Auto-Da-Fé
by Tennessee Williams
directed by Jef Hall-Flavin
with Susan Grilli
starring Cristine McMurdo-Wallis
A TW Festival Production
Provincetown, MA
A French Quarter mother-son drama with a Dixieland band.
Eloi, over 30 and still living at home with his mother, has intercepted upsetting letters with unseemly photographs in the mail, and he will go to desperate lengths to keep his mother from seeing them.
In true Tennessee Williams style, this mother-son knot frays in a dramatic conclusion.
From just around the corner there's the persistent sound of music approaching – in this production it's a flamboyant pageant, accompanied by a live Dixieland band, with extraordinary costumes from New Orleans, courtesy of the Krewe of Armenius.
Cristine McMurdo-Wallis (left) is featured as Madame Duvenet in Auto-da-Fé. She has appeared on stages from coast to coast, playing leading ladies at well-known theaters such as Hartford Stage, Seattle Repertory, Huntington Theatre, Denver Center Theatre, Portland Stage Company, Southern Repertory Theatre, Oregon Shakespeare Festival and many others. She won awards for her roles in Angels in America at American Conservatory Theatre, directed by Mark Wing-Davey.
Ms. McMurdo-Wallis was also featured in films such as American Heart (with Jeff Bridges), as well as The Hand that Rocks the Cradle. She now makes her home in Baton Rouge, Louisiana.
Performed on the side porch of the Gifford House, Auto-Da-Fé is directed by Festival director Jef Hall-Flavin with live music from the Hot Tamale Brass Band. Festival audiences will remember dancing down Commercial Street with the Hot Tamales in the 2010 funeral procession of Stella Brooks.
This year's musical spectacle will involve dozens of performers from throughout Provincetown, directed by Counter Productions' own Susan Grilli, in a stunning finale to Tennessee Williams' dramatic Auto-da-Fé.
The Krewe of Armeinius was the subject of the documentary “The Sons of Tennessee Williams” shown for the first time outside of New Orleans by the Provincetown Tennessee Williams Festival in July of 2010.