Senior Austin Schwartz is bringing “The Office” to the Newman University campus, but with a twist. Guests of all ages can see it live on stage March 2-5 in the De Mattias Performance Hall.
“The Office, A Stage Adaption” will run 7:30 p.m. Thursday through Saturday, March 2-4, and 2 p.m. Sunday, March 5.
Tickets for “The Office, A Stage Adaption” can be purchased online or at the door for $10 for the general public; $5 for seniors, military, Newman faculty, staff and non-Newman students. Newman students get in free with their student I.D.
Based on the U.S. mockumentary sitcom television series, “The Office,” is set at a paper company in Scranton, Pennsylvania. The play captures fan-favorite scenes of the comedic, everyday work lives of office employees.
“The Office, A Stage Adaption” is spearheaded by Schwartz, a theater and English major. When asking himself “what’s something not only an audience would love but students would love to be involved in,” he came up with this project. It’s his first full-length production and he is looking forward to the feedback.
Schwartz says that he was taught a formula to help him with the legality of making shows his own. He must change every fourth line of exchange to be original and even added new pieces of comedy he wrote into the show. Schwartz is also allowed to change characters, costumes and have different set layouts.
The cast is large and everyone involved is Newman affiliated. Schwartz says that his performers really bring the characters to life and allow the audience to see their personal twists on the characters. Even alumni are stepping in and taking on smaller roles while students are mainly filling the more prominent roles.
“I also have wonderful support from Deanne Zogleman (instructor, director of music department) who is helping me with the set plan and Mark Mannette (associate professor and director of theater) who gave me the approval to take on this project,” Schwartz said.
Announcing the cast
Schwartz had artistic liberty to gender-bend characters as needed, but assures audience members that they will recognize many of the same personalities “The Office” that they already know and love.
Here is a list of the Newman cast for “The Office, A Stage Adaptation” production March 2-5:
- Michelle (Michael) Scott – Elizabeth Raehpour
- Dwight Schrute – John Suffield
- Jim Halpert – Alex Dehoet
- Pam Beesly – Emily Maddux
- Andy Bernard – Asher Khokhar
- Jan Levinson – Talia Powers
- Kelly Kapoor – Catherine Madison
- Stanley Hudson – Junior Kimfuema
- Kevin Malone – Corbin Molina
- Angela Martin – Minh Nguyen
- Oscar Martinez – Daniel Cubias
- Phyllis Vance – Hadassah Umbarger
- Meredith Palmer – Vanessa Parks
- Ryan Howard – Rebekah Lipinski
- Toby Flenderson – Austin Schwartz
- Creed Bratton – Brenden Schwartz
- CPR instructor – Ariel Johnson
Reserve your tickets today
Tickets for “The Office, A Stage Adaption” can be purchased online or at the door for $10 for the general public; $5 for seniors, Military, Newman faculty and staff as well as non-Newman students. Newman students get in free with their student I.D.
