Austin Pendleton Directs VIVIEN LEIGH: THE LAST PRESS CONFERENCE, Now thru 7/9

Obie Award winning director Austin Pendleton is now joined by playwright Marcy Lafferty for talkbacks for Mississippi Mud Productions reprise of her stunning play, Vivien Leigh: THE LAST PRESS CONFERENCE, in New York, NY, tonight, July 6 and July 7, & 9, 2012 at the Alexander Technique Center For Performance And Development, 330 West 38th Street, Suite 805.

Acclaimed Actor/Director Austin Pendleton directs. The show returns for three summer night  performances after a successful limited run in NYC in March and touring regionally in Long Beach, NY, Key West, Fl., and Long Island's Gold Coast. Ms. Lafferty will join us for a talkback following the July 7^th performance. Mr. Pendleton joins us for a talkback following the July 9^th performance.Mr. Pendleton will also be joining Mississippi Mud for their Summer of Mud Mudraiser BBQ on July 1^st. More details on Vivien Leigh: The Last Press Conference and Mud's fundraiser can be found on www.mississippimudproductions.com.

Motion picture star Vivien Leigh takes questions from the press in what is actually a confrontation with Death in the summer of 1967 on everything from her dreams as a young actress in London, to impossibly landing her Academy Award winning role of Scarlett O'Hara, her love life in and out of her mentor, lover, and husband Sir Laurence Olivier's arms, on beauty, fame, destiny, Hollywood and aging, to funny, frank behind-the-scenes dishing on Gone with the Wind, A Streetcar Named Desire on stage and on film, horseplay with Marlon Brando, her affairs and sexual compulsions and their shattering effects on her marriage, her breakdown in India that led to her being flown back to Hollywood in a straightjacket, and her lifelong “companions” tuberculous and bipolar disorder that never made her lose faith in acting and love. A bold, funny, candid look at a courageous and charismatic star who continues to fascinate.

Jen Danby (Vivien Leigh) is founder, artistic director, and ensemble member of Mississippi Mud Productions, a New York City based theatre company. Select acting credits include Vivien Leigh in the New York revival of Orson’s Shadow by Austin Pendleton, Blanche in A Streetcar Named Desire (co-directors Austin Pendleton and Brian Lady), Maggie the Cat in an unfolding Mud Lab Cat on a Hot Tin Roof,Helena in Maria Irene Fornes’s Lust, Hedda in Hedda Gabler, Delfina Treadwell in Valparaiso, Maggie Brunswick in Birmingham Reunion,Belle in Stupid and Terrible, Melinda in the film True Hollywood Sitter and Ann in Run #3, and a fashion stylist opposite Susan Lucci in All My Children. Jen holds her BA in Drama from the University of Texas at Austin, her Master’s in Acting from CW Post, Long Island University, and her Ph.D. in Acting Studies from the City University of New York. She performed in three experimental vlogisodes with The Wooster Group, opposite Jim Fletcher (Gatz). She is the director of Mississippi Mud's educational wing. Representation: Ken Park Talent 212.566.8672 – kenparkmgmt@aol.com. Member AEA, SAG-AFTRA.

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