“Feast of Fools,” a broad comedy featuring several notable stage performers including Grammy and Emmy winner June Angela and veteran actress/comedienne Cathy McAuley will debut at Hudson Theater in LA Sept 14-24. Written by Eugene O’Neil Playwright Award winner Jim Landis.
Several major celebs and die-hard Jim Landis fans including Melissa McCarthy, Billy Gardell, Kate Flannery and Hillary Duff will be attending the Harvest Theater Company’s debut production of “Feast of Fools!,” a broad comedy featuring several notable stage performers including Grammy and Emmy winner (and Tony nominee) June Angela and veteran actress/comedienne Cathy McAuley. Playwright Jim Landis, past winner of the Back Stage West/Drama-Logue and Eugene O’Neil Playwright awards, penned the two-act comedy and will direct it. The Actors Equity Association production will run September 14-24 at the Hudson Theatre (6539 Santa Monica Blvd, Los Angeles, Californina 90038). Tickets are $35 ($30 for students/seniors/veterans ) and can be purchased at https://www.harvesttheatercompany.com/
“Feast of Fools!” is loosely based on Landis’s own life, which he characterizes as “dysfunctional,” and features a Thanksgiving holiday family reunion that brings together some colorful, idiosyncratic and witty characters whose interactions set the tone for the play’s lively, irreverent plot. While the comedy touches on such sensitive topics as terminal illness, LGBTQ prejudice and alcoholism, Landis says that these issues are dealt with in novel, humorous and unexpected ways that have kept preview audiences in stitches.
The show marks a reunion of sorts between Landis, the actors and other production creatives who began their stage careers together more than 30 years ago. They hoped then to one day establish their own theatrical company and today that dream has been realized with the formation of the Harvest Theater Company.
Among the cast members of “Feast of Fools!”: Angela, a Tony nominee and Drama Desk award winner for best lead actress in a musical for “Shogun,” starred opposite Danny Glover in "Yohen" and Yul Brennen in “King and I” and has numerous TV credits to her name including being a series regular; McAuley, a prolific voice-over actor who honed her comedy chops by touring with Tim Conway and Harvey Korman in several stage productions, was a recurring character on NBC’s “Night Court,” guest starred in numerous other TV shows and is a Cleo Award winner with hundreds of commercials to her name; Mark Nordike, a veteran of TV, stage and films with 30 years of experience; and Laura McCord, a classically trained Shakespearean actress whose crossover into other genres include off-Broadway roles as Masha in “Three Sisters” and Nurse Ratched in “One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest.”
(PICTURED ARE ACTRESS CATHY McAULEY AND PLAYWRIGHT/DIRECTOR JIM LANDIS)
