Why³ with Scott Edmiston

We asked all of our directors this season the question “why?” Here are the answers from the director of our upcoming show, The Little Foxes!

Why The Little Foxes?

“Lillian Hellman was America’s first great female playwright, a feminist pioneer, and a moral force. Her work deserves to be seen, celebrated, and reconsidered. And it’s just a damn good story.”

Why at The Lyric Stage?

“Lyric Stage audiences LOVE American classics. They GET them. They Lyric Stage has become the go-to place in Boston for new 21st-century versions of great 20th-century plays”

Why now?

The Little Foxes was written in 1939. It is a cautionary tale about the danger of allowing greedy, dishonest, self-serving businessmen to take over your country. Hmmm… I wonder if it will still be relevant today?”

More about Scott Edmiston:

Scott Edmiston (Director) returns to the Lyric Stage where he recently directed the award-winning productions of Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf? (2017 Elliot Norton Award) and My Fair Lady, (2016 Elliot Norton Award). Other Lyric stage credits: Light Up the Sky, Cat on a Hot Tin RoofWater by the Spoonful,Time Stands Still, My Name is Asher LevMiss WitherspoonThe Scene, Lobby Hero, and Private Lives. He has directed more than 60 Boston-area productions at SpeakEasy Stage, American Repertory Theatre, Huntington Theatre, and Underground Railway Theatre, among others. Highlights include Long Day’s Journey into Night, Constellations, Shakespeare in Love, The History Boys, Casa Valentina, The Light in the Piazza, Reckless, Five by Tenn, In the Next Room or the vibrator play, A Marvelous Party, and Betrayal. Six of his productions have received Elliot Norton Awards as Outstanding Production or Musical, and he has received four Norton Awards and three IRNE Awards for his direction. He is the recipient of the Distinguished Alumni Award from Penn State, the StageSource Theatre Hero Award, and the Norton Prize for Sustained Excellence in Theatre. He is the author of “Acting Misbegotten: The Creative Journey to Eugene O’Neill” published in the anthology Critical Insights: Eugene O’Neill (Salem Press, 2012). Scott is a Professor of the Practice and Chair of the Department of Theatre at Northeastern University.

More about The Little Foxes:

Lillian Hellman’s classic drama captures the riveting story of how a family’s vicious pursuit of financial success destroys the American Dream. In the post-Civil War South, Regina Giddens and her scheming brothers, Oscar and Ben, want to partner on a business deal to exploit the poor and increase their already substantial wealth. There is only one problem: Regina’s husband, Horace, refuses to give them the funds they need — setting in motion a vicious game of duplicitous dealings that ultimately leads to death. A timely story about corrosion of the soul and corruption of the heart.