After the third quarter of the 16thCentury “only the French” – as acontemporary put it – “recklessly

engaged in duels,” or at least en-gaged in them with an ardour whichhad no equivalent elsewhere. Theaccounts given by foreigners are thebest proof of this. We must there-fore take as a pertinent observation

and not as boasting the affirmationby French authors that their compa-triots surpassed their Italian mastersand that the duel, which wasbrought back from Naples by CharlesVIII’s army, found its mostfavourable territory in France—as al-ready witnessed by the character ofthe ancient Gauls. For it was notenough to state that dueling was achiefly French phenomenon. Thisfact was justified and interpretedwith all sorts of arguments which wecan classify as natural and supernatu-ral.

According to supernatural ar-guments, the French aptitude, andindeed vocation, for single combatwas beyond all rational explanation,except perhaps for that of as-

trologers. It had been announced,and therefore imposed, by the mostancient and venerable prophecies,ranging from a vision which KingChilperic had at the dawn of Frenchhistory to one of David’s psalms orNebuchadnezzar’s dream in HolyWrit itself. So the French were du-elists because of a mysterious and di-

vine decision.Obviously such explanations

do not explain the phenomenon forus, but they have an interest whichgoes beyond anecdotal curiosity.These explanations, formulated anddisseminated at the time, helped toconsolidate phenomenon and rein-force its durability. For if it were

destiny, be it biological, astrolog-ical or providential, which forcedthe French, commoners includ-ed, to fight duels, then it waspointless to try to resist. The ac-ceptance that it is the nature orfate of a nation to adopt a cer-tain social attitude, it is a guaran-tee that individuals are not re-sponsible for the unfortunateconsequences of their actions.The stereotype of the furiafrancese, of the hot-bloodedpeople, justified and reinforcedthe duel’s strength in France.

from The Duel, Its Rise and Fall in EarlyModern France by François Billacois(New Haven: Yale University Press,1990).

Lovers and Executioners • SOUTH COAST REPERTORY P3

A German training school, from a sixteenth-century handbook on fencing.

Fencing positions from a French seventeenth-century handbook.

Un Phénomène Français

by John Strand

Antoine Jacob (1640-1685),known as Montfleury,wrote plays for a brief,

twelve-year period during thegolden age of French comedy.Louis XIV reigned absolutely onthe throne, and Molière, less abso-lutely but no less brilliantly, on thestage. As a writer of comedies,Molière had several serious rivalsin his day. Of these, Montfleurywas, for a time, the most serious.

He was the principal play-wright for the Hôtel de Bour-gogne, the prestigious troupe thatpredated Molière’s, and which wasalso funded directly by the king.He wrote some 15 plays, all come-dies, with the exception of onewell-received tragedy (which inci-dentally, bears a good deal of re-semblance in plot to Hamlet,Montfleury having used the samesource material as Shakespeare).Of his comedies, several were su-perior, enjoyed great success intheir day, and were played regu-

larly on French stages well afterthe playwright’s death. Amongthese were Le Mari sansfemme (The Husband With-out a Wife), La Fille capi-taine (The Girl Soldier),and his masterpiece,La Femme juge et par-tie (The Wife, Judgeand Accuser).

Montfleurycame from a presti-gious theatre fami-ly. His father,Zacharie Jacob,also known asMontfleury, was asometime-play-wright and re-nowned actor, oneof the great stageperformers in a cul-ture that took its the-atre very seriously, de-bated it hotly, and sup-ported it assiduously.Montfleury père was a bigpresence, literally. He was amammoth figure, rotund with apowerful, booming voice and

given to

exaggeratedstance and de-livery, a stylethen much ap-preciated, al-though not uni-versally: ZacharieMontfleury’schief detractorwas Molière.When the latterlampooned Mont-fleury in The Im-promptu of Ver-sailles, the rivalry

P4 SOUTH COAST REPERTORY • Lovers and Executioners

Zacharie Jacob de Montfleury (1600-1667), father of the playwright.

Cyrano de Bergerac (pictured at left) wrote a letter in whichhe made fun, rather heavily, of Montfleury’s large stomach:“I can assure you,” he wrote, “that if a beating could besent by post, you would read my letter with your shoulders;and don’t be surprised by my suggestion as, your roundedsurface being so great, I am convinced you are a land inwhich I would like to plant sticks to see what would becomeof them.” In Act One of his play Cyrano de Bergerac (to beproduced at SCR this June), Edmond Rostand turned thisepistolary incident into a face-to-face meeting betweenCyrano and Montfleury on the stage of the Hôtel de Bour-gogne.

(from Daily Life in the French Theatre at the Time of Molière by Georges Mongrédien, translated by Claire Eliane Engel)

Antoine Jacob de Montfleury

turned to bitter en-mity. To the de-fense of his fatherleapt the son, thenaged 24 and alawyer who hadwritten a halfdozen plays. An-toine penned TheImpromptu of theHôtel de Condé, adeliberate counter-attack that lam-pooned Molière inthe same fashion.The family honor,at least, was intact.

Shortly there-after, ZacharieMontfleury madethe mistake thatearned him thedisdain of genera-tions of French lit-erary historiansand theatre critics:he denounced Molière to the King,accusing the great playwright ofhaving married his own daughter,a rumor that plagued Molièrethroughout his later years. TheKing did nothing directlyabout

the charges,Montfleury père died a short timelater, having been mortally injured,the story goes, by a portion of hisstage costume—the metal belt he

was forced to wear to support hisenormous belly.

Antoine’s breakthrough as aplaywright came just after his fa-ther’s death.

LaFemme juge et partie was a resounding success and

something of a scandal, due to itscontroversial subject matter. Play-ing on stage a few blocks awaywas another scandal: Molière’s

Tartuffe. It is said that Mont-fleury’s play was considered by hiscontemporaries to be the equal ofMolière’s. History has disagreed.

Montfleury fi ls admiredabove all else the Spanishmodel—the great dramatists Lopede Vega and Calderòn. He couldspeak Spanish fluently, better, ac-cording to the Queen of Spain(whom he knew) than manySpaniards of her court. Many ofhis own plots were borrowed, inthe common practice of the day,from Spanish plays. At a timewhen Molière was inventing aFrench comedy of manners,using the Italian model as ajumping-off point, Montfleuryremained devoted to the roman-tic, florid, and often bawdy ma-

terial of Spanish theatre. As a re-sult—in a curious, geography-de-fying twist of literary fate—Mont-fleury’s work is closer in style toElizabethan theatre than to thenew French style Molière was es-tablishing.

Lovers and Executioners • SOUTH COAST REPERTORY P5

The Royal Players of the Hôtel de Bourgogne.

Hôtel de Bourgogne

Built in 1548, the Hôtel de Bourgogne was the first theatre in Paris

and for a long time, the city’s only true theatre. The building was

leased to traveling players until 1610, when the first permanent com-

pany was formed. Called the King’s Players, the actors at the Bour-

gogne were the unchallenged masters of theatrical art, with legendary

performers such as Bellerose, Floridor and Montfleury setting the bom-

bastic style of the day. The arrival of Molière at the Théâtre du

Marais in 1658 created fierce competition between the two compa-

nies and the Hôtel de Bourgogne was never able to regain its former

supremacy. In 1680, these two companies merged to form the

Comédie Française.

P6 SOUTH COAST REPERTORY • Lovers and Executioners

The Oxford English Dictionarydefines “cuckold” as a “deri-sive name for the husband of

an unfaithful wife.” The word canalso be used as a verb meaning“to dishonor a husband by com-mitting adultery.” Derived fromthe Middle English wordcukeweld or cokewold, which inturn appears to have come fromthe Old French cucuault, thisderogatory term has been aroundfor more than seven centuries.

The modern French wordfor cuckold, cocu, is also thename of the European cuckoo.Females of this species make nonests of their own, but instead laytheir eggs in other birds’ nests—unusual behavior that apparentlyrecalls the scandalous deeds ofunfaithful wives. The cuckoo wassacred to the medieval May-games, when marriage bondswere temporarily ignored and

promiscuity was theorder of the day.

The origin ofthe image of horns,which is typicallyassociated withcuckoldery, is un-clear. It may havedescended from thepagan sign of theHorned God, whichwas sacrificed as astag, goat, or ram atthe spring feasts.Priests wore thehorns of the sacri-ficed animals ontheir heads, andhorned masks orheaddresses werecommonly worn byparticipants in therite. When a mar-ried woman hadsexual relations out-

side of mar-riage, her husband was saidto sprout horns, in referenceto his public humiliation.Throughout history, the hornhas been apowerful em-blem of sexu-al power (orthe lackthereof). Togive a man“the horn”was to signi-fy the sexu-al conquestof his wife,thereby ex-posing thehusband’s impotenceand the adulterer’s virility.

On this page are twodepictions of cuckolds illus-

trating this concept. In the one atleft, the betrayed husband has ac-tually sprouted horns; in the oneabove, the seducer of the womanon the couch is drawing a cuck-

old’s horns

on her unfortunatehusband’s portrait.

Horns of Dilemma

BERNARD:I now speak the word I am loathe to hear,That damns the very soul of the woman I held dear,In private only, man to man, may it be said: Cuckold.

FREDERIC:Cuckold?

BERNARD:My wife dishonored my bed.(Lovers and Executioners, Act IV, Scene 2)

*JULIAN ACOSTA (Don Lope)made his SCR debut earlier thisseason as the Lector in Anna inthe Tropics. Other theatre appear-ances include Loose Ends andStags and Hens both at theGuthrie Theater and Anna De-veare Smith’s Piano at IACD/American Repertory Theatre inCambridge, Mass. He was a seriesregular on ABC’s critically ac-claimed “The Job,” and played arecurring role on Lifetime’s drama“Strong Medicine.” Other televi-sion credits include “Kingpin,”“Law and Order” and “One Life toLive.” Acosta is a recent graduateof Rutgers University Mason GrossSchool of the Arts.

*ANDREW BORBA (Octavius) ismaking his SCR debut. Theatrecredits include The Countess at theOld Globe Theatre; Closer atBerkeley Repertory; Othello,

Chicago, Arcadia, Two Gentlemenof Verona, Pentecost, Cymbeline,Love’s Labour’s Lost and Henry IV,Part 1 at the Oregon ShakespeareFestival; The Misanthrope at theDallas Theatre Center; An Enemyof the People at the Long WharfTheatre; A Shayna Maidel at theDelaware Theatre Company; TenLittle Indians at the Hangar The-atre; and Mrs. Warren’s Profession,The Illusion and Othello at thePortland Stage Company. Filmand television credits include Livefrom Baghdad, Path to War, ABright Shining Lie, Discord,“Alias,” “The Shield,” “Once andAgain” and “Century City.”

*SUSAN DALIAN (Beatrice) returnsto SCR after appearing in BAFOand Crumbs from the Table of Joy.Other theatre credits includeMephisto, XXX Love Act, Dream-play, Private Battle and

Medea/Macbeth/Cinderella at TheActors’ Gang; Bitter Women at theCast Theatre; Immortality at LATC;The Importance of Being Earnestat the 24th Street Theatre; Romeoand Juliet at the Grove TheatreCenter; A Midsummer Night’sDream at the San Francisco Shake-speare Festival; On the Razzle atIndiana Repertory Theatre; TheRape of Tamar and Merry Wives ofWindsor at Shakespeare SantaCruz; Volpone at Berkeley Reperto-ry; and Hamlet, As You Like It,Macbeth and Two Gentlemen ofVerona at the California Shake-speare Festival. Film credits in-clude Undisputed, The Brothers,Disney’s The Kid, and The ScottishTale. Television credits includeroles on “The Pretender,” “Party ofFive,” “The Parkers,” “The Hugh-leys,” “Felicity,” “Star Trek: Voy-ager” “Hang Time,” “The Practice”and “Profiler.”

Artist Biographies

ANDREW BORBA

OctaviusSUSAN DALIAN

BeatriceJULIAN ACOSTA

Don Lope

Lovers and Executioners • SOUTH COAST REPERTORY P7

P8 SOUTH COAST REPERTORY • Lovers and Executioners

*DAVID KELLY (Bernard) is makinghis SCR debut. He appeared atthe Oregon Shakespeare Festivalbetween 1991 and 2003. Some ofthose appearances includeRichard II, Present Laughter, Nois-es Off, As You Like It, Merchant ofVenice, Three Sisters, Enter theGuardsman, Hamlet, The ThreeMusketeers, Richard III, Henry IV,Part II, Comedy of Errors, A Mid-summer Night’s Dream, BaltimoreWaltz, Timon of Athens, Death ofa Salesman, Tempest, Coriolanus,Romeo and Juliet, Pravda and YouCan’t Take It with You. Other the-atre credits include Haroun andthe Sea of Stories and Fuente Ove-juna at Berkeley Repertory, AChristmas Carol at GEVA, MuchAdo about Nothing and A Mid-summer Night’s Dream at the SanFrancisco Theatre Festival, TwoGentlemen of Verona at MontanaShakespeare, King Lear at Col-orado Shakespeare and TwelfthNight at Utah Shakespeare.

*RUTH LIVIER (Constance) returnsto SCR after appearing in theNewSCRipts reading of Montezu-ma and Hispanic Playwrights Pro-ject readings of Welcome to Ar-royo’s, El Otro and Santa Concep-tion and as the first Gracie in La

Posada Mágica. She was born inGuadalajara, Mexico where shebegan performing in local govern-ment-sponsored theatre while inher early teens. Ms. Livier hasworked non-stop as an actressever since. In addition to count-less Spanish language commer-cials, she remains loyal to her the-atre roots, performing with TheActor’s Gang and East L.A. ClassicTheater at the Mark Taper Forumas well as the Long Beach OperaCompany. Her feature film creditsinclude a co-starring role oppositeDennis Hopper in Bad City Blues,directed by Michael Stevens,which was screened at the AFIFilm Festival. Her other films in-clude The Last Flight, Matters ofConsequence, Hash Brown’s, ADeath in Bethany and My Father’sLove. On television, she was a se-ries regular on “ResurrectionBlvd.” and has had recurring roleson “Beverly Hills 90210,” “Soldierof Fortune” and “Weird Science.”She has guest starred on “Becker,”“NYPD Blue,” “The Pretender” and“Haunted” opposite Matthew Fox.

*CHRISTOPHER LIAM MOORE(Guzman) is making his SCRdebut. New York theatre creditsinclude The Video Store Owner’s

Significant Other, A CaliforniaSeagull and Too Noble Brothers.Regional theatre credits Nickeland Dimed at the Guthrie Theater,Medea/MacBeth/Cinderella at YaleRepertory Theatre (CT Drama Crit-ics Circle Nomination), The GoodPerson of New Haven at the LongWharf Theatre, As You Like It atthe Old Globe Theatre, TwelfthNight at Taper, Too (OvationAward), A Community Carol atArena Stage and The King Stage atthe American Repertory Theatre.He is also a founding member ofCornerstone Theatre Company.On television he was a series reg-ular on “Murder in Small Town X”and plays the recurring role of IanJankowski on “Judging Amy.”Other film and television creditsinclude “Friends,” “3rd Rock fromthe Sun,” “Star Trek: Voyager,”Memron, The Cherokee Kid andSimone.

*LIBBY WEST (Julie) is making herSCR stage debut. She previouslyappeared in the NewSCRipts read-ing of People Be Heard. NewYork theatre credits include theOff-Broadway productions ofThings You Shouldn’t Say PastMidnight and The Cripple of Inish-maan as well as Antony and

RUTH LIVIER

ConstanceCHRISTOPHER LIAM MOORE

GuzmanDAVID KELLY

Bernard

Cleopatra, The Seagull, The DyingPhotographer, Passion Play, Assas-sins Have Starry Eyes, Zastrozzi,Measure for Measure, Dead andGone to Granny’s and Othello. Re-gional theatre credits include LesLiaisons Dangereuses at the Ameri-can Conservatory Theatre, OrangeFlower Water at the ContemporaryAmerican Theatre Festival, Cyranode Bergerac at the Denver TheatreCenter, Wuthering Heights and AnIdeal Husband at the Paper MillPlayhouse, Pygmalion at IndianaRepertory Theatre, Real InspectorHound/Black Comedy at TheWilma Theatre, Red Corners at theCincinnati Playhouse in the Park,The Tempest at PlayMakers Rep,The Comedy of Errors at the OldGlobe Theatre, Ghosts at the Inti-man Theatre, Love’s Labour’s Lostat The Shakespeare Theatre and

five shows at the Actors Theatre ofLouisville. Film and televisioncredits include Two Weeks Notice,Homecoming, The Take, DreamHouse, Ride of Passage, DieBlessed, Iceman, The Guests, Mir-rorland, Fluffy, The Scrapper,Richard, The Take, Rift, Misan-thrope, “As the World Turns,”“One Life to Live” and “All MyChildren.”

PLAYWRIGHT,DIRECTOR & DESIGNERS

JOHN STRAND (Playwright) is theauthor of Tom Walker (SCR, 2001)and Lovers and Executioners (bothcommissioned and premiered byArena Stage; published by Dramat-ic Publishing, Inc., Chicago) whichwon the Charles MacArthur Awardfor Outstanding New Play. Hisother work includes The Diaries,Signature Theatre 2002; the bookfor a new musical entitled TheHighest Yellow premiering at theSignature Theatre fall 2004; atranslation and adaptation ofMolière’s The Miser, set in Reagan-era America; Three Nights inTehran, a comedy about the Iran-Contra affair; Otabenga at Signa-ture Theatre, directed by MichaelKahn; The Cockburn Rituals atWoolly Mammoth Theatre; andBurying Molière at New York Uni-versity’s Mainstage Theater. Hehas adapted his play Otabenga tofilm for Julian Krainin Productions.Mr. Strand received an SCR com-mission to write his latest play

Lincolnesque and is also workingon new play commissions forArena Stage and the ShakespeareTheatre. He lives in the Washing-ton DC area with his wife andthree children.

BILL RAUCH (Director) is co-founder and artistic director of theLos Angeles-based CornerstoneTheater Company, and has direct-ed over 40 of the company’s pro-ductions, many of them collabora-tions with diverse communitiesacross the nation. He has also di-rected at the Mark Taper Forum,the Oregon Shakespeare Festival,the Guthrie, Long Wharf, GreatLakes Theater Festival, ArenaStage, and Yale Repertory wherehe is an Associate Artist. For SCR,he staged Anthony Clarvoe’sWalking Off the Roof for the inau-gural Pacific Playwrights Festival.Mr. Rauch has won Helen Hayes,Garland, LA Weekly, Drama-Logue,and Connecticut Critics CircleAwards for his direction, and wasthe only artist to win the inauguralLeadership for a Changing WorldAward. He served on the board ofTheatre Communications Groupfrom 1992-1998 and has testifiedto Congress on behalf of theN.E.A. He is proud to be one ofLiam’s two dads.

LYNN K. JEFFRIES (Scenic Design)has worked with director BillRauch for 23 years. She is afounding member of CornerstoneTheater Company, for which she

Lovers and Executioners • SOUTH COAST REPERTORY P9

LIBBY WEST

Julie

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has designed sets, costumes, orboth for over 40 productions, in-cluding The Central Ave; ChalkCircle; For Here or To Go; BrokenHearts; Twelfth Night, or As YouWere; The Winter’s Tale; An Inter-state Adventure; Romeo and Juliet;and Tartoof, or an Impostor inNorcatur, and at Christmas! Shehas also designed sets for PeterPan at Great Lakes Theater Festi-val, The Good Person of NewHaven at Long Wharf Theatre,Steelbound at Touchstone Theatre(performed in the former Bethle-hem Steel iron foundry) and ACommunity Carol at Arena Stage.Costume credits include Nickeland Dimed at the Guthrie Lab andMedea/Macbeth/Cinderella at theActors’ Gang. Jeffries’ puppetshave appeared in several Corner-stone productions, including Bodyof Faith and Mary Shelley’s SantaClaus, and have been featured inshows at Company One, The RoadCompany, Kanaqeel, The GuthrieLab, and the Mark Taper Forum’sOther Voices Project. She has re-ceived a Drama-Logue Award andtwo Back Stage West GarlandAwards, and nominations for twoOvation Awards and a Lester Hor-ton Dance Award for Set Design.

SHIGERU YAJI (Costume Design) isvery pleased to enter his 22ndseason at SCR with more than 45productions including most re-cently Major Barbara and TheSchool for Wives. Over more than20 years, he has designed for 25

theatres on the West Coast, creat-ing costumes for more than 120productions. He is the recipientof numerous awards and recogni-tions, including six Los AngelesDrama Critics Circle Awards and aBay Area Theatre Critics CircleAward. His most recent entertain-ment designs have been for aspectacle show, Mystic Rhythms,at Tokyo Disney Sea in Japan, andthe A&E broadcast of CathyRigby’s Peter Pan, for which hereceived a 2000-01 Emmy Awardnomination following the produc-tion’s Broadway engagement andnational tour. Mr. Yaji is a mem-ber of the United Scenic ArtistsLocal 829 and the UC IrvineDrama Department faculty.

GEOFF KORF (Lighting Design) de-signed lighting for the SCR pro-ductions of Two Gentlemen ofVerona, The Dazzle, Making It,Hold Please, Art, Entertaining Mr.Sloane, Amy’s View, The SummerMoon, References to Salvador DaliMake Me Hot and Two Sisters anda Piano. Most recently he de-signed the lights for Sandra TsingLoh’s Sugar Plum Fairy at the Gef-fen Playhouse. Mr. Korf is also amember of the ensemble of Cor-nerstone Theater where he hasdesigned more than 20 produc-tions in the past 11 years. His de-signs have also appeared in pro-ductions at the Mark Taper Forum,La Jolla Playhouse, Old GlobeTheatre, Seattle Repertory Theatre,ACT Theatre in Seattle, Long

Beach Opera, San FranciscoOpera, Goodman Theatre, TrinityRepertory, Yale Repertory Theatre,Huntington Theatre, Actors The-atre of Louisville, The Children’sTheatre Company of Minneapolis,Stage One in Louisville, and onBroadway. Mr. Korf is a graduateof California State University,Chico and the Yale School ofDrama. He is also a member ofthe faculty at the University ofWashington in Seattle.

PAUL JAMES PRENDERGAST(Composer/Sound Design) is hon-ored to be making his SCR debut,and overjoyed to be working onceagain with old friends. Theatrecredits include productions at theMark Taper (Forum, Ivy, P.L.A.Y.),Long Wharf Theatre, Great LakesTheater Festival, Florida Stage, theGeffen, East West Players, dozensof 99 seaters and 20 productionswith Cornerstone Theater Compa-ny. His work has been featured attheme parks, in feature films, onrecordings and in music venuesnationwide. He also works as avocalist, actor, scenic designer,and is knee deep in the world ofalternative (natural) house build-ing. He lives in Los Angeles andJoshua Tree.

DANIEL R. FORCEY (Fight Chore-ographer) received his undergrad-uate degree in theatre with minorsin physics and philosophy fromthe University of Southern Califor-nia. Mr. Forcey also holds his

Lovers and Executioners • SOUTH COAST REPERTORY P11

graduate degree in Acting with anemphasis on movement teachingfrom York University in Toronto,Canada, where he wrote his mas-ter’s thesis on the use of theBritish quarterstaff. He hasworked extensively across the USand Canada for the last ten years,choreographing and teachingmovement and stage combat. Hehas held faculty positions at YorkUniversity, the Centre for Indige-nous Theatre, the University ofSouthern California, Cal State Uni-versity, Long Beach, Cal PolyPomona and the Cerritos Centerfor the Performing Arts. His workcan currently be seen in Masterand Commander: The Far Side ofthe World (20th Century Fox) andon the History Channel program“Conquest.”

LAURIE WOOLERY (Assistant Di-rector) is an actor, director andplaywright who has worked atSCR, the Mark Taper Forum, LosAngeles Theatre Center, Corner-stone Theatre, Deaf-West Theatre,fofo Theatre, Highways Perfor-mance Space, A Noise Within,Sundance Playwrights Lab as wellas the Sundance Children’s The-atre. As a director and playwright,she has created and collaboratedon many new works including Or-phan Train: The Lost Children,The Snow Teen, BLISS, I Slept withJack Kerouac, Lapin and Lapino-va, California Scenarios and theadaptation of Eleanor Estes’ TheHundred Dresses. Her award-win-

ning production of Our Town wonBest Scene at the 2001 KennedyCenter’s American College TheatreFestival and her production of ASick World was part of in theO’Neill Summer Festival. Her soloplay, Salvadorian Moon/AfricanSky, was commissioned by theCornerstone Theatre Companyand performed by Ms. Woolery intheir citywide Festival of Faith.She worked on the world pre-miere of Lisa Loomer’s Living Outand Annie Weisman’s A TotallyMeaningful Ritual at the MarkTaper Forum. Ms. Woolery is anAssociate Artist with CornerstoneTheatre Company, an active mem-ber of the Virginia Avenue Project,playwright in residence for Holly-grove Children’s Home in Los An-geles, Instructor at Citrus Collegeand Director of SCR’s Young Con-servatory. Currently, her produc-tion of Bryan Davidson’s Reflect-ing Back can be seen at the LosAngeles Central Library as part oftheir American Originals exhibit.She is also a proud member of theLincoln Theatre Center’s DirectorsLab West.

*JAMIE A. TUCKER (Stage Manag-er) completed his MFA in Dance,specializing in Stage Management,at UCI in 1994. This season hehas stage managed Anna in theTropics and last year stage man-aged the world premiere ofRichard Greenberg’s The VioletHour, the West Coast premiere ofHorton Foote’s The Carpetbagger’s

Children, Relatively Speaking andthe world premiere of Rolin Jones’The Intelligent Design of JennyChow. He worked as SCR’s stagemanager for the Second Stage pro-ductions of The Dazzle, True West,Play Strindberg, the world pre-miere of But Not for Me and thePacific Playwrights Festival pro-duction of Landlocked. He alsowas stage manager of La PosadaMágica for two seasons and SCR’sFestival Latino ’97 production ofRick Najera’s Latinologues. Hehas worked as assistant stagemanager on the Mainstage pro-ductions of New England, OurTown and Arcadia, and the Sec-ond Stage productions of BAFOand Three Days of Rain . Mr.Tucker has worked at the LongBeach Civic Light Opera on No,No, Nanette, Can Can, A ChorusLine, The King and I and Man ofLa Mancha. If you can’t find himin the theatre, he is likely to be onthe diamond.

DAVID EMMES (Producing ArtisticDirector) is co-founder of SCR,one of the largest professional res-ident theatres in California. Hehas received numerous awards forproductions he has directed dur-ing SCR’s 39-year history, includ-ing a 1999 Los Angeles DramaCritics Circle Award for the direc-tion of George Bernard Shaw’sThe Philanderer. He directed theworld premieres of Amy Freed’sThe Beard of Avon and Freedom-land, Thomas Babe’s Great Day

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in the Morning, Keith Reddin’sRum and Coke and But Not for Meand Neal Bell’s Cold Sweat; theAmerican premiere of Terry John-son’s Unsuitable for Adults; theWest Coast premieres of C.P. Tay-lor’s Good and Harry Kondoleon’sChristmas on Mars; and the South-land premiere of Top Girls (at SCRand the Westwood Playhouse).Other productions include theWest Coast premieres of ThreeViewings by Jeffrey Hatcher, TheSecret Rapture by David Hare andNew England by Richard Nelson;and Arcadia by Tom Stoppard,Six Degrees of Separation by JohnGuare, The Importance of BeingEarnest by Oscar Wilde, Ayck-bourn’s Woman in Mind and Rel-atively Speaking and You NeverCan Tell by George Bernard Shaw,which he restaged for the Singa-pore Festival of Arts. His produc-ing responsibilities involve theoverall coordination of SCR’s pro-grams and projects. He hasserved as a consultant to the Or-ange County Performing Arts Cen-ter and as a theatre panelist andonsite evaluator for the NationalEndowment for the Arts. He hasserved on the Executive Commit-tee of the League of Resident The-atres, and as a panelist for the Cal-ifornia Arts Council. After attend-ing Orange Coast College, he re-ceived his BA and MA from Cali-fornia State University, San Fran-cisco, and his PhD in theatre andfilm from USC.

MARTIN BENSON (Artistic Direc-tor) shares co-founder credit andartistic leadership of SCR with hiscolleague David Emmes. As oneof SCR’s chief directors, Mr. Ben-son has directed nearly one third

of the plays produced here in thelast 39 years. He has distin-guished himself in the staging ofcontemporary work, includingHorton Foote’s The Carpetbagger’sChildren and the world premiereof his Getting Frankie Married—and Afterwards, the critically ac-claimed California premiere ofWilliam Nicholson’s Shadowlands,Athol Fugard’s Playland, BrianFriel’s Dancing at Lughnasa ,David Mamet’s Oleanna, HaroldPinter’s The Homecoming, DavidHare’s Skylight and the West Coastpremieres of Peter Hedges’ GoodAs New and Martin McDonagh’sThe Lonesome West. He has wonaccolades for his direction of fivemajor works by George BernardShaw, including the Los AngelesDrama Critics Circle (LADCC)Award winners Major Barbara,Misalliance and HeartbreakHouse . Among the numerousworld premieres he has directedare Tom Strelich’s BAFO and Mar-garet Edson’s Pulitzer Prize-win-ning Wit, which he also directedat Seattle Repertory Theatre andthe Alley Theatre in Houston. Hehas directed American classics in-cluding Ah, Wilderness!, A Street-car Named Desire, A Delicate Bal-ance and All My Sons. Mr. Bensonhas been honored with theDrama-Logue Award for his direc-tion of 21 productions and re-ceived LADCC DistinguishedAchievement in Directing awardsan unparalleled seven times forthe three Shaw productions, JohnMillington Synge’s Playboy of theWestern World, Arthur Miller’s TheCrucible , Sally Nemeth’s HolyDays and Wit. He also directedthe film version of Holy Daysusing the original SCR cast. Along

with David Emmes, he acceptedSCR’s 1988 Tony Award for Out-standing Resident ProfessionalTheatre and won the 1995 TheatreLA Ovation Award for LifetimeAchievement. Mr. Benson re-ceived his BA in Theatre from Cal-ifornia State University, San Fran-cisco.

PAULA TOMEI (ManagingDirector) is responsible for theoverall administration of SouthCoast Repertory and has beenManaging Director since 1994. Amember of the SCR staff since1979, she has served in a numberof administrative capacities includ-ing Subscriptions Manager, Busi-ness Manager and General Manag-er. She currently serves as Presi-dent of the Theatre Communica-tions Group (TCG), the nationalservice organization for the pro-fessional not-for-profit theatre. Inaddition, she has served as Trea-surer of TCG, Vice President ofthe League of Resident Theatres(LORT) and has been a memberof the LORT Negotiating Commit-tee for industry-wide union agree-ments. She represents SCR at na-tional conferences of TCG andLORT; is a theatre panelist and sitevisitor for the National Endow-ment for the Arts and the Califor-nia Arts Council; served on theAdvisory Committee for the ArtsAdministration Certificate Programat the University of California,Irvine; and has been a guest lec-turer in the graduate school ofbusiness at Stanford. She graduat-ed from the University of Califor-nia, Irvine with a degree in Eco-nomics and pursued an additionalcourse of study in theatre anddance.

The Actors and Stage Managers em-ployed in this production are membersof Actors’ Equity Association, the Unionof Professional Actors and Stage Man-agers in the United States.

The Scenic, Costume, Lighting andSound Designers in LORT theatresare represented by United ScenicArtists Local USA-829, IATSE.

The Director is a member of the Soci-ety of Stage Directors and Choreogra-phers, Inc., an independent nationallabor union.