Arts Equity sets sail on Eugene O'Neill's
"The Long Voyage Home"

Arts Equity - at The Main Street Theatre sets sail with Eugene O'Neill's "The Long Voyage Home".

Nobel Prize-winner Eugene O'Neill aboard the British tramp steamer S.S. Glencairn. The lives of the crew are lived out in fear, loneliness, suspicion and camaraderie. The men smuggle drink and women aboard, fight with each other, spy on each other, comfort each other as death approaches, and rescue each other from danger. Out of four short plays of the sea (Bound
East for Cardiff, In the Zone, The Long Voyage Home, and The Moon of the Caribbees ) under the title: "The Long Voyage Home," evolves a penetrating glimpse into the never-ending story of man's wanderings over the waters of the world in search of peace for his soul.

From eoneill.com http://www.eoneill.com/biography.htm

"...as a child, steeped in the peasant Irish Catholicism of his father and the more genteel, mystical piety of his mother, two influences, often in dramatic conflict, which account for the high sense of drama and the struggle with God and religion that distinguish O'Neill's plays...

Confined to the Gaylord Farm Sanitarium for six months (1912-13), he confronted himself soberly and nakedly for the first time and seized the chance for what he later called his "rebirth." He began to write plays. His most-distinguished short plays include the four early sea plays, "Bound
East for Cardiff", "In the Zone", "The Long Voyage Home", and "The Moon of the Caribbees", which were written between 1913 and 1917...

O'Neill was the first American dramatist to regard the stage as a literary medium and the only American playwright ever to receive the Nobel Prize for Literature. Through his efforts, the American theatre grew up during the 1920s, developing into a cultural medium that could take its place with the best in American fiction, painting, and music."

He was awarded the Pulitzer four times, including one after his death.

More background information is available at http://www.eoneill.com/

The Ensemble Cast of "The Long Voyage Home" includes:

Richard Garfield,
Alexander MacKenzie,
Thomas Foley,
John Bangs, (Cover Shot, The Ice Fishing Play, Zaney, The Birthday Party)
Rod Harrel
Stefan Kay (The Birthday Party, Hot N Throbbing)
Melody Marshall
Athena McElrath (Road Rage, The Birthday Party)
Risa Rank (Cover Shot, Road Rage)
Neil Wade Freer

"The Long Voyage Home" is designed and directed by Llewellyn J. Rhoe

This production reunites Llewellyn J. Rhoe with writer, actor, director Rod Harrel a Vancouver native. Harrel along with E.J. Westlake and Robin Suttles founded Stark Raving Theatre in Portland in the late 1980's. When Rhoe produced and directed E.J. Westlake's "A.E. The disappearance and Death of Amelia Earhart" he cast Harrel as George Stultz the drunken
co-pilot. "A.E." went on to be the recipient of The Oregon Literary Arts Award for the playwright and a Drammy Award for best new play in 1991.

Rhoe produced and directed Harrel's "Now Let Me Say this about that" a dark send up on the JFK autopsy and the two worked together on numerous video projects.

This production gets an extra push from Alexander MacKenzie, a former Navy and Merchant Marine captain who is also president of the Portland Council of the Navy League of the United States. He commands the 125-foot decommissioned Coast Guard cutter Alert: "said to be the oldest operable engine-powered, ex-military combat ship in the United States (some say the
world)". The Alert is tied up at Terminal One, just west of the Inn at the Quay on the Vancouver waterfront.


PERFORMANCE DATES:
March 15 Invited preview audience
March 16 Champagne/Wine Opening Night
March 17 Benefit Performance the Nonprofit Cutter Alert Preservation Team
March 22
March 23
March 24
March 29
March 30
March 31
April 1 Matinee Performance at 2pm with Talk back session following
April 5
April 6
April 7
April 12
April 13
April 14
April 19
April 20
April 21
April 22 Closing Matinee Performance at 2pm

All performance times 7:30 pm except listed matinees

TICKET PRICES AND INFO:
$8 to $24 All seats reserved
http://www.artsequity.org/contact.html