Broken Glass – Westport Country Playhouse, Westport, CT, USA

The Westport Country Playhouse celebrates Arthur Miller’s 100^th birthday with his play Broken Glass, a late Miller work that is a powerfully, intense drama that takes place in a Jewish home in 1938 Brooklyn, New York, centering on Kristallnacht (Night of Broken Glass) in Berlin, Germany, and how its impact rippled across the world. This brilliant production of Arthur Miller’s masterpiece left us with goose bumps at the play’s conclusion! Director Mark Lamos elicits the best from the impressive cast of John Hillner, Merritt Janson, Felicity Jones, Angela Reed, Stephen Schnetzer, and Steven Skybell. The play runs from October 6 – 24, 2015.

Arthur Miller (October 17, 1915 – February 10, 2005), born in Harlem, New York is considered to be one of America’s greatest playwrights. A prolific writer, a few of his many notable plays include: The Man Who Had All The Luck (1940), All My Sons (1947), Death of A Salesman (1949), The Crucible (1953), A View From The Bridge (1955), After The Fall (1964), The Price (1968), The American Clock (1980), and Broken Glass (1994).

Felicity Jones (Sylvia Gellburg)
Photo by Carol Rossegg

He was honored with numerous awards including two Tony Awards for his plays, a Tony Award for Lifetime Achievement, and a Pulitzer Prize for Death of a Salesman. His screenplays include All My Sons (1948), The Hook (1947), Let’s Make Love (1960), The Misfits (1961) starring his then-wife, Marilyn Monroe, Clark Gable, and Montgomery Clift, Everybody Wins (1984), Death of a Salesman (1985), The Crucible (1995), and Mr. Peters Connections (1998). He also wrote essays, fiction and non-fiction, and radio plays.

Steven Skybell (Phillip Gellburg),
Stephen Schnetzer (Dr. Harry Hyman)
Photo by Carol Rossegg

Director Mark Lamos writes of the play, "’Broken Glass’ is considered one of Miller’s finest achievements from his ‘late’ period," said Lamos. "Though he was Jewish, it’s virtually the only drama he ever wrote that actually deals with Jewish identity issues. In its swift-moving, almost thriller-like action, Miller audaciously entwines a crippled marriage, in which the wife is herself mysteriously crippled in reaction to news of Nazi atrocities against German Jews, mirrored by a world on the verge of collapse. Winner of the Olivier Award for Best New Play, "Broken Glass," according to Lamos, "is truly unlike anything this great American writer ever wrote before. I’m thrilled that we are exploring and reviving it in this centenary year." 

Felicity Jones (Sylvia Gellburg),
Angela Reed (Margaret Hyman)
Photo by Carol Rossegg

Arthur Miller was a genius at writing about human emotions and his play Broken Glass, for which he received a Tony nomination for Best Play, is a carefully orchestrated symphony where one must listen not only to the overall melody but to the individual components to find its true meaning. The play takes place in a Jewish couple’s apartment in 1938 Brooklyn, New York with Kristallnacht (Night of Broken Glass) in Nazi Germany as its focus and its universal effects. 

Stephen Schnetzer (Dr. Harry Hyman),
Felicity Jones (Sylvia Gellburg)
Photo by Carol Rossegg

Felicity Jones shines in her role as Sylvia Gellburg, an American Jewish woman whose obsession with the news of Nazi Germany’s Kristallnacht leads to a physical paralysis that is symptomatic of what really lies below the surface of her emotions and problems. Steven Skybell gives a stellar performance as Sylvia’s distraught husband, Phillip Gellburg, who has his own torments to deal with, as well as Sylvia’s illness. Merritt Janson plays her attentive sister Harriet dedicated to finding a cure for her sister. 

John Hillner (Stanton Case),
Steven Skybell (Phillip Gellburg)
Photo by Carol Rossegg

Stephen Schnetzer is brilliant as Dr. Harry Hyman, Sylvia’s compassionate and attractive doctor whose dedication can lead to a dangerous entanglement. Angela Reed brings humor and edginess to her part as Margaret Hyman, whose own emotions sway in a delicate balance in her role as doctor’s wife as well as his nurse. John Hillner as Phillip Gellburg’s boss, Stanton Case, plays his role to perfection with sophisticated, polished civility underscored with subtle hostility and prejudice.  

Angela Reed (Margaret Hyman),
Stephen Schnetzer (Dr. Harry Hyman)
Photo by Carol Rossegg

Written in 1994 about events in 1938, Arthur Miller’s play, Broken Glass, still resounds with a powerful rich clarity that touches the emotions leaving the audience breathless at its culmination. Bravo!  

Merritt Janson (Harriet),
Stephen Schnetzer (Dr. Harry Hyman)
Photo by Carol Rossegg

Broken Glass Cast

The Creative Team

Performance Information: Broken Glass performance schedule is Tuesday at 7:00 pm, Wednesday at 2:00 pm and 8:00 pm, Thursday and Friday at 8:00 pm, Saturday at 3:00 pm and 8 pm, and Sunday at 3:00 pm.

Stephen Schnetzer (Dr. Harry Hyman),
Felicity Jones (Sylvia Gellburg)
Photo by Carol Rossegg

The WCP also has a series of events to celebrate the work and times of Arthur Miller. Visit their website for additional information: www.WestportPlayhouse.org/Celebrate-Arthur-Miller

Special series feature Taste of Tuesday, Previews, LGBT Night OUT, Opening Night, Sunday Symposium, Open Captions, Thursday TalkBack, Together at the Table Family Dinner, Playhouse Young Professionals, and Backstage Pass.  

Concurrent with the run of "Broken Glass," the Playhouse will present a community engagement initiative, "The Individual & American Society:  Celebrating Arthur Miller at One Hundred," examining Miller’s life and the multi-faceted themes of his works.  Programming will include speakers, discussions, workshops, films, family events, and a month-long lobby exhibit, as well as events off-campus.  Many of the programs are free and open to the public. A complete calendar of community engagement events is available on-line at westportplayhouse.org, or a special brochure may be requested by calling the Playhouse box office at 203-227-4177.

For information on the play or to purchase tickets, please call the box office at 203-227-4177 or call the toll-free number at 888-927-7529, or visit them on the website at www.WestportPlayhouse.org.

The Westport Country Playhouse Box Office is open during Performance Days Tuesday through Friday from 12:00 pm until 8:30 pm, Saturday from 11:00 am until 8:30 pm, Sunday from 11:00 am until 3:30 pm, and is closed on Monday. Non-Performance Days, the Box Office is open Tuesday through Friday from 12:00 pm until 6:00 pm, and is closed on Monday. 

The Westport Country Playhouse named as "Theatre Company of the Year" in December 2013 by The Wall Street Journal, opened in the 1930s in a transformed 1835 cow barn, which has, and continues to attract, a "who’s who" of prominent actors. Looking at the framed posters of past shows that line the lobby walls was like entering an encyclopedia of the arts. A few of the many renowned actors who have appeared on the stage there include Ethyl Barrymore, Dorothy and Lillian Gish, Tallulah Bankhead, Gloria Swanson, Don Ameche, Hume Cronin and Jessica Tandy, Jane Fonda, Danny Aiello, Blythe Danner, Jill Clayburgh, Richard Dreyfus, Whoopi Goldberg, Liza Minnelli, Bernadette Peters, Lynn Redgrave, Gene Wilder, and Westport residents Joanne Woodward and Paul Newman.

"Westport Country Playhouse, a not-for-profit theater, serves as a cultural nexus for patrons, artists and students and is a treasured resource for the State of Connecticut.  There are no boundaries to the creative thinking for future seasons or the kinds of audiences and excitement for theater that Westport Country Playhouse can build."

For information on upcoming events and other performances, please visit the website: www.WestportPlayhouse.org.

Upcoming Performances in 2015 and 2016

Westport Country Playhouse  
25 Powers Court
Westport, Connecticut  06880
United States
Box Office:     +1-203-227-4177
Toll-Free:       +1-888-927-7529
Fax:               +1-203-454-3239
Box Office:     +1-203-227-4177
Website:         www.WestportPlayhouse.org
Facebook:       www.Facebook/WestportCountryPlayhouse

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