Tag Archives: Regi Ott

Pulitzers Play Little Rock: RABBIT HOLE at Weekend Theater

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RabbitHoleTWTThe announcement that the 2007 Pulitzer Prize for Drama went to David Lindsay-Abaire for Rabbit Hole was a bit of surprise.  The play had actually opened on Broadway the prior season.  (While now the Pulitzer year equals the calendar year, at that time, the Pulitzer calendar went from Autumn to Autumn.)

Lindsay-Abaire’s play tells the tale of a family coming to grips with the accidental death of a four year old son.  The Weekend Theatre brought the play to life on a Little Rock stage in 2009.  Andy Hall directed the production (duties he has performed for the current Weekend Theatre production of Assassins).

Patti Airoldi took on the central role of the aggrieved mother.  Duane Jackson played her husband, Patti German played her mother, and Regi Ott was her somewhat unconventional sister.  William Moon rounded out the cast.

Though the play veers to the edge of maudlin, it never gets there.  The script presents how different people cope with grief and guilt without becoming a “Very Special Episode” of After School Special.

2018 marks the 100th anniversary of the first Pulitzer Prize for Drama being given. To pay tribute to 100 years of the Pulitzer for Drama, each day this month a different Little Rock production of a Pulitzer Prize winning play will be highlighted.  Many of these titles have been produced numerous times.  This look will veer from high school to national tours in an attempt to give a glimpse into Little Rock’s breadth and depth of theatrical history.

Weekend Theater: LARAMIE PROJECT, TEN YEARS LATER

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In the wake of the 1998 murder of Matthew Shepard, playwright/director Moises Kaufman and several colleagues visited the site of the crime.  The outcome of their interviews was the performance piece The Laramie Project, which the Weekend Theater presented a few seasons back.

In 2008, Kaufman and colleagues revisited Laramie and revisited some of the interviewees. They also conducted interviews with new people who had been involved in the 1998 incident, including two of young men who attacked and killed Shepard. The result of these interviews was The Laramie Project: Ten Years Later.

Duane Jackson, who directed the Weekend Theater’s production of the previous play, helms this production.  The cast includes David Anderson, Johnnie Brannon, Alan Douglas, Jeremy Estill, Julie Atkins, Sally Graham, Regi Ott, and Roben Sullivant.  Each actor portrays a variety of characters in this tale of a town and an entire nation.

The production opens on Friday, January 13 and plays the next three weekends.  Showtimes are at 7:30 p.m. Fridays and Saturdays through Jan. 28. Tickets, $16 for general admission and $12 for students and seniors age 65 and over can be reserved by calling (501) 374-3761 or online at www.weekendtheater.org.

Sponsors for this production are Canvas Community Church, Quapaw Quarter United Methodist Church, Open Door Community Church, and New Beginnings Church of Central Arkansas.