Flora the Red Menace by Kander and Ebb, produced by Mary Baldwin University’s Theatre Department, opens February 8, 2019, at the Fletcher Collins Theatre in Deming Fine Arts Center.
Aspiring fashion illustrator Flora Mezaros falls for an idealistic young Communist in Depression-era New York in this early Kander and Ebb musical, which made a star of Liza Minnelli and inspired Cabaret and Chicago. As ideals and ideologies collide, will Flora find herself on the “long march” to happiness or a short road to ruin?
Directed by MBU Shakespeare and Performance professor and professional actor Matt Radford Davies and choreographed by Lauren Ballard of the American Shakespeare Center, Flora the Red Menace is performed by a dynamic cast of student actors under the musical guidance of voice professor Anne Wick and pianist Marie Masincup. In the spirit of Flora and her plucky community of artists, our production benefits from a lively collaboration between the departments of theatre, fine arts, and the Shakespeare and Performance graduate program. Staged as a production of the Federal Theatre Project, part of Roosevelt’s New Deal to put performers back to work, Flora continues to speak to the dreams and struggles of young artists against the backdrop of arts funding in perpetual jeopardy.
The show runs February 8 through 17 at 7:30 p.m. and Sunday matinees at 2 p.m. Tickets are $7 for students, seniors, and MBU staff, and $12 for adults. Tickets are available at the door, online, and by calling the theatre department at 540-887-7189.
