<HTML><HEAD></HEAD>
<BODY dir=ltr>
<DIV dir=ltr>
<DIV style="FONT-SIZE: 12pt; FONT-FAMILY: 'Calibri'; COLOR: #000000">
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt" align=center><B
style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal"><SPAN
style='FONT-FAMILY: ; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-family: arial'><FONT
face=Georgia>Great Lakes Theater treats Austen’s ‘Pride and Prejudice’ with
austerity </FONT></SPAN></B></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt" align=center><B
style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal"><SPAN
style='FONT-FAMILY: ; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-family: arial'><FONT
face=Georgia></FONT></SPAN></B> </P>
<P class=MsoNormal
style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt; LINE-HEIGHT: 12pt; tab-stops: 45.8pt 91.6pt 137.4pt 183.2pt 229.0pt 274.8pt 320.6pt 366.4pt 412.2pt 458.0pt 503.8pt 549.6pt 595.4pt 641.2pt 687.0pt 732.8pt"
align=center><SPAN
style='BORDER-TOP: windowtext 1pt; FONT-FAMILY: ; BORDER-RIGHT: windowtext 1pt; BORDER-BOTTOM: windowtext 1pt; COLOR: ; PADDING-BOTTOM: 0in; PADDING-TOP: 0in; PADDING-LEFT: 0in; BORDER-LEFT: windowtext 1pt; PADDING-RIGHT: 0in; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-family: arial; mso-border-alt: none windowtext 0in'><FONT
face=Georgia>Bob Abelman</FONT></SPAN><SPAN
style='FONT-FAMILY: ; COLOR: ; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"'></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal
style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt; tab-stops: 45.8pt 91.6pt 137.4pt 183.2pt 229.0pt 274.8pt 320.6pt 366.4pt 412.2pt 458.0pt 503.8pt 549.6pt 595.4pt 641.2pt 687.0pt 732.8pt"
align=center><I style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal"><SPAN
style='BORDER-TOP: windowtext 1pt; FONT-FAMILY: ; BORDER-RIGHT: windowtext 1pt; BORDER-BOTTOM: windowtext 1pt; COLOR: ; PADDING-BOTTOM: 0in; PADDING-TOP: 0in; PADDING-LEFT: 0in; BORDER-LEFT: windowtext 1pt; PADDING-RIGHT: 0in; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-family: arial; mso-border-alt: none windowtext 0in'><FONT
face=Georgia>Cleveland Jewish News, The News Herald, The Morning
Journal</FONT></SPAN></I><SPAN
style='FONT-FAMILY: ; COLOR: ; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"'></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal
style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt; tab-stops: 45.8pt 91.6pt 137.4pt 183.2pt 229.0pt 274.8pt 320.6pt 366.4pt 412.2pt 458.0pt 503.8pt 549.6pt 595.4pt 641.2pt 687.0pt 732.8pt"
align=center><SPAN
style='BORDER-TOP: windowtext 1pt; FONT-FAMILY: ; BORDER-RIGHT: windowtext 1pt; BORDER-BOTTOM: windowtext 1pt; COLOR: ; PADDING-BOTTOM: 0in; PADDING-TOP: 0in; PADDING-LEFT: 0in; BORDER-LEFT: windowtext 1pt; PADDING-RIGHT: 0in; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-family: arial; mso-border-alt: none windowtext 0in'><FONT
face=Georgia>Member, American Theatre Critics Association</FONT></SPAN><SPAN
style='FONT-FAMILY: ; COLOR: ; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"'></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="BACKGROUND: white; MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style='FONT-FAMILY: ; COLOR: ; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"'><FONT
face="Times New Roman"></FONT></SPAN> </P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style='COLOR: ; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-family: calibri'> </SPAN><SPAN
style='FONT-FAMILY: ; COLOR: ; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"'><FONT
face=Georgia><FONT color=#222222> “In an innovative, tradition-defying
rethinking of one of the greatest comedies in the English language,” begins a
satirical article in a recent posting on theonion.com, “Morristown Community
Players director Kevin Hiles announced Monday his bold intention to set his
theater's production of Shakespeare's ‘<SPAN
style="mso-bidi-font-style: italic">The Merchant of Venice’</SPAN> in
16th-century Venice.”</FONT></FONT></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="BACKGROUND: white; MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style='FONT-FAMILY: ; COLOR: ; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"'><FONT
color=#222222 face=Georgia></FONT></SPAN> </P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="BACKGROUND: white; MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style='FONT-FAMILY: ; COLOR: ; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"'><FONT
face=Georgia><FONT color=#222222>"I know when most people hear ‘<SPAN
style="mso-bidi-font-style: italic">The Merchant Of Venice</SPAN>,’ they think
1960s Las Vegas, a high-powered Manhattan stock brokerage, or an 18th-century
Georgia slave plantation, but I think it's high time to shake things up a bit,"
Hiles said.</FONT></FONT></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="BACKGROUND: white; MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style='FONT-FAMILY: ; COLOR: ; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"'><FONT
color=#222222 face=Georgia></FONT></SPAN> </P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="BACKGROUND: white; MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><FONT
face=Georgia><SPAN
style='FONT-FAMILY: ; COLOR: ; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"'><FONT
color=#222222>Despite Great Lakes Theater’s propensity for re-envisioning
classic works, it too has gone the risky route of staging the theater version of
</FONT></SPAN><SPAN
style='FONT-FAMILY: ; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"'>Jane Austen’s
novel “Pride and Prejudice” in the time, place and spirit in which it was penned
and published over 200 years ago.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes">
</SPAN><SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN></SPAN></FONT></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="BACKGROUND: white; MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style='FONT-FAMILY: ; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"'><FONT
face=Georgia></FONT></SPAN> </P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="BACKGROUND: white; MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style='FONT-FAMILY: ; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"'><FONT
face=Georgia>In the playbill, director/co-adapter Joseph Hanreddy calls “Pride
and Prejudice” a “perfectly written novel” and treats it as a sacred text for
this production.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>His and J.R.
Sullivan’s script works hard at maintaining the work’s narrative voice and calls
for fairly bare-boned staging so as not to detract from Austen’s precise
prose.</FONT></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style='COLOR: ; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-family: calibri'></SPAN> </P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><FONT face=Georgia><SPAN
style='FONT-FAMILY: ; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-family: arial'>The
show’s austerity</SPAN><SPAN style="FONT-FAMILY: "> may not be to everyone’s
liking and, as </SPAN><SPAN
style='FONT-FAMILY: ; COLOR: ; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"'><FONT
color=#222222>Morristown Community Players director Kevin Hiles learned,
“audiences may be taken aback initially by the lack of Creole accents.” But Jane
Austen fans will likely be delighted by this
production.</FONT></SPAN></FONT></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><FONT face=Georgia><SPAN
style='FONT-FAMILY: ; COLOR: ; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"'></SPAN></FONT> </P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="BACKGROUND: white; MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><FONT
face=Georgia><I style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal"><SPAN
style='BORDER-TOP: windowtext 1pt; FONT-FAMILY: ; BORDER-RIGHT: windowtext 1pt; BORDER-BOTTOM: windowtext 1pt; COLOR: ; PADDING-BOTTOM: 0in; PADDING-TOP: 0in; PADDING-LEFT: 0in; BORDER-LEFT: windowtext 1pt; PADDING-RIGHT: 0in; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-family: arial; mso-border-alt: none windowtext 0in'>For
more of this article, go to </SPAN></I><SPAN
style='FONT-FAMILY: ; COLOR: ; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"'><FONT
color=#0000ff>www.clevelandjewishnews.com/columnists/bob_abelman/</FONT></SPAN></FONT></P></DIV></DIV></BODY></HTML>