Grounded – Westport Country Playhouse, Westport, CT, USA

Elizabeth Stahlmann gives a powerful performance in George Brandt’s award-winning contemporary drama, Grounded, at the Westport Country Playhouse in Westport, Connecticut. The dynamic play is about a US Air Force fighter pilot whose life is turned upside down when an unexpected pregnancy takes her from being a top gun in the sky to being "grounded" and becoming a Predator drone pilot on the ground, and the ultimate consequences of her new role. Grounded is a play that will leave you breathless with its emotional impact and message! The play runs from July 11 until July 29, 2017.

Elizabeth Stahlmann (The Pilot)

Playwright George Brandt’s well-crafted contemporary play delivers an evocative look at the changing face of war. A 2016 winner of the prestigious Lucille Lortel Award, and winner of a Fringe First Award at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival, the play brings home the new way wars are being fought and the moral cost we must now pay.

We had the pleasure of seeing the play on opening night on July 15, 2017 and were impressed with the delivery of its powerful emotionally charged message. Director Liz Diamond elicits the best from Elizabeth Stahlmann, a recent Yale School of Drama graduate, who gives an amazing and credible performance in the role of The Pilot, a fearless, gutsy woman proud of her accomplishments to have achieved the rank of an ace fighter pilot, fighting alongside "her boys," alone in her "Tiger" flying in the blue and doing her work. The plot focuses on her well-deserved leave stateside, where she meets a man in a bar with whom she spends her time off. Returning to war, she now finds that she is pregnant, can no longer fly in the sky, and is sent stateside to work as a Predator drone pilot in Las Vegas.

Elizabeth Stahlmann (The Pilot)

While being a "chair force" drone pilot does have some advantages including providing her with the opportunity to marry the man she had met and ultimately fell in love with while on leave, raise their child together, and come home each night to kiss them at the end of her 12-hour shifts, she is also resentful of not being able to work as a real fighter pilot, "out there" fighting alongside her boys.

Working as a Predator drone pilot in the desert of Las Vegas, her job shifts from the safe anonymity of being an F-16 fighter pilot flying in the blue taking care of business from a remote distance, to being "an eye in the sky" bringing the war to her in an up-close, more personal experience, and learning how she must adapt and change to meet the new challenges of fighting a "different kind of war."

Brilliant set design by Riccardo Hernandez, along with lighting by Solomon Weisband, sound design by Kate Marvin, and projection design by Yana Birÿkova, transport the audience from the Westport Country Playhouse into the vision and the life of a fighter pilot. Well done! Bravo to Elizabeth Stahlmann and the creative team on delivering a powerful performance that will linger long after the house lights come up.

Elizabeth Stahlmann (The Pilot)

Grounded

The Creative Team

Performance Information: The play runs 90 minutes. There is no intermission. Adult language and themes.

Grounded 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 8:00 pm. and Sunday at 3:00 pm. Special series feature Taste of Tuesday, LGBT Night OUT, Opening Night, Sunday Symposium, Open Captions, Thursday TalkBack, Together at the Table Family Dinner, Playhouse Happy Hour, and Backstage Pass.

Edward F. Nesta, Elizabeth Stahlmann,
Mark Lamos (Artistic Director)

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 – 2017

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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