“Lend Me A Tenor,” a Tony Award-winning comedy, will be presented at 7:30 p.m. April 8-9 and April 13-16 in Perry Theatre in the Aurora Foundation Center at 1305 Kenilworth Place.
The public is invited. Admission is free.
Kelly Roush is the director. She will lead a public discussion of the production at 7 p.m. on Wednesday, April 13.
John Curran of St. Charles, Associate Professor of Theatre, and students in his stagecraft class are building the set. They are working from a virtual scale model Curran created with computer software.
“Tenor" won three Tony Awards and four Drama Desk Awards. Set in September 1934, the production focuses on Saunders, the general manager of the Cleveland Grand Opera Company.
He is primed to welcome world-famous, Tito Morelli, Il Stupendo, the greatest tenor of his generation, to appear for one night only as Otello.
The star arrives late and, through a hilarious series of mishaps, is given a double dose of tranquilizers and passes out. His pulse is so low that Saunders and his assistant Max believe he’s dead.
In a frantic attempt to salvage the evening, Saunders persuades Max to get into Morelli's Otello costume and fool the audience into thinking he's Il Stupendo. Max succeeds admirably, but Morelli comes to and gets into his other costume ready to perform.
Now two Otellos are running around in costume and two women are running around in lingerie, each thinking she is with Il Stupendo. The madcap, screwball comedy was a sensation on Broadway and in London's West End.
