Arena Stage Delays Second Musical Premiere
'A Civil War Christmas' Is Unready for Production
Tuesday, July 25, 2006; Page C01
Arena Stage has gone from two world-premiere musicals for the coming season to none.
The company said yesterday it has been forced to postpone "A Civil War Christmas," an ambitious piece by Pulitzer Prize winner Paula Vogel that was to have been the company's major holiday offering.
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The scrubbing of "A Civil War Christmas" follows the recent erasure from the 2006-07 schedule of "The Women of Brewster Place," a new musical based on the popular novel by Gloria Naylor.
It is not unusual for a theater to postpone or scratch a production, particularly one as technically challenging as a musical. Other Washington theaters have had to shuffle their seasons after concluding that a show wasn't ready or viable. But the postponing in succession of two original musicals -- shows, in this case, announced with some fanfare as creative anchors of the season -- is a much rarer occurrence.
Arena spokeswoman Kirstin Lunke confirmed that Vogel had asked that "A Civil War Christmas" be withdrawn so she could devote more time to it. Its replacement will be a revival of "She Loves Me," a 1963 musical by Joe Masteroff, Jerry Bock and Sheldon Harnick that is set in a Budapest perfumery.
Vogel, author of the Pulitzer-winning play "How I Learned to Drive," is an old friend and collaborator of Arena's artistic director, Molly Smith, who has been eager to stage an original Vogel work here.
Smith, who has directed "Drive" and another Vogel play, "Hot 'n' Throbbing," for Arena, had been gingerly lobbying the playwright to complete "A Civil War Christmas," a work that the two had been in talks over for several years.
Lunke said that Arena expects to stage "Civil War" in the near future. Smith has expressed the hope that the musical might become a piece that Arena could bring back in future holiday seasons.
Stephen Richard, Arena's executive director, said in a statement that the change was part of the give-and-take of producing new work. "Developing new plays is not an exact science and 'A Civil War Christmas' presents a particular challenge because it demands to be produced at a very specific time of year," he said. "Rather than risk rushing this epic musical to the stage before its time, we've decided to postpone the production."
The musical, which interweaves vignettes about the war and period songs, was to have run from Nov. 17 to Dec. 31 in the Fichandler. The director was to have been Kyle Donnelly, who Lunke said will now stage "She Loves Me."
In May, Arena announced the postponement of "The Women of Brewster Place" because the playwright, Tim Acito, wanted more time to develop the work. The musical was to have been presented next spring, but now is expected to be staged in the 2007-08 season. Its substitute is "Peter and Wendy," a dreamy variation on "Peter Pan" that was first performed in New York by Mabou Mines in 1997.
Because "A Civil War Christmas" was included in promotional literature for the new season, Arena is notifying subscribers about the most recent change in the lineup.