The smash comedy hit of the London and Broadway stages, this much-revived classic from the playwright of Private Lives offers up fussy, cantankerous novelist Charles Condomine, re-married but haunted (literally) by the ghost of his late first wife, the clever and insistent Elvira who is called up by a visiting “happy medium” one Madame Arcati. As the (worldly and un-) personalities clash, Charles’ current wife, Ruth, is accidentally killed, “passes over,” joins Elvira, and the two “blithe spirits” haunt the hapless Charles into perpetuity.
Long ago, near a little town in Calabria, Italy lived an old witch called Strega Nona “Grandma Witch.” She knew magic and loved to use it to help people. Big Anthony, Strega Nona’s helper, didn’t like to work, never paid attention and almost always got into trouble. Every Christmas Eve, Strega Nona made a big feast for all the people of Calabria with no magic at all because she says, “No magic at Christmastime. Christmas has a magic all its own.” After Big Anthony nearly ruined Christmas by another one of his goofs, it seemed like nothing but a miracle could save Strega Nona’s feast. But Christmas is a time for miracles … and wonderful surprises too.
This award-winning play, adapted into the Oscar-winning film Dangerous Liaisons, tells a chilling tale of love and revenge played as a high-stakes game of life and death. The Marquise de Merteuil is a powerful player in French aristocracy who manipulates the lives of others for sport. She challenges her former lover Valmont to prove his seductive powers, and an innocent bride-to-be and the virtuous Madame de Tourvel get caught in the middle. But while these aristocrats sabotage others’ hearts and reputations, their own prove to be even more fragile.
