November 2 - December 2, 2007

Director: Norman Seltzer

Evening Performances:
November 2, 3, 9, 10, 16, 17, 23, 24, 30 and Dec. 1 at 8
Sunday Matinees:
November 11 and Dec. 2 at 2

"Broadway Bound with a dose of dysfunction"

"Silver Spring Stage is currently giving us a strong performance of this final installment [of Simon's Brighton Beach triology], Broadway Bound. --- While the two boys are starting to succeed in show business, their parents’ marriage is crumbling around them. --- It is a play of extremes, but director Norman Seltzer and his talented cast capture and integrate these varied moods very well." --- David Cannon, Montgomery Sentinal, November 15, 2007 Read the article

Silver Spring Stage presents Neil Simon’s hilarious and heart wrenching family memory play Broadway Bound, directed by Norman Seltzer. The third of Simon’s endearing autobiographical memory plays of two brothers aspiring to become comedy writers while their family breaks apart. Broadway Bound will run weekends November 2 to December 2, 2007.

Silver Spring Stage is located in the Woodmoor Shopping Center, lower level (next to the CVS) at Colesville Road and University Boulevard. Ticket prices range from $13 to $18. Performances are Friday and Saturday at 8:00 PM and Sunday matinees on November 11 and December 2 at 2:00 PM. Tickets can be purchased at www.ssstage.org. Information is also available by calling (301) 593-6036.

In the 1980’s, Neil Simon turned from his masterly comic interpretation of the adult conventions of the 1960’s and 1970’s to return to his childhood in three successful, award-winning plays Brighton Beach Memoirs, Biloxi Blues, and Broadway Bound. Broadway Bound premiered in 1986, ran on Broadway for more 750 performances, and won two Tony Awards. It was made into a 1992 TV movie. While the first of the trilogy was the introduction to his antic family and the second his discovery of manhood, the third chartered new territory with a mature and candid portrayal of generational conflict and the temptation and modern Jewish guilt of youthful opportunity departing from family custom. In Broadway Bound, Simon exposes more of the family laundry – extramarital affairs and marital dissolution – and the honesty of facing those hurts. The two brothers are firmly based on Simon himself (Eugene) and his older brother Danny (Stan), who also became a very successful comedy writer. “I didn’t know I was so angry,” Eugene says in the play. “Like there’s a part of my head that makes me this nice, likable, funny kid . . . and there’s the other part, the part that writes, that’s . . . angry, hostile.” Eugene/Simon has grown up. The peerless character Simon has written so lovingly is his mother (Kate). In the earlier plays, she was the traditional bedrock of the family, but in Broadway Bound, we see a fully dimensional Jewish mother with humor, disappointments and a realization that the old world has become obsolete. Simon doesn’t sacrifice the laughs for this more revealing depiction of the Jewish American family. He gives the audience one of the fullest and sincerest pictures of the Jewish American experience.

It’s 1948 and back in Brooklyn after the war, Eugene (Jamie Driscoll) and his older brother, Stanley (Michael Avolio), are working together to become comedy writers for radio. Along with the brothers in the house are their father Jack (Norman Gleichman) and mother Kate (Linda Moore), her father Ben (Ken Lechter), and her sister Blanche (Carole Preston). Meanwhile, their parents’ relationship is falling apart. The brothers learn that their father has been cheating on their mother. When Eugene and Stanley find a job where they can write short comedic skits for the radio, they obscurely make fun of their own family. Jack can hear the similarities between the fictional family in the broadcast and their own family, and becomes outraged. He gets into a major argument with Stanley, which turns to an argument about Jack's affair. Later, Kate holds a nostalgic conversation with Eugene, revealing how she had tried to win his father's heart when she was younger. Eventually, Jack leaves. Stanley and Eugene move out the house when they are offered a bigger opportunity to success.

The Stage's 40th anniversary season continues with a special holiday show A Visit from St. Nicholas or The Night Before Christmas (Dec. 7-16); Seascape (Jan. 11-Feb. 3); The Cripple of Inishmaan (Feb. 22-Mar. 16); Communicating Doors (Apr. 11-May 4); Come Back to the Five and Dime, Jimmy Dean, Jimmy Dean (May 30-June 22); and Deathtrap (July 11-Aug. 3).

Silver Spring Stage is grateful for support from the Arts and Humanities Council of Montgomery County and the Maryland State Arts Council.