The Production Company is proud to announce the opening of George Bernard Shaw’s surprisingly timely comedy Mrs. Warren’s Profession at The Chandler Studio Theatre in North Hollywood.

Outlawed and protested for many years in both Great Britain and The United States, the play is Shaw's controversial attack on society's hypocrisy.  Young Vivie Warren; emancipated, intelligent and self sufficient is astounded to learn her mother rose from poverty to riches through prostitution---and also that she is now owner and operator of a chain of brothels.  Mrs. Warren ably justifies her past---attacking a hypocritical society that rewards vice and oppresses virtue.  She tells Vivie that poverty and the society that fosters poverty are the real villains and that life in a brothel is preferable to life in a 19th century factory.  Vivie, respecting her mother's courage, accepts her past but cannot accept her continued association with the profession in question.  In a single-minded reaction, Vivie  cuts herself off from her mother and, rejecting all suitors, throws herself into the independent life of a career woman, leaving herself alone without a family.

When Pasadena Playhouse announced in 2007 that Mrs. Warren’s Profession would be included in their 2008 season, The Production Company’s Artistic Director August Viverito sadly dropped his plans to produce and direct Shaw’s brilliant comedy only to be overjoyed when ‘Mrs. Warren…” was replaced on that venerable theatre’s season.  Viverito then set out to find the ultimate actors for the play’s pivotal leading characters.   Enter Gillian Doyle and Joanna Strapp.   In the role of Mrs. Warren, Ms. Doyle’s impressive resume includes many star turns on the professional scene including Mark Taper Forum, Inside the Ford, Theatricum Botanicum, and numerous others.  Gillian has garnered numerous performance nominations and awards over her impressive career.   Newer to the scene and recently graduated from Carnegie-Mellon University, the challenging role of prudish daughter Vivie Warren is impressively inhabited by the brilliant Joanna Strapp whose credits already include Laguna Playhouse, Williamstown Theatre Festival, and the Edinburgh Fringe Festival.   Returning to The Production Company’s stage is young veteran actor Jeremy Lelliott who was seen as ‘Smike’ in The Production Company’s ‘Nicholas Nickleby’, as well as at The Shubert, The Chance and many others stages in and around the Los Angeles area.   In a final bit of casting good fortune, the three adult male character roles of Mr. Praed, Sir George Crofts, and Rev. Sam Gardner will be played by impressive L.A. actors TL Kolman, Skip Pipo, and Barry Saltzman, respectively.