Complete Casting and Info Announced for MRS. SHARP

Playwrights Horizons (Tim Sanford, Artistic Director; Leslie Marcus, Managing Director) will present the Richard Rodgers Award Presentation of MRS. SHARP, a new musical with Book by Kirsten Guenther and Music & Lyrics by Jonathan Larson Grant recipient Ryan Scott Oliver. Starring current Emmy-nominee and Tony Award Winner Jane Krakowski (30 Rock) and directed by three-time Tony Award nominee and Playwrights Horizons alumnus Michael Greif (Grey Gardens, Next to Normal, Rent), the Industry invitation-only readings will take place on Thursday, July 30 (at 1:00pm and 4:30pm) and Friday, July 31 (also at 1:00pm and 4:30pm) at Playwrights Horizons (416 West 42nd Street).

Playwrights Horizons is presenting the readings with support from The Richard Rodgers Foundation.

Lead by Tony Award winner Jane Krakowski (“30 Rock,” Nine, additional Tony nomination for Grand Hotel) in the title role and Tony Award nominee Christian Borle (Legally Blonde, Spamalot, Thoroughly Modern Millie) as her ill-fated husband Kevin, the twelve-member cast will also feature Curt Hansen as Jake, Preston Sadleir as Noah, Ali Stroker as McKenzie, Alex Wyse as Charlie, and Kyle Harris, Jeff Hiller, Jay Armstrong Johnson, Marla Mindelle, Amina Robinson, and Sam Tedaldi in the Ensemble. Dominick Amendum will serve as Music Director, leading a five-piece band.

Based on the 1991 teacher-student sex scandal and murder trial surrounding Pamela Smart, MRS. SHARP tells the story of a woman who “wants you to become more.” Having written an unsuccessful self-help series entitled Invent Yourself: Five Words to Live By, 31-year old Kimberly Sharp (Jane Krakowski) is encouraged by her husband (Christian Borle) to take a job teaching at the local high school. Kimberly sets out to change the lives of her students, absorbing them into her web of fantastical delusions and private affairs. But when her husband discovers she’s gone just a bit too far, Kimberly realizes there’s only one thing that can be done about him. Someone goes to jail, someone becomes a beloved self-help guru and someone gets shot in the head – but everyone learns a lesson from Mrs. Sharp.

MRS. SHARP was originally conceived at the Graduate Musical Theater Writing Program at New York University in 2007 as Alive at Ten, where it was presented as a staged reading and selected to participate in the ASCAP/Disney Musical Theatre Workshop in Manhattan. Later that year, Stephen Schwartz, who leads the panel of musical theater writers, chose the musical to receive a workshop at Carnegie Mellon University in association with ASCAP and Pittsburgh Civic Light Opera. In February 2008, the show was awarded the Richard Rodgers Award for Staged Readings, selected by a jury lead by Stephen Sondheim, Lynn Ahrens, John Guare, Sheldon Harnick, Richard Maltby Jr. and John Weidman, and in March of that year was granted a complete cast recording by the Clive Davis Dept. of Recorded Music.

Playwrights Horizons is supported in part by public funds from the National Endowment for the Arts, the New York State Council on the Arts, the New York City Department of Cultural Affairs, the New York State Assembly and the New York State Senate. In addition, Playwrights Horizons receives major support from Carnegie Corporation of New York, Charina Endowment Fund, The Peter Jay Sharp Foundation, The Shubert Foundation and Time Warner Inc.

www.playwrightshorizons.org