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I’m looking forward to seeing The Vortex again… the Noel Coward play is back by popular demand this week opening at the Matrix Theatre on Melrose.
Gene Franklin Smith is back in the director’s chair along with other original cast members from the Playhouse production and produced by artist and Genlux Magazine fashion editor Amanda Eliasch.
Eliasch, an award winner herself and a well-known supporter of the arts, Eliasch told British Weekly: “I saw this production of The Vortex which is now set in the sixties, back in May of this year and fell in love with it immediately. I felt it needed a wider audience, so I reached out to the super-talented director Gene Franklin Smith and proposed that I produce it.”
Of The Vortex, director Gene Franklin Smith says: “Coward never really wrote another play quite like The Vortex again. He created a juicy role for himself, including drug abuse, repressed homosexuality and Oedipal jealousy, knowing full well it would make him a star. The Vortex doesn’t sit in the same high pantheon as Private Lives or Blithe Spirit, but it is far more contemporary than Coward’s other works, and you would swear it was written today and not 90 years ago.”
Starring the remarkable talents of Shannon Holt as “Florence” and Craig Robert Young as “Nicky”, The Vortex surprises audiences with its climactic emotional showdown between a mother and son that evokes Hamlet.
The play’s original run was way back in 1924, in London, and its scandalous subject matter – along with the author’s trademark wit and trenchant one-liners – made Coward an overnight sensation,.
Holt and Young are joined by an impressive cast, which includes Victoria Hoffman as “Helen”, Daniel Jimenez as “Tom”, Skye LaFontaine as “Bunty”, newcomer John Mawson as “David”, and Cameron Mitchell Jr., as Pawnie.
Catch this production if you can… A big two thumbs up!
Who: Written By: Noel Coward, Directed By: Gene Franklin Smith, Produced By: Amanda Eliasch, Starring: Shannon Holt and Craig Robert Young with Victoria Hoffman, Daniel Jimenez, Skye LaFontaine, John Mawson and Cameron Mitchell Jr.
Where: The Matrix Theatre, 7657 Melrose Avenue, Los Angeles, CA 90048.
Running time: 1 hour 25 minutes. Appropriate for ages 13 and up.
When: Now playing through Sunday, December 14, 2014. Shows are Thursdays, Fridays and Saturdays at 8 PM and Sundays at 3 PM. Preview performance Wednesday, November 12.
How: Tickets may be purchased online at www.plays411.com/vortex or by calling (323) 960-7735. Single tickets for the preview are $20 and $34 for all regular performances.
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