Theatre

Footlight Players Announce “POTUS: Or Behind Every Great Dumbass Are Seven Women Trying To Keep Him Alive”

Published

1 year ago

August 29, 2023

UPDATE on 8/29/23 – Due to this performance’s popularity, the Footlight Players have extended the run for another weekend. They have added two more shows which will be held at 7:30 pm on both Friday, September 8th and Saturday, September 9th.

—Original Post Below—

A ‘gleefully filthy’ (NY Times) straight-from-Broadway comedy is set to kick off the Footlight Players’ 92nd season at the Queen Street Playhouse.

The show’s full title of POTUS: Or, Behind Every Great Dumbass are Seven Women Trying to Keep Him Alive, should give you an idea of the farcical nature of Selina Fillinger’s new show. The play’s seven characters are the women in an unnamed U.S. president’s inner circle. When the president commits a public relations disaster that snowballs into an international crisis, it’s up to those exasperated, beleaguered women to do damage control. As usual. Though the play is called POTUS, the president in question never actually appears on stage. Fillinger said in a New York Times article that this is because she didn’t want to give undeserved attention to the character of a man who abuses power, and focus fully on the women affected instead.

Originally produced on Broadway at the Schubert Theatre in April 2022, POTUS has its own special ties to Charleston as recent Tony Award-winning producer, and Charleston native, David Lynch (Parade) was part of the producing team of POTUS’s original Broadway run.

The comedy features seven incredible local Charleston actors taking on the diverse cast of characters from the FLOTUS (Ari Snowden) and Chief of Staff (Sam Smith) to the president’s mistress (Sarah Callahan Black) and the Press Secretary (Imani Lloyd) and more. POTUS makes its regional premiere at the Queen Street Playhouse beginning August 18th running through September 3rd.

POTUS isn’t the only play making its regional premiere in Footlight’s 92nd season. Cadillac Crew, another all female driven play which made its world premiere at Yale Rep. in 2019, will find its regional debut in March 2024 at the Queen Street Playhouse. The play takes place on the day of a much-anticipated speech by Rosa Parks during the height of the Civil Rights Movement, where four activists working in a Virginia civil rights office wonder whether the proclamation of equality amongst mankind includes women.

The Pulitzer Prize-winning drama Proof by David Auburn marks the third play in the season arriving on the QSP stage in February 2024. Footlight’s MainStage season will also include the musicals Andrew Lippa’s The Wild Party (Sept. 29 – Oct. 15), the FLP original musical A Very Merry Footlight Holiday Special (Dec. 8 – 22) and Urinetown: The Musical (April 2024).

Footlight’s second stage season known as Act Two, kicked off the season early this summer with the sold out run of Five Lesbians Eating A Quiche and will include annual favorite The Rocky Horror Experience and see the return of the one-woman holiday comedy Who’s Holiday.

Additionally, Footlight Players and Queen Street Playhouse will return for a second season with the ever popular Sunday Night Speakeasy series where the theatre lobby is transformed into a tiny speakeasy bar seating only 45 guests and featuring an eclectic lineup of vocalists and musicians. This season’s lineup incudes two-time Best of Charleston winning actress Madelyn Knight (August 6), R&B/soul artist Tonya Nicole (Oct. 20) and pianist and vocalist Manny Houston (Dec. 20th).

Tickets and further information on all shows can be found at footlightplayers.net or by calling the box office at 843.722.4487.