Westport's 2014 Season Explores Different Facets of Love

Mark Lamos

Westport Country Playhouse Artistic Director Mark Lamos has selected plays by Noël Coward, Ingmar Bergman, Alan Ayckbourn, and Lynn Nottage for the theater’s 84th season.

“It's a season that will be rich and enriching,” said Lamos. “A rich variety of offerings, each exploring the different facets of love: passionate, cruel, remembered, longed-for, or hysterically silly. An enriching series of experiences for theatergoers who love theater worth talking about.”

The 2014 season will begin with Coward’s A Song at Twilight directed by Lamos, April 29 – May 17, 2014, a co-production with Hartford Stage. In this exquisite battle of wits, Coward explores the nature of passion, the cruelty of love, and the price of hidden secrets. The story tells of Sir Hugo Latymer, who, in his long career, has achieved more than most writers even dream of—money, fame, and a reputation beyond reproach. But his carefully constructed ivory tower is imperiled when a long-ago love threatens to shed a very public light into the most scandalous corner of his private past, a revelation that could bring it all tumbling down.

The second show, playing June 10 - 28, 2014, will be announced at a later date. Directed by Lamos, it will be either a comedy or a world premiere musical event.

Nora, Bergman’s adaptation of Henrik Ibsen’s A Doll’s House, translated into the English language by Frederick J. Marker and Lisa-Lone Marker, will run July 15 – Aug. 2, 2014, directed by David Kennedy, Playhouse associate artistic director. A story of love, blackmail, and the little lies people tell.

A comedy by Playhouse favorite Ayckbourn, Things We Do for Love, will run Aug. 19 – Sept. 6, 2014. Replete with trademark Ayckbourn touches, this wickedly funny play questions just how sane anyone really is when it comes to love. Fastidious Barbara’s orderly, but solitary world is thrown into chaos when the arrival of her longtime friend Nikki and her fiancé ignites unexpected and violent passions.

Rounding out the season, Oct. 7 – 25, 2014, is Intimate Apparel by Pulitzer Prize winner Nottage (Ruined). The play explores how each choice people make is a vital stitch in the ornately and delicately embroidered fabric of their lives. The story weaves an intricate tapestry of the joys, sorrows, tragedy, and triumph of a gifted but lonely African-American seamstress in early 20th century Manhattan who's negotiating the choice between a love that is accepted and one that is true.

Information: 203-227-4177; toll-free at 1-888-927-7529; 25 Powers Court, Westport. Tickets: twww.westportplayhouse.org.