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The Wilma Theater announces its 1999-2000 millennium season -- celebrating 20 years of innovation and excellence For Immediate Release: June 2, 1999 PHILADELPHIA, PA - June 2 - Celebrating both the 20th Anniversary of their arrival at the Wilma and the start of the new millennium, The Wilma Theater Artistic Directors, Blanka and Jiri Zizka, today announced the full slate for the 1999-2000 season, including two breakthrough productions that will position the theater in the national spotlight. Re-affirming their acclaimed tradition of innovation, the Zizkas will open the season with a bold and imaginative production of THE 3 MUSKETEERS, performed by Theatre de la Jeune Lune of Minneapolis (September 8 - October 10), followed by THE TIN PAN ALLEY RAG, a musical play by Mark Saltzman, featuring the songs of Irving Berlin and Scott Joplin, which will be directed by Jiri Zizka (November 10 - December 12). For the new year, the Wilma will mount the U.S. East Coast premiere of Tom Stoppard's latest master work, THE INVENTION OF LOVE (February 9 - March 19), directed by Blanka Zizka. The season's final production will be a WILMA WILD CARD (May 3 - June 4), which will be announced in the fall. Wilma Co-Artistic Director, Blanka Zizka, commented "We are looking forward to an exciting millennium season at the Wilma. The collaboration with Jeune Lune is a good fit for us. For twenty years, this French/American company of artists has been known for its imaginative repertory and bold physical style of performance. We are pleased to bring them here for their Philadelphia debut. We are also incredibly proud to be staging the East Coast premiere of THE INVENTION OF LOVE at the Wilma. We've had a long and close friendship with Tom Stoppard, and it is his confidence in us and respect for our work that helped us to secure the rights to this extraordinary play." THE 3 MUSKETEERS originally premiered at Theatre de la Jeune Lune in November, 1996 and later toured to the Spoleto Festival in Charleston, South Carolina. Directed by Dominique Serrand, it is a clever and richly imaginative deconstruction of the 150-year-old Alexandre Dumas story of intrigue, swordplay and the triumph of youthful adventure during the 17th century religious wars. With playfully witty esprit, the production reinvents the story, altering the setting and age of the adventurers while honoring the romantic spirit of the novel -- creating an intoxicating, swashbuckling celebration of the artistic impulse and the power of the human imagination. A company comprised of French and American theater artists, Theatre de la Jeune Lune was established in Minneapolis, Minnesota, as "...a theatre of imagination," dedicated to exploring and celebrating theatricality. Known for an eclectic repertoire ranging from commedia dell'arte and Shakespeare to contemporary artists such as Jacques LeCoq and Peter Brook, to Bertolt Brecht, Jeune Lune's past productions have included Children of Paradise: Shooting the Dream, The Hunchback of Notre-Dame, Cyrano de Bergerac, Yang Zen Froggs, Circus, Ubu for President, Red Noses, 1789, August August August, among others. THE TIN PAN ALLEY RAG, a musical play by Mark Saltzman, is a trip back in time to a fantasy meeting between legendary composer Irving Berlin and the immortal Scott Joplin - creator of the unique music form known as "ragtime." As each takes an unexpected journey into the other's world, in the saloons where these historic talents played and sang, this rousing musical will have audiences dancing in the aisles and stomping their feet to some of the greatest songs ever written. From The Maple Leaf Rag to Alexander's Ragtime Band, The Entertainer and more, THE TIN PAN ALLEY RAG is non-stop glorious entertainment with a purely American twist. THE INVENTION OF LOVE, which is the latest play by world-renowned playwright and two time Oscar-winning screenwriter (co-author of Shakespeare in Love and Brazil) Tom Stoppard, takes as its focus the secretive life and turbulent times of poet and scholar A.E. Housman. Set in 1936 (the year Housman died), and filled with a sense of surprise and wonder, the play has Housman reaching into his rich tapestry of memory as he's being ferried across the River Styx, meeting up with Moses Jackson and a young Oscar Wilde. Equating Hades with the Oxford of Housman's youth, Stoppard peers into the time when the high Victorian morality was under siege from the Aesthetic movement, touching on Britain's notorious 1885 Criminal Law Amendment Bill under which Wilde was tried, and on the very nature of love itself. Tom Stoppard will be in residence during rehearsals. The season's final production will be a WILMA WILD CARD, traditionally an opportunity for a last-minute inspiration by the artistic directors, and the excitement of the unknown for audiences. Unique as the Wilma itself, WILD CARD productions can range from raw, gritty realism to a wild, imagistic fantasy, from humor to poignancy, and everything in between. It is theater at its most pure, with the element of complete surprise. Subscription prices for The Wilma Theater's 1999-2000 season range from $84 to $160. Single ticket prices for each production are $25 to $38, with discounts available for groups of 10 or more, and special rates for students and seniors on selected performances and "Student Saturday" matinees. Subscriptions are available at The Wilma Theater Box Office, Broad & Spruce Streets, by calling 215.546.STAGE, or by visiting our website at www.wilmatheater.org. Single tickets will go on sale this summer. ###
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