Displaying items by tag: Moritz von Stuelpnagel

Following an acclaimed run at the Geffen Playhouse in Los Angeles and NY City Center in New York, AVA: The Secret Conversations, written by and starring Academy Award, Golden Globe, and Emmy Award-nominated actress and Evanston native Elizabeth McGovern (Downton Abbey, Ordinary People, Once Upon a Time in America), will make its Chicago premiere this this fall. Based on a series of real-life interviews given by Hollywood legend Ava Gardner, the production is directed by Tony Award nominee Moritz von Stuelpnagel (Broadway: Hand to God, Present Laughter), produced by Karl Sydow (Los Angeles, San Francisco, Toronto, UK: The Last Ship, UK: Noises Off), also features Aaron Costa Ganis (TV: "Bull," "Blue Bloods"). Step inside the world of the play with this look at McGovern as Ava Gardner.

AVA: The Secret Conversations runs September 24 – October 12, 2025 at the historic Studebaker Theater at the Fine Arts Building (410 S Michigan Ave). 

Tickets go on sale June 19, 2025 at www.AvaGardnerPlay.com.
Sign-up for email alerts at https://avagardnerplay.com/chicago/ to receive the Chicago presale code to access prime seat locations before the general public.
 

At the height of the Golden Age of Cinema, starlet Ava Gardner sat for a series of interviews with writer Peter Evans for him to glean the juicy details about her life story, her marriages to Mickey Rooney, Artie Shaw, and Frank Sinatra, and her turbulent relationship to Howard Hughes. Initially barred from publication, Evans' account of a bygone era was published twenty-five years later with permission from Gardner's estate and is now reimagined on stage.

"I am beyond thrilled to bring Ava: The Secret Conversations to Chicago," McGovern commented. "Gardner's life was one of incredible complexity, and I feel so privileged to step into her world and share her story onstage in my original hometown this fall."

AVA: The Secret Conversations marks McGovern's return to the Chicago area, where she previously filmed Robert Redford's Oscar-winning film "Ordinary People." Best known for her role as Lady Cora in the "Downton Abbey" series and films, McGovern will be seen this fall on screen in the sequel, Downton Abbey: The Grand Finale. She also stars in Anne Rice's "The Talamasca" on AMC this fall.
 
The creative team includes David Meyer (scenic design), Toni-Leslie James (costume design), Amith Chandrashaker (lighting design), Cricket S. Myers (sound design), Alex Basco Koch (projection design), and Matthew Armentrout (wig design). The Production Stage Manager is Avery Trunko. General management is by Pemberley Productions.

About the Artists

Elizabeth McGovern (Ava Gardner, Playwright). Elizabeth McGovern's internationally renowned career spans theatre, film, television, and music. In 2019, Elizabeth played Lady Cora in the feature film adaptation of the multiple award-winning television show "Downton Abbey," a role for which she was nominated for a Golden Globe and a Primetime Emmy and won a SAG Award. We then saw Elizabeth reprising her role of Lady Cora on the big screen in the sequel Downton Abbey 2, starring alongside Maggie Smith and Hugh Bonneville. Elizabeth received an Academy Award and Golden Globe nomination for her role in Ragtime, her second feature film, following her debut in Robert Redford's Ordinary People while still a student at Julliard. She has worked with John Hughes in She's Having a Baby, Curtis Hanson in The Bedroom Window, and Steven Soderbergh in King of the Hill. Other major film roles have included starring opposite Robert De Niro in Once Upon a Time in America and Sean Penn and Nicolas Cage in Racing with the Moon. In 2018, Elizabeth worked on The Commuter with Liam Neeson and later starred in Michael Engler's The Chaperone which Elizabeth also produced. Elizabeth has performed in both American and UK theatres, winning the 2013 Will Award from the Shakespeare Theatre Company. Other notable productions include Alexi Kaye Campbell's Sunset at the Villa Thalia, Lindsay Posner's God of Carnage last year in Bath, The Misanthrope at the Young Vic, Three Days of Rain at the Donmar and David Mamet's The Shawl at the Arcola Theatre. 2017 saw her return to Broadway in J.B. Priestley's Time and the Conways. Elizabeth also recently appeared in the West End premiere of Kenneth Lonergan's The Starry Messenger with Matthew Broderick. Elizabeth was most recently seen on the stage, writing and starring in her own adaptation of Peter Evans' memoir of the same name, AVA: The Secret Conversations. This wonderful production was also reprised earlier this year at the Geffen Theatre in Los Angeles. Last year, Elizabeth was seen on the big screen in And Mrs. alongside Harriet Walter and Aisling Bea. Elizabeth will next be seen reprising her role as Lady Cora in Downton Abbey 3. We will also see her star in Anne Rice's TV adaptation "The Talamasca" as Helen. With her band, Sadie and the Hotheads, Elizabeth has released four albums through Universal Music, and there is a fifth album pending, tentatively titled "Let's Stop Fighting."
 
Aaron Costa Ganis (Peter Evans) is an actor, writer, and director who has worked theatrically at the Roundabout Theatre Company, LAByrinth, Second Stage Theater, The Public Theater, Williamstown, the Geffen and Pasadena Playhouse. He currently recurs on "Power Book III: Raising Kanan," and can recently be seen on TV in "Fantasy Island," "The Endgame," "Bull," "Almost Family," "Blue Bloods," "Jessica Jones, House of Cards," and more. He can be seen in the upcoming Untitled Steven Spielberg Film for Universal and previously in the films Susie Searches, The Noel Diary, Lazy Eye, Monsters and Men, and Set It Up. Aaron dedicates this show to June and Rick, his mom and dad. MFA: NYU Graduate Acting Program, BA: Brandeis University & University of Oxford. 
 
Moritz von Stuelpnagel (Director). Broadway: Theresa Rebeck's I Need That starring Danny DeVito, Theresa Rebeck's Bernhardt/Hamlet starring Janet McTeer, Noël Coward's Present Laughter starring Kevin Kline (Tony nomination for Best Revival), Rob Askins' Hand to God (Tony nominations for Best Play and Best Director). London's West End: Theresa Rebeck's Mad House starring David Harbour and Bill Pullman, Hand to God (Olivier nomination for Best New Comedy). Off-Broadway: Theresa Rebeck's Seared (MCC Theater); Larissa FastHorse's The Thanksgiving Play (Playwrights Horizons); Mike Lew's Teenage Dick (Ma-Yi Theater Company/The Public Theater); Nick Jones' Important Hats of the Twentieth Century (Manhattan Theatre Club); Nick Jones' Verité (LCT3); Mike Lew's Bike America (Ma-Yi Theater Company); Nick Jones' Trevor (Lesser America); Rob Askins' Love Song of the Albanian Sous Chef (Ensemble Studio Theatre); Mel & El: Show and Tell (Ars Nova); Michael Mitnick's Spacebar: A Broadway Play by Kyle Sugarman and Adam Szymkowicz's My Base and Scurvy Heart(Studio 42). Regional: Williamstown Theatre Festival, The Huntington, Alliance Theatre, Pasadena Playhouse, Olney Theatre Center, Woolly Mammoth Theatre Company, Chicago Shakespeare Theater, South Coast Repertory, Barrington Stage Company, Chautauqua Theater Company, Hudson Valley Shakespeare Festival, and more. Upcoming: a nationwide tour of Westwood's own Michael Shayan in his smash hit play avaaz. Moritz is the former artistic director of Studio 42, NYC's producer of "unproducible" plays. www.moritzvs.com
 
Karl Sydow (Producer) produced Sting's The Last Ship at the Ahmanson Theatre in Los Angeles and at the Golden Gate Theatre in San Francisco in 2020, at the Princess of Wales Theatre in Toronto in 2019, following a 2018 tour of the UK and Ireland. Recent theatre includes Noises Off (Lyric Hammersmith, Garrick Theatre West End), The Light in the Piazza (Royal Festival Hall, LA Opera, Lyric Opera of Chicago); Toast (West End, UK tour); Sweat (Gielgud Theatre West End, Evening Standard Award Best Play); Valued Friends (Rose Theatre Kingston); Invisible Cities with 59 Productions (Manchester International Festival, Brisbane Festival, Australia); Alan Ayckbourn's The Divide with The Old Vic and Edinburgh International Festival; David Hare's The Moderate Soprano at the Duke of York's Theatre; Sketching by James Graham at Wilton's Music Hall; as well as Red Joan, a film featuring Dame Judi Dench which premiered at the Toronto International Film Festival. In North America, he has produced Broadway productions of The Seagull with Carey Mulligan, Kristin Scott Thomas, and Peter Sarsgaard, and American Buffalo with John Leguizamo; Backbeat directed by David Leveaux (Royal Alexandra Theatre in Toronto, Ahmanson Theatre in Los Angeles); international tours including The Last Confession with David Suchet, and Our Country's Good (the original Tony-nominated Broadway production and Out of Joint's revival in the West End and Toronto).

FACT SHEET

Title: AVA: The Secret Conversations

Written by: Elizabeth McGovern

Directed by: Moritz von Stuelpnagel

Produced by: Karl Sydow

Featuring: Elizabeth McGovern as Ava Gardner and Aaron Costa Ganis as Peter Evans.

Creative Team: David Meyer (scenic design), Toni-Leslie James (costume design), Amith Chandrashaker (lighting design), Cricket S. Myers (sound design), Alex Basco Koch (projection design), and Matthew Armentrout (wig design). The Production Stage Manager is Avery Trunko. General management is by Pemberley Productions.

Run Dates: September 24 – October 12, 2025

Press Opening: Saturday, September 27, 2025

Schedule: Tuesday through Saturday at 7pm; Wednesday, Saturday and Sunday matinees at 2pm

No performances on Thursday, September 25 or Thursday, October 2. No matinee performance on Wednesday September 24.

Location: The Studebaker Theater in the Fine Arts Building, 410 S, Michigan Ave, Chicago.

Box Office: Online at www.fineartsbuilding.com or by phone at (312) 753-3210 x102

Ticket Prices: $40 - $170

Students: $30

Groups: $60

Website: www.AvaGardnerPlay.com

Social Media: Find us on Facebook, YouTube, Instagram and X at @AvaGardnerPlay

Trailer: https://youtu.be/6ZmMhM2uqbc 

One of the things I have always enjoyed and admired most about Chicago Shakespeare Theatre is their willingness to bring fresh ways to experience Shakespeare’s classic works as well as bringing new works and voices to the stage. Avaaz, which opened on Jan. 24, is no exception. And we are the better for it.

It is the first time that Chicago Shakes has welcomed to its stage an Iranian-American playwright, Michael Shayan, as he shares the story of his mother, an Iranian-Jewish immigrant, and her deeply personal journey from Tehran to “Tehran-geles,” California. 

Shayan, who is an Emmy-nominated and Harvard-trained writer and actor, not only wrote the play, but he also is the star of this one-person production with his energetic and engaging portrayal of his larger-than-life mother, Roya. It is funny, life-affirming, joyous, yet at times, tragic, as Shayan grapples with his mother’s experiences in forging a new life in America, while also exploring his complicated relationship with his mother.

We first meet Roya before the show even begins as she sashays through the audience in her glittering gold kaftan, welcoming playgoers and encouraging them to join her in shimmying their shoulders to the pulsing Iranian music. (In fact, before the performance on Jan. 28, there is a free workshop to learn Middle Eastern dancing.) We are there to party with Roya, as she prepares for the celebration of Nowruz, the Persian New Year, which is all about renewal and rebirth.

The centerpiece of Nowruz is the Haft Sin table, and indeed, that elaborate buffet is also the focal point of the set. Throughout the 90-minute production, Roya moves about the Haft Sin table, explaining the symbolism of seven food items on the table while interweaving her story.

Appropriately, Avaaz means “voice,” and we are hearing Roya’s voice as she shares about her life growing up in Teheran (the best city in Iran, she affirms), her beloved father’s imprisonment for his activism during the Iranian revolution, her loveless arranged and abusive marriage, and her underlying desire to make a better life for her son. As Roya, Shayan brings her story to life with equal doses of humor and compassion and the audience is immediately captivated.

For Shayan, the production is his heartfelt tribute to his mother. While growing up, Shayan said his mother never really talked to him about his past. At one point, he asked if he could interview her, and once the recorder was turned on, Roya opened up. The subsequent interview became the impetus for the piece. In fact, the play closes with snippets from that original recording and we hear Roya’s own voice as well.

While Shayan says the play is at its core about the mother-son relationship, is also touches on the ongoing women-led revolution happening in Iran right now. In many respects, Shayan says, what Roya experienced 40 years ago in Iran parallels what is going on now.

“One call coming out of Iran is to ‘be our voice,’ and I think that’s part of what we can contribute as artists – in some small way, I can help amplify the voices of those who are crying out for ‘Woman. Life. Freedom,’” he said.

Chicago Shakes is one of the many planned stops for the production on its inaugural national tour. Directed by Tony Award nominee, Moritz Von Stuelpnagel, Avaaz is one of those theatre experiences that lingers with you long after the performance is over. You leave the theatre grateful you were invited to be part of Roya’s world and culturally enriched because of it.

Avaaz is playing at Chicago Shakespeare through Feb. 9. Visit here for more information.

Crowds will flock to see “Judgment Day,” having its world premiere at Chicago Shakespeare Theater on Navy Pier. While many will be drawn by its star, Emmy and Tony-winning actor Jason Alexander of “Seinfeld” fame (George Costanza), and he is definitely a draw—but just one of many—in this remarkably funny, highly polished play by Rob Ulin.

With perfect comedic delivery, Alexander plays Sammy Campo, a craven lawyer who has gained riches continuously by winning cases at any cost, ethics be damned. From the moment Alexander begins his audacious performance, fueled by the razor wit of Ulin’s smart script, the audience was laughing and we knew, this is a comedy.

Yet “Judgment Day” treats serious subjects, a truly thoughtful discernment of weighty values and living a purposeful life. We hear throughout the play an important conversation going on, the laughter taking down barriers to really listening. This is a morality play, and a good one, in the mold of Moliere blending serious matters with fun. Sammy goes through a spiritual journey, not so different than Dicken's Ebenezer Scrooge. But "Judgment Day" has the added power of swimming in contemporary mores and values.

Jason Alexander stars as a corrupt lawyer attempting to make amends with the help of a conflicted priest, played by Daniel Breaker, in the world premiere comedy Judgment Day at Chicago Shakespeare Theater. 

Sammy may soon be disbarred—for seedy practices such as suborning perjury from witnesses. As his secretary Della (Olivia D. Dawson is marvelous) delivers a world-weary litany of the sketchy legal methods for which Sammy may lose his law license, her droll deadpan is interrupted repeatedly by Sammy’s frantic interjections, after each of which she resumes undeterred, eliciting big laughs.

Della lets us know Sammy once convinced a client to saw off his own leg to win a claim. “It almost worked,” says Sammy, revealing his breathtaking depravity and lack of moral compass with such complete unselfconsciousness the only response we can have is to laugh. It’s clear that Della has seen it all, and knows Sammy’s MO only too well.

Working from Golden Globe winner Ulin’s extremely witty script, Tony-nominated director Moritz von Stuelpnagel coaxes split second timing from Della and Sammy, establishing the standard of interplay among actors that we will enjoy all evening. Without spoiling the fun, let’s just say Sonny passes out and falls to the floor.
“You dead?” Stella queries. And we laugh.

Not quite dead, it turns out, and following the ensuing near death experiences, the recovered Sammy decides to straighten up his life. But he hasn’t changed one iota. Always calculating, he goes to confession and meets Father Michael (Daniel Breaker is superb), putting it to him baldly: “What’s the least amount of good I can do to avoid going to hell?”

Father Michael, a conflicted priest in a crisis of faith, is the perfect pairing with Sammy, and much of the rest of the play is the two jousting abouty moral values, and whether good works for selfish reasons merits a heavenly reward. The heavy intellectual lifting falls to Father Michael, as he guides Sammy in his moral quest. (Breaker played Aron Burr in "Hamilton" and originated the role of "Donkey" in Skrek the Musical.) A lengthy scene puts the two together in a car during a stakeout. Bantering about issues personal and moral, Father Michael's inner struggle is revealed. The scene would have been at home on "Seinfeld," except unlike the series famed for being "about nothing," this one is about something. 

As we get to know Father Michael—and for that matter the rest of the cast including the wife Sammy walked out on (Tracy Bofill) and his young son (Ellis Myers); Angel (Candy Buckley) Sammy’s deceased teacher (now in wings and a habit); a struggling widow Edna (Meg Thalken); Father Michael’s superior (Michael Kostroff as Monsignor); even the Principal (also played by Dawson)—each of these characters are so intriguing I wanted to see more of them, perhaps in another setting (spin-off shows?).

Notably, most of the cast and creative team make their Chicago Shakespeare Theater debuts in this show, many cast from New York. Chicago is a good setting for testing out this play, which like the city is very Catholic (no less than three scenes are in confessionals) but this is neither off-putting nor irreverent. In fact, it's a study in the transformation of the Catholic Church since the 1960s, beautifully expressed. And tt's another home run for CST's new artistic director, Edward Hall. 

Presented in The Yard, Chicago Shakespeare’s newest, state-of-the art space, the stage itself allows large audiences to have an intimate theater experience. Scene changes (Beowolf Boritt does scenic design) whisk in and out as fast as camera cuts in the movies.The adaptable Yard, which can when needed replicate the courtyard stage of Shakespeare’s Globe, here simulates a proscenium space, with upstage and downstage, stage left and right all part of the action. This gives an immediacy and presence to the performance for the audience that surpasses anything I have seen in New York, London, or elsewhere in Chicago. You are drawn into the show, and the experience is captivating.

Suffice it to say, “Judgment Day” comes highly recommended: an excellent play, performed and directed beautifully, and a story that will stay with you. “Judgment Day” runs through May 26, 2024 at Chicago Shakespeare Theater.

*Extended through June 2nd