Cast and Crew:

One Flea Spare by Naomi Wallace

Produced by

Mildred’s Umbrella Theatre Company

William Snellgrave... Greg Dean

Darcy Snellgrave... Jennifer Decker

Bunce... Mark Carrier

Morse...Bree Welch

Kabe... Eric Doss

Directed by... Patricia Duran

Stage Manager... Carole Kelly

Set Design...   Wayne Barnhill and

                        Kevin Taylor

Light Design... Kevin Taylor

Costume Design... Kelly Robertson

Sound Designer... Charlie Naked

Assistant Director... Mike Switzer

Props... Carole Kelly and Patricia Duran

Dramaturg... Dr. Rob Shimko

Thursday through Friday, 8pm

April 24th - May 10th, 2008

Monday April 28th, and May 5th

Midtown Arts Center

3414 LaBranch St

Houston, TX 77004

ONE FLEA SPARE

by

Naomi Wallace

Directed by Patricia Duran

April 24th – May 10th, 2008

Mildred’s Umbrella Theatre Company presents the Houston Premiere of Naomi Wallace’s, One Flea Spare, running April 24 – May 10, 2008 at the Midtown Arts Center, 3414 La Branch at Holman. One Flea Spare is the winner of the Susan Smith Blackburn Prize, Obie Award for Best Play, and voted The Best of Theatre in 1996 by Time Magazine.

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Darkly comic and deeply moving by turns, One Flea Spare is set in plague-ravaged 17th Century London where social roles and the boundaries that describe them have turned upside down. The definition of morality is up for grabs. History is being tantalized. Upper and lower class are forced to live in quarantine together and the secrets and sins of the four shut-ins are laid bare. The social hierarchy collapses, and sexual inhibitions are loosened as the prisoners wait for death to strike them down or pass them by. Who, if anyone, will survive?

The New Yorker critically hailed the play as, “artful and haunting...One Flea Spare is built to provoke, not to distract, and it doesn't surrender its meanings easily. But the play's powerful sexual subtext and its beautiful poetic surface reveal an original theatrical imagination.”

"She speaks to, and for, the body as eloquently as any American writer since Walt Whitman."

    - American Theatre, February 2002

"Wallace's drama is not about dying; it's about love and survival—about searching for answers while grappling with the wide array of factors that plague contemporary culture. In the tradition of Orwell, Brecht, and Miller, the story is set in another time while addressing the present.”

    - Shirle Gottlieb, Back Stage West

"What makes Wallace’s play so fascinating is that, although awash in death and corruption, so much life beats in its heart…”

    - Joel Beers, O.C. Weekly

One Flea Spare features Mildred’s Umbrella Company members Greg Dean, Jennifer Decker, and Eric Doss. Other familiar Houston faces include Mark Carrier and Bree Welch. The production is directed by Mildred’s Umbrella Company member Patricia Duran.

Midtown Arts Center

3414 La Branch St

Houston, TX 77004

All Proceeds from the May 1st, 2008 Performance will benefit The Homeless Pet Placement League.

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Jennifer Decker

Eric Doss

Greg Dean

Bree Welch

Mark Carrier

“One Flea Spare is haunting and beautiful.”

Everett Evans, Houston Chronicle

CLICK HERE TO READ THE WHOLE REVIEW