COD College Theater Presents "The Dining Room" Feb. 24-March 13

College of DuPage (COD) College Theater opens 2022 with “The Dining Room,” by A.R. Gurney at the McAninch Arts Center (MAC) Studio Theater, Feb. 24-March 13. “‘The Dining Room’ serves a banquet of theatrical riches,” says the New York Daily News, Variety calls it, “a thoughtful and superbly written comedy,” and the New York Times hails it as “often funny and rueful and, by the end, very moving.” Co-chair of the COD Theater Department and Buffalo Theatre Ensemble Managing Artistic Director Connie Canaday Howard directs.

Covering seven decades of upper middle class family life in New England, beginning in the 1930s, “The Dining Room” features 18 vignettes are all set around a dining room table over breakfast or dinner and reflect a variety of special occasions. The 10 actors change roles, personalities and ages as they portray a wide variety of characters sharing a mosaic of stories with a range of compassionate humor and abundant humanity, demonstrating that change is inevitable. “The Dining Room” premiered at the Studio Theatre of Playwrights Horizons in January 1981 and was a finalist for the 1985 Pulitzer Prize for Drama.

“The emergence of the COVID pandemic threw lives around the world into a pattern of constant and unpredictable change,” says Canaday Howard. “We all were impelled to deal with each new change to the best of our ability but we also felt the need to maintain some semblance of normalcy. Gurney’s characters find themselves in a similar situation. As they see the world as they know disappearing, we see them coping — sometimes in amusing and sometimes in awkward ways — the best that they can.

The cast for “The Dining Room” features Dillon Connolly (Arthur, Architect, Billy, Tony, Guest); Elmeka Elme (Sally, Carolyn, Dora, Nancy, Meg, Guest); Luke Hernandez (Boy-Charlie, Grandfather, Fred, Gordon, Harvey, Host); Nicholas Ilo (Father, Michael, Brewster, Ben, David, Guest); Alyson Meyers (Girl, Peggy, Beth, Sarah, Bertha, Guest); Olivia Reamer (Mother, Aggie, Margery, Helen, Claire, Ruth); Monica Rosales (Annie, Grace, Winkie, Harriet, Emily, Annie);Chris Talia (Client, Psychiatrist, Nick, Stuart, Jim, Dick, Guest); Nicholas Washington (Howard, Ted, Paul, Chris, Standish, Guest) and Lilly Zuniga (Agent, Ellie, Sandra, Old Lady, Kate, Guest).

The design team for “The Dining Room” includes Connie Canaday Howard (director), Sabrina Zeidler (scenic and properties design), Kimberly G. Morris (costume and makeup design), Elias Morales (lighting design), Jon Gantt (production support) and Fisher Parsons (sound design). Christopher Yee is stage manager and a Second City John Belushi Scholar Recipient.

Gurney (1930-2017) was an academic, author and playwright. He wrote nearly 50 plays including “Sweet Sue,” which featured Mary Tyler Moore and Lynn Redgrave in the 1986-87 Broadway run; “Sylvia” which featured Sarah Jessica Parker, Blythe Danner and Charles Kimbrough in its 1995 off Broadway debut; and his Pulitzer Prize nominated plays “The Dining Room” and “Love Letters.” The Wall Street Journal has called his works "penetratingly witty studies of the WASP ascendancy in retreat.” “Most of my plays are very close to home,” Gurney told Playbill in 2010. “That was very much my family on stage.” Honors and awards include the PEN/Laura Pels International Foundation for Theater Award as a master American dramatist (2007) and the Lifetime Achievement Award at the 2016 Obie Awards.

COD College Theater’s presents “The Dining Room” by A.R. Gurney, directed by Connie Canaday Howard at the McAninch Arts Center’s Studio Theater, 425 Fawell Blvd. on the campus of College of DuPage, Feb. 24-March 13. Performances are 8 p.m. Thursday-Saturday and 3 p.m. Sunday. Tickets are $16 (adult) and $14 (student). There will also be a pre-show discussion with director and designers 6:45 p.m., Thursday, Feb. 24; and a post-show discussion with director, actors and crew Friday, March 4. Please note: This play uses adult language and themes. For tickets or more information, visit AtTheMAC.org or call the MAC Box Office at 630.942.4000.

Also note: MAC COVID-19 policies currently require masking and proof of COVID-19 vaccination or a negative test (regardless of age). For more information or protocol updates visit AtTheMAC.org.