Beverley Hills' Priestley Makes Stage Debut
Date: 6 January 2000
American TV star Jason Priestley will make his British stage debut next month in Warren Leight's award-winning Broadway hit Side Man. The play, which beat out stiff competition from transferred British productions of Closer, Lonesome West and Not About Nightingales to scoop last year's Tony Award for Best New Play, opens at the Apollo Theatre on 28 February 2000.
Priestley is best known for his years in the teen TV series Beverley Hills 90210. His film credits include Love and Death on Long Island, in which he starred opposite John Hurt. In Side Man, he plays the young narrator who recalls his harrowing childhood memories in an age of jazz. In New York, where the play ended its extended Broadway run in October, the role attracted numerous former teen heartthrobs, including Christian Slater and Andrew McCarthy.
Priestley is joined in London by many of the original New York cast including Frank Wood, Edie Falco, Jeff Binder, Kevin Geer, Michael Mastro and Angelica Torn who will be appearing for a limited 12 week run. Wood won the show a second 1999 Tony for Best Featured Actor in a Play for his portrayal of Gene, the trumpeteer whose obsession with jazz drives his wife, played by Falco, to alcohol and insanity.
Leight's autobiographical play is set in New York, running from the jazz heyday in the 1950s to the dark years in the 1980s. This covered the period when many great musicians had to cobble together a mix of club dates, unemployment cheques and cash gigs to make a living. These musicians, known as sidemen, and their families made great sacrifices to serve their passion for music. Side Man includes jazz classics by Roy Eldridge, Miles Davis, Clifford Brown, Lee Morgan, Donald Byrd, Ella Fitzgerald and Duke Ellington.
Side Man is directed by Michael Mayer with set design by Neil Patel, costumes by Tom Broecker, lighting by Kenneth Posner and sound by Scott Myers. It is produced in London by Ron Kastner, Anita Waxman and Elizabeth Williams in association with the original New York producers.
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