We are transforming our theatre into a Victorian Age music hall in Dublin for its first production of Oscar Wilde’s wildly witty The Importance of Being Earnest November 30 – December 17!
Wilde’s popular and family-friendly comedy is directed by Stephanie Shine (TSC’s Emily Dickinson: I Dwell in Possibility, Miss Bennet: Christmas at Pemberley, It’s a Wonderful Life: A Live Radio Play) and is generously sponsored by Kathryn and Jim Gilliland and by Anne and Mike Keeney.
Audiences will be greeted with a raucous celebration from our lobby stage, featuring the songs that filled Wilde’s Ireland with music and laughter. The music hall’s famous entertainers will escort patrons onto our Tabor Stage, where they will follow the escapades of two bachelors, Jack Worthing and Algernon Moncrieff, who create fictional alter egos to escape their social responsibilities and to manage romantic entanglements.
As Jack and Algernon navigate a web of mistaken identities, Wilde brilliantly incorporates Irish sensibility, heightened language, and searing wit to poke fun at the societal norms of his Victorian Age. Using clever wordplay to highlight the importance of authenticity and of “Being Earnest” in an Age obsessed with appearances, Wilde invites his audiences, past and present, to have a sense of self-humor. In so doing, he creates four women’s roles that famously continue to stand the test of time: the young ladies who insist on only loving a man named “Ernest” (Cecily Cardew and Gwendolyn Fairfax), the walking moral compass of a Nanny (Miss Prism), and the grande dame herself passing like a ship in the bright day (Lady Augusta Bracknell).
Oscar Fingal O’Flahertie Wills Wilde was born to Jane (a revolutionary poet) and William (a knighted doctor and patron of medical social justice) in Dublin, Ireland, on October 16, 1854. After graduating with highest honors from Dublin’s Trinity College, Oscar wrote short stories, plays, and poems that were, and remain, wildly popular. Early in his career, he barnstormed America as a lecturer on Aesthetics, wrote children’s stories, revitalized Women’s World Magazine, and penned his novel titled The Picture of Dorian Gray, meeting a storm of Victorian protest for its implied homoerotic theme. His first play, Lady Windermere’s Fan, opened in 1892 to such success that it prompted him to write more: A Woman of No Importance, An Ideal Husband, and in 1895, The Importance of Being Earnest. Not long after the successful premiere of The Importance of Being Earnest, Oscar was arrested and convicted on charges related to homosexuality, which was criminalized at the time, and sentenced to two years of hard labor. Upon his release, he wrote the poem “The Ballad of Reading Gaol” in response to his agony in prison. He passed away three years later on November 30, 1900.
“There is little reason to stage a play if it doesn’t help our community,” says director Stephanie Shine. “I believe this piece does that, as humor is a valid path to healing and growth. It can often be the path of least resistance. It can bring people together, especially when we can laugh at ourselves. In my 40-year career, I’ve never been part of an Oscar Wilde production, so I am especially excited for this.”
The cast of The Importance of Being Earnest features TSC veterans Lorraine Cotten as Lady Bracknell (Taming of the Shrew, It’s a Wonderful Life), Dean Coutris (Mr. Darcy in Miss Bennet: Christmas at Pemberley) as Jack Worthing, Lauren Gunn as Miss Prism, and Nicolas Dureaux Picou as Rev. Chasuble, as well as TSC newcomer Erin Amlicke as Gwendolyn Fairfax. The ensemble also returns to the TSC stage Logan McCarty (Trinculo in TSC’s Tempest) as Algernon Moncrieff, Allison Teegarden (Ariel in The Tempest) as Cecily Cardew, Elijah Hernandez as Lane and Merriman, and as the Music Hall Performers: Marquis Dijon Archuleta, Carleigh Boyle, Kristina Hinako, Irene Keeney, Hadley Evans Nash, and Cheleen Sugar-Ducksworth.
The design team includes Jeremy Allen Fisher (Lighting), Melanie Mulder (Props), Roger Hanna (Scenic), Jason Eschhofen (Sound/Music Direction), Blake Galtelli-Meek (Hair/Wigs/Makeup), and Allison White (Costumes). The production stage manager is Victoria Coulter (The Tempest), and the assistant stage manager is Hadley Evans Nash.
The Importance of Being Earnest’s discounted ($22 tickets) Preview performance is Thursday, November 30 at 7:30 pm. Opening night is Friday, December 1 at 7:30 pm, with the price of tickets including a post-show reception with the actors. Subsequent performances are on Thursdays, Fridays, and Saturdays at 7:30 pm, and on Sundays at 3:00 pm through December 17.
Thursday performances on November 30 and December 7 and 14 are Free Will Kids’ Nights when up to four children 17 years and younger may attend for FREE when accompanied by at least one, full-price-paying Adult Guardian.
Artistic and Production Bios
Marquis Dijon Archuleta (Music Hall Performer) TSC: most recently in The Tempest and Cyrano de Bergerac; also Romeo and Juliet and Julius Caesar. Regional: Of Mice and Men (Crooks), The Shawshank Redemption (Red), Pentecost (Antonio), Romeo and Juliet (Lord Capulet), and Jesus Christ Superstar (Simon Peter).
Erin Amlicke (Gwendolyn Fairfax) Recent credits: Greenbrier Valley Theatre: Frankenstein; Burning Coal Theatre Company: The Cherry; Theatre at Monmouth: The Comedy of Errors, Amphitryon, Antony and Cleopatra, Lysistrata; University of Houston: The Oresteia, Henry V, Picnic, A Midsummer Night’s Dream, The Cherry Orchard, Silence, Boston Marriage. Erin received her M.F.A. in Acting from the University of Houston, and she writes and performs with the theatre collective, The Paper Architects.
Carleigh Boyle (Music Hall Performer) TSC: The Tempest (Sebastian). Favorite roles include Fun Home (Medium Alison), The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Nighttime (Siobhan), The Rocky Horror Show (Riff Raff), Silent Sky (Henrietta Leavitt), Twelfth Night (Olivia), and The Wolves (#46).
Lorraine Cotten (Lady Bracknell) TSC: The Taming of the Shrew and It’s a Wonderful Life: A Live Radio Play, and she co-directed Romeo and Juliet (2015). Playhouse on the Square: The Prom, Gentleman’s Guide, Left Hand Singing, Memphis the Musical, Shakespeare in Love, and Tuck Everlasting, among others. Theatre Memphis: Addams Family. Germantown Community Theatre: Next to Normal and Smoke on the Mountain. Regional credits: Cincinnati Playhouse in the Park, the New Jersey Shakespeare Festival, Arkansas Rep, Barter Theatre, Tiffany Theatre (LA), Perry Street Theatre (NY Theatre Workshop), and New Dramatists (NY). M.F.A. in Directing: University of Memphis.
Victoria Coulter (Production Stage Manager) TSC: The Tempest. She recently received her B.F.A. in Design and Production with a concentration in Stage Management from University of North Carolina School of the Arts. Some previous credits include Assistant Stage Manager for Measure for Measure at Illinois Shakespeare Festival, Production Stage Manager for Weston Theater Company’s TYA Shrek, and Production Assistant for American Ballet Theater’s Summer MET season.
Dean Coutris (Jack Worthing) TSC: Miss Bennet: Christmas at Pemberley (Mr. Darcy). Other credits: As You Like It (Jaques), Clue! (Wadsworth), The Taming of the Shrew (Petruchio), Twelfth Night (Orsino), Bus Stop (Bo Decker), Of Mice and Men (Slim), and Man and Superman (Mendoza). Dean earned his M.F.A. in Theatre at the University of Houston’s Professional Actor Training Program.
Jason Eschhofen (Sound Designer/Music Director) is the Resident Sound Designer of Theatre Memphis. TSC: Miss Bennet: Christmas at Pemberley. Theatre Memphis: Urinetown, Guys and Dolls, Mary Poppins, Sister Act, Arsenic and Old Lace, Immediate Family, The Play that Goes Wrong, Mrs. Mannerly, The Crucible, Blithe Spirit, and Silent Sky. Playhouse on the Square: The Last Five Years, Murder for Two, Songs for a New World, Little Shop of Horrors, May We All, A Closer Walk with Patsy Cline, I Am My Own Wife, Nat Turner in Jerusalem, Ivanka vs. Reality, Days of Rage, and Torch Song.
Jeremy Allen Fisher (Production Manager/Lighting Designer) TSC Resident Lighting Designer 2014-present; and Opera Memphis Resident Lighting Designer 2013-present. Jeremy is a member of United Scenic Artists Local USA 829 and a graduate of Oklahoma City University. He has worked with Theatre Memphis, Youngblood Studios, Ballet Memphis, University of Memphis, Memphis’ Orpheum Theatre, Seattle Opera, Desoto Family Theatre, New Day Children’s Theatre, and New Ballet Ensemble. Some of his other credits include lighting Memphis’ Broad Avenue Water Tower, Wiseacre’s downtown Taproom, and several works at Saint Jude’s Research Hospital and Le Bonheur Children’s Hospital. Awards: 2017 TAC Individual Artist Award, and 11 Ostrander Award nominations with four wins for Lighting Design.
Blake Galtelli-Meek (Wig/Makeup/Hair Designer) has over 15 years of experience in the beauty industry, including theatre, film, print, editorial, and artist training and development. Recent credits include: TSC’s Cyrano de Bergerac; Opera Memphis’ The Falling and The Rising, Bon Appétit!; Germantown Community Theatre’s Wit; and University of Memphis Scheidt Family Performing Arts Center’s La Bohème.
Lauren Gunn (Miss Prism) TSC: The Tempest, Cyrano de Bergerac, Macbeth, Henry VI, Ada and the Engine, Romeo and Juliet, Miss Bennet: Christmas at Pemberley. Southern Arena Theatre: Boeing Boeing, I Hate Hamlet. New Stage Theatre: A Midsummer Night’s Dream, Crimes of the Heart, A Christmas Carol, Cat in the Hat. Fish Tale Group Theatre: Voice of Freedom Summer. Unframed: Constellations, Gruesome Playground Injuries. Lauren is honored to continue serving military veterans at the Memphis V.A. Medical Center with the Feast of Crispian-South program. Lauren is a member and associate instructor with Dueling Arts International.
Roger Hanna (Scenic Designer) has designed sets for theater, opera, and dance in Japan, Israel, and across the U.S., including over 150 productions in NYC. Regional productions include The Glass Menagerie and The Tempest for TSC. Collaborators include Pulitzer Prize-winner Nilo Cruz, MacArthur “Genius” Susan Marshall, and 10-time Tony-winner Tommy Tune. Awards include a Lortel Award, two Drama Desk nominations, and a True West Award from the DCPA. As an educator, Roger taught and designed at major schools including Manhattan and Mannes Schools of Music, NYU, and Yale. He is currently the Head of Set Design at Colorado State University.
Elijah Eliakim Hernandez (Lane/Merriman) TSC: The Tempest (Caliban). Credits in Texas: Coriolanus, Dracula, All My Sons, She Stoops to Conquer, The Impostor, Camino Real, Sense & Sensibility, and Treasure Island.
Kristina Hinako (Music Hall Performer) TSC: The Tempest (Miranda). Credits include: Treasure Island, Julius Caesar, A Midsummer Night’s Dream, Blue Stockings, Men on Boats. She previously served as an Artist Educator at Kentucky Shakespeare Festival.
Irene Keeney (Music Hall Performer) TSC: The Tempest and The Heart is a Lonely Hunter. Other credits: Constellations, The White Plague, Mr. Burns: A Post Electric Play, Whose Wives are They Anyway, A Midsummer Night’s Dream, The Seagull, and The Importance of Being Earnest.
Logan McCarty (Algernon Moncrieff) TSC: The Tempest (Trinculo). Credits in Mississippi include Macbeth, Peter Pan, Quills, Much Ado About Nothing, Boeing Boeing, and Cabaret.
Melanie Mulder (Properties Designer) TSC credits: Ada and the Engine; The Miraculous Journey of Edward Tulane. Additional credits: The Color Purple, Jelly’s Last Jam, A Song for Coretta, Ruined, In the Heights, and Once on this Island at Hattiloo Theatre. Melanie has served as Props Designer on productions for the Nashville Shakespeare Festival (TN), Seaside Music Theatre (FL), Vineyard Theatre, Pearl Theatre, the New School for Drama and The Signature Theatre (all NYC), Williamstown Theatre Festival (MA), Lake George Opera (NY), and Northern Stage (VT). Melanie is a native Memphian and received her B.F.A. in theatre from The University of Memphis.
Hadley Evans Nash (Music Hall Performer/Assistant Stage Manager) TSC: The Tempest (Alonsa). Credits include The Importance of Being Earnest, Love’s Labor’s Lost, and Butts in Seats: Musical Settings of Shakespeare. Directing credits: King Lear, Cymbeline, And Through the Woods, My Dance with Lisa, and The Tempest. Hadley is the Artistic Director and Founder of Brick by Brick Players.
Nicolas Dureaux Picou (Rev. Chasuble) Recently with TSC: The Tempest (Antonio), Cyrano de Bergerac (Christian), Macbeth (Banquo/Porter/Seyton), Romeo and Juliet (Romeo), and Ada and the Engine (Lords Lovelace and Byron). Nic also recently appeared in New Moon Theatre’s production of Small Mouth Sounds (Ned). Offstage, Nic is proud to serve area high school students as a teaching-artist for the Romeo and Juliet Project and the Macbeth Initiative. Nearest to his heart is Nic’s work with justice-involved youth, for whom he facilitates poetry and Shakespeare classes as part of TSC’s Juvenile Justice program.
Stephanie Shine+ (Director) TSC directorial credits include Emily Dickinson: I Dwell in Possibility, which she co-created with Denice Hicks, Henry VI: Wars of the Roses, Macbeth, Miss Bennet: Christmas at Pemberley, Henry V, A Midsummer Night’s Dream, Julius Caesar, It’s a Wonderful Life: A Live Radio Play, Southern Yuletide, Shakespeare’s Greatest Hits, Shake(s), Rattle, and Roll, Shakespeare Said It, Lend Me Thy Sword, 12 productions of Romeo and Juliet, and 14 Literary Salons. Prior to joining TSC, she was Artistic Director of Seattle Shakespeare Company, a position she enjoyed for 13 years. Other directorial credits include King Lear and As You Like It for Houston Shakespeare Festival, The Taming of the Shrew and The Comedy of Errors for Colorado Shakespeare Festival, the award-winning one-woman internationally-touring Marilyn Monroe Biopic, Marilyn: Forever Blonde, and several new works for Seattle’s Book-It Repertory Theatre. Her production of I am of Ireland (which she also conceived and adapted) opened Book-It’s 25th Anniversary Season in 2014. The Germantown Arts Alliance honored her with its 2016 Distinguished Arts and Humanities Medal for Performing Arts. She is the mother of four exceptional people: Conor, Cahilan, Sullivan, and Collins. Education: graduate of the Pacific Conservatory of the Performing Arts; B.F.A in Acting from the University of Washington’s Professional Actor Training Program; M.F.A. in Directing from the University of Memphis.
Cheleen Sugar-Ducksworth (Music Hall Performer) TSC: The Tempest. Credits include El Paso Playhouse: It’s A Wonderful Life; Sweet Tea Shakespeare: Man of Mode, Venice Preserv’d, The School for Scandal, The Roaring Girl, Macbeth, Merry Wives of Windsor, Richard III. Also, she was featured in The Container, Phantasmagoria: Let Us Seek Death, and Selene and the Dream Eater with Burning Coal Theatre.
Allison Teegarden (Cecily Cardew) TSC: The Tempest (Ariel). Ashland New Plays Festival: The Hunt for Benedetto Montone, Last Drive to Dodge; Oregon Shakespeare Festival: Greenshow: Today is the Day – Devised Commedia Dell’arte; Southern Oregon University: Dead Man’s Cell Phone, A Vampire Story, Angels in America: Millennium Approaches, Hay Fever. Other Credits: My Mind is on Fire (Oregon Screams Horror Film Festival Winner). Allison is the recipient of the regional Kennedy Center American College Theater Festival Irene Ryan and Voice and Speech Trainers Association award, and a national Mark Twain Comedic Acting award.
Allison White (Costume Designer) has been the resident costume designer and costume shop manager at TSC for the last two seasons: The Tempest, Cyrano de Bergerac, Ada and the Engine, Macbeth, Henry VI: The War of the Roses, The Romeo and Juliet Project (2022 and 2023); also I Love You, You’re Perfect, Now Change (Germantown Community Theatre); Blithe Spirit, You Can’t Take it With You (Theatre Memphis); Pippin, Between Riverside and Crazy, The Day is Long to End (University of Florida); Caroline, or Change (Cape Fear Regional Theatre); The Secret World of Og (Sarasota Opera Youth Program); Smokey Joe’s Café, All My Sons, The Mystery of Edwin Drood (Theatre Raleigh).
+ member of the Society of Stage Directors and Choreographers, Inc., an independent national labor union.
Box Office
Seating Section One tickets are $42 (Students $22/Seniors $37). Seating Sections Two and Three are $32 (Students $22/Seniors $27). The Preview performance on November 30 is $22 for all tickets. Thursday night performances are Free Will Kids’ Nights: up to four children 17 years and younger may attend for free when accompanied by at least one, full-price-paying Adult Guardian, while seats last, and must be purchased either over the phone or in person.
Tickets may be purchased online here or by calling our Box Office at (901) 759-0604, which is open Monday-Friday from 9:00 am – 4:00 pm, and one hour prior to curtain. TSC is located at 7950 Trinity Road, Memphis, TN 38018-6297. No refunds/exchanges. The house opens 30 minutes prior to curtain. Credit Card charges require a $1 per-ticket fee. Free Tabor Stage parking and covered drop-off at the front door are available at TSC.
The cast and schedule are subject to change with notice.
Season 16 Sponsors and Partners
TSC’s generous sponsors of our season, productions, and Education and Outreach Program include FedEx, International Paper, Arts Midwest, ARTSmemphis, Tennessee Arts Commission, Independent Bank, Evans Petree PC, First Horizon Foundation through an ArtsFirst grant, AutoZone, Nancy R. Copp, Kathryn and Jim Gilliland, Anne and Mike Keeney, Pat and Ernest Kelly, Dorothy O. Kirsch, J. Walker Sims and the Sims Family Charitable Trust, the Barbara B. Apperson Angel Fund, the family of Owen and Margaret Wellford Tabor, the Dunbar Abston Fund for Sustainable Excellence, and the Jack Jones Children’s Literacy Fund.
TSC’s season is funded under a Grant Contract with the State of Tennessee; and is being supported, in whole or in part, by federal award number SLFRP5534, awarded to the State of Tennessee by the U.S. Department of Treasury.
TSC’s programming and outreach partners include Bartlett Performing Arts Center, Benjamin Hooks Public Library Friends, Cities of Bartlett and Collierville and Memphis, Davies Manor, Dixon Gallery & Gardens, Memphis Juvenile Justice System, Memphis V.A. Medical Center, Overton Park Shell, Overton Square, Shelby County Election Commission, Shelby County Schools, St. George’s Episcopal Church, University of Memphis’ Department of Theatre & Dance, Wiseacre Brewery, WKNO Radio (91.1 FM Memphis), and Woodlawn.
