Tony Award-Winning Comedy Comes to Dix Hills

The Dix Hills Performing Arts Center will present the multi-award winning Broadway mad-cap screwball comedy "Lend Me a Tenor," on Feb. 23, 24 and 25 at 7:30 p.m. and Sunday, Feb. 26 at 2 p.m.

Winner of three Tony awards, including Best Play, and four Drama Desk awards, including Best Director and Best Actor (David Bosco), "Lend Me A Tenor" is a hilarious comedy about the opera set in Cleveland in 1934.Tickets are $15 and $12 for seniors and students.

Written by Ken Ludwig, the play premiered in London’s West end in 1986, produced by Andrew Lloyd Weber and directed by David Gilmour. The play opened on Broadway in 1989, and has been translated into 16 languages and produced in 25 countries since then. A Broadway revival opened in 2010, staring Stanley Tucci. A subsequent musical version opened early last year in London, and ended its run last summer.

The play is a farcical romp, replete with fast-paced chases and hilarious twists and turns. The lead character, Saunders, general manager of the Cleveland Grand Opera Company, is primed to welcome world-famous performer Tito Morelli, a.k.a. “Il Stupendo,” the greatest tenor of his generation, scheduled to play one night only to benefit the opera company in the role of Othello. 

The star arrives late, and through a hilarious series of mishaps is given a double dose of tranquilizers and passes out. His pulse is so low that Saunders and his assistant Max believe he is dead. In a frantic attempt to salvage the evening, Saunders persuades Max to get into Morelli’s Othello costume, and fools the audience into believing he is Il Stupendo.

Max succeeds admirably, but Morelli comes to, and dons his other costume ready to perform. Theatrical mayhem ensues, as two Othellos try to play the role at once amid a series of mistaken identities, innuendo and physical comedy.

The production stars Five Towns College Theatrical students, and is being directed by Five Towns College Professor Jennifer Hart.