The Man Who Came to Dinner

by George Kaufman and Moss Hart

 

Nov 2-4 on the Stargate School K-5 stage.  

 

Just before a Christmas in the late 1930’s, Sheridan Whiteside, a noted radio personality, is invited to dinner at the home of Ernest W. and Daisy Stanley in Mesalia, Ohio. After slipping on ice and claiming to have dislocated his hip, he becomes an intrusive and outrageously demanding houseguest. Whiteside proceeds to terrorize the Stanley's, taking over their home and interfering with almost every aspect of their lives. He holds court in the living room for his wide circle of friends, commandeers the telephone, runs up staggering long-distance bills to world leaders, monopolizes the Stanley servants, fills the library with penguins and cockroaches, and invites a band of paroled convicts over for lunch. But Whiteside's life is about to change for the worse when his secretary of 10 years, Miss Maggie Cutler, falls in love with the local newspaper editor, Bert Jefferson, who had dropped by to interview Whiteside. Descends into a panic. He calls on glamorous Hollywood actress, Lorraine Sheldon, to lure Bert away from Maggie, under the guise of pursuing his brilliant play. Maggie counters with a trick of her own, aided by the vocal impressions of sophisticated British performer Beverly Carlton. Her plan to send Lorraine on a wild goose chase is discovered, however. 

 

The Man Who Came to Dinner is a brilliantly witty madcap play, which manages to combine the sophistication of great comedic literature, the frenetic energy of the silliest farce, and a genuinely sweet heart into one of the most beloved comedies of the American theatre, filled with fascinating character roles and winking homage to the intellectual and popular culture of the 1930s.

 

Tickets: $8 adults or $4 students ($10/ $5 at the door).