‘Do I Hear a Waltz?’ Added to Pasadena Playhouse Schedule

The Pasadena Playhouse will open its summer-fall 2001 season in July with a revival of “Do I Hear a Waltz?” With music by Richard Rodgers, lyrics by Stephen Sondheim and book by Arthur Laurents, the 1965 musical about a lonely schoolteacher seeking romance in Italy, is a rare collaboration among three theater world giants.

Also on the boards is the world premiere of “Now You See It” by award-winning suspense writer Richard Matheson (“What Dreams May Come,” “Somewhere in Time”) and a family-oriented production, as yet unnamed, to be mounted at holiday time.

“Do I Hear a Waltz?” will be directed by David Lee, executive producer-creator-director of TV’s “Frasier,” who met Pasadena Playhouse artistic director Sheldon Epps in the mid-1990s. Interested in breaking into TV, Epps was observing on the set of “Wings,” another Lee show, and went on to direct episodes of “Frasier.”

Last year, Lee was brought in to direct the Pasadena Playhouse production of the Moss Hart comedy “Light Up the Sky”--a welcome return to his theater roots, he says. He’s always wanted to tackle “Do I Hear a Waltz?”--a play that left a “bad taste” in the mouths of its creators, he says, but deserves another look.

“This is a simple, charming piece that sat around for 35 years--an asterisk on everyone’s resume,” Lee says. “Sondheim and Laurents recently revisited the material for a New Jersey production, and that’s the version we hope to be doing.”

The play joins the Alan Ayckbourn comedy “How the Other Half Loves,” Christopher Hampton’s Broadway hit “Les Liaisons Dangereuses” and Warren Leigh’s “Side Man” the 1999 Tony Award for best play, already scheduled for the season.

“I want each season to be like dining at six really good restaurants--sampling meals with different spices and flavors,” says Epps, who has been with the playhouse for 3 1/2 years. “We’ve had an artistic renaissance at the theater that has returned us to a place of respect.”