12, 2008

Rounding Third
By Richard Dresser
Directed by Maynard Villers

The tumultuous journey of two Little League coaches through an entire season...from their first tentative meeting to the climactic championship game. And over the course of exhilarating victories, heartbreaking defeats, and interminable rainouts, the two men battle over how to lead the team. Out of the conflicting philosophies, the real issues of the play emerges: How should we raise our children?

Frankie & Johnny in the Clair de Lune

by Terrence McNally
Directed by Jonn Jorgensen

September 17 - October 3, 2009

Artistic Associate and Spokane favorite Karen Kalensky returns to the Interplayers stage to star with her husband John Henry Whitaker (Oleanna) in this funny and hard-edged adult drama depicting a one-night stand between blue-collar workers.

Dare they try to make it into a relationship?

Click here to download the program for
Frankie & Johnny in the Clair de Lune.

Rating: Mature Subject Matter/Language

by John Patrick Shanley
Directed by Roger Welch

October 22 - November 7, 2009

The 2005 Pulitzer Prize for Drama winner, exploring the prickly question of possible abuse within a certain Catholic parish in 1964.

Directed by Roger Welch. Featuring Aaron Murphy, Bethany Hart, Rebecca Davis, and returning to Spokane as Sister Aloysius, Ann Russell Whiteman. Director Welch, Murphy and Davis reunite to complete the production that was in rehearsal at Actors Repertory Theatre last season, when that company suddenly folded.

Underneath the Lintel

by Glen Berger
Directed by Damon Abdallah

November 25 - December 12, 2009

A one-man show featuring Reed McColm as a shabby, obsessive Dutch librarian, who finds in the Returns bin a book that has been overdue for 113 years.

"What begins as Pythonesque highbrow silliness turns into an existential detective story. Storytelling of the highest caliber." —Time Out New York

"A blissfully ludicrous vision quest, outrageously funny, madly literate ... a stunner ... with a spiritual sensitivity that extends the Librarian's search for an alternate truth to Everyman. — L.A. Weekly

Rating: Hilarous!

Love Letters

AR Gurney
Directed by Reed McColm

January 29 - January 30, 2010

Ellen Travolta and Jack Bannon will perform
AR Gurney's staged-reading play, Love Letters, as a fundraiser for

Interplayers 30^th Anniversary Campaign

Only three performances:

7:30 pm on Friday, January 29th

and two shows at

2 & 7:30 pm on Saturday, January 30th.

Honky Tonk Angels

Ted Swindley
Directed by Reed McColm

February 3 - February 21, 2010

Honky Tonk Angels is the song-filled story of three women as they travel to Nashville to pursue their dreams of singing country western music. They meet on a Greyhound bus, discover their mutual ambitions, and hitch their wagons together as a rockin', rollickin' trio.

There's Angela, rural optimist and mother of six, "citified" Sue Ellen, leaving an unhappy secretarial career in Los Angeles, and finally young and naive Darlene, straight from a small town in Texas. Together they are the Honky Tonk Angels, guaranteeing musical fun and achingly satisfying ballads wherever they roam.

The production is directed by Reed McColm and will star Jennifer Jacobs (Cowgirls) as Angela, Emily Cleveland (The Graduate) as Darlene, and Marina Kalani as Sue Ellen. Musical direction is by Carolyn Jess with choreography by Jennifer Shell. Playwright Ted Swindley also wrote the IPT mega-hit Always, Patsy Cline.

Third week: (replaces the original first week, moved due to Love Letters benefit performances.)

Wed., Feb. 17, SOLD OUT
Thu., Feb. 18, 7:30 pm
Fri. Feb. 19, 8 pm
Sat., Feb. 20, 8 pm
Sun. Feb. 21, 2 pm (matineé)