Flower Mound Performing Arts Theatre opens Love Letters for this weekend only

by Shawn Parikh

Tons of the theater companies around town are getting all lubby-dubby for Valentine's Day, and Flower Mound Performing Arts Theatre is joining the mood by presenting Love Letters for one weekend only, from February 12-15. Purchase tickets online or by calling 972-724-2147.

The "Valentine treat for the young at heart" is written by A. R. Gurney. Andrew Makepeace Ladd III, played by Grant James and Melissa Gardner played by Sylvia Luedtke, both born to wealth and position, are childhood friends whose lifelong correspondence begins with birthday party thank-you notes and summer camp postcards. Romantically attached, they continue to exchange letters through their college years and as they marry and raise families, build careers and lives of success and achievement.

Love Letters also kicks off FMPAT's 17th season where tickets are already available for purchase online. Here is the lineup:

• Channel Surfin': A Night of Live TV from April 30 – May 9, 2009. All youth production co-presented by FMPAT’s Young Artist Training Program. An evening of live television! Presented by the students of the Young Artist Training program, Channel' Surfin' is a fun original musical in classic variety show format. Actors poke fun at the wide array of your favorite tv shows. Tune in.
• Greater Tuna from May 28 – June 7, 2009. By Jaston Williams, Joe Sears, and Ed Howard. What do Arles Struvie, Thurston Wheelis, Aunt Pearl, Petey Fisk, Phineas Blye and Rev. Spikes have in common? In this hilarious send-up of small town morals and mores, they are all among the upstanding citizens of Tuna, Texas' third smallest town. The long-running Off Broadway hit features two actors creating the entire population of Tuna in a tour de farce of quick change artistry, changing costumes and characterizations faster than a jack rabbit runs from a coyote. Two actors, twenty characters and a barrell of laughs, ya'll.
• Into the Woods July 9 – 18, 2009. Book by James Lapine, Lyrics and Music by Stephen Sondheim. All-youth production co-presented by FMPAT’s Young Artist Training Program. An ambivalent Cinderella? A blood-thirsty Little Red Ridinghood? A Prince Charming with a roving eye? A Witch...who raps? They're all among the cockeyed characters in James Lapine and Stephen Sondheim's fractured fairy tale. When a Baker and his Wife learn they've been cursed with childlessness by the Witch next door, they embark on a quest for the special objects required to break the spell, swindling, lying to and stealing from Cinderella, Little Red, Rapunzel and Jack (the one who climbed the beanstalk). Everyone's wish is granted at the end of Act One, but the consequences of their actions return to haunt them later, with disastrous results. What begins a lively irreverent fantasy in the style of “The Princess Bride” becomes a moving lesson about community responsibility and the stories we tell our children.
• Ruthless! The Musical from September 17 – 27, 2009. Book and Lyrics by Joel Paley, Music by Marvin Laird. Eight year old Tina Denmark knows she was born to play Pippi Longstocking and she will do anything to win the part in her school musical. Anything includes murdering the leading lady! This aggressively outrageous musical hit garnered rave reviews during its long Off-Broadway run which opened with Britney Spears as understudy for the title role.