GEORGE STREET PRESENTS "I LOVED, I LOST, I MADE SPAGHETTI"

(New Brunswick, NJ) -- George Street Playhouse is always on the lookout for new plays that engage the mind and touch the heart. The next play up on the New Brunswick theatre's schedule will also engage the sense of taste as well, as I Loved, I Lost, I Made Spaghetti plays at George Street beginning March 11. Adapted by Jacques LeMarre from Giulia Melucci's memoir of the same name, the play stars Antoinette LaVecchia recounting stories of life and love - all the while preparing a three-course Italian meal, which is served to a few lucky audience members seated on stage.


I Loved, I Lost, I Made Spaghetti begins cooking on the New Brunswick stage, March 11 and runs through April 6. Opening night is set for Friday, March 14. Tickets, beginning at $20, are now available through the George Street Playhouse Box Office 732-246-7717 or online at www.GSPonline.org . A limited number of onstage seats are also available on a first-come-first-served basis from $74-$102 (price varies based on performance); on-stage seating includes being served the three-course meal (antipasto, pasta and dessert) with wine. George Street Playhouse is located at 9 Livingston Avenue in the center of New Brunswick's vibrant downtown, steps away from myriad restaurants for every palate and pocketbook. Visit the Playhouse website, www.GSPonline.org to help plan your visit.
The world (or rather, the kitchen) of the play is being created by scenic designer John Coyne; costume designer Alejo Vietti; lighting designer John Lasiter and sound design by Jacques Lemarre.

I Loved, I Lost, I Made Spaghetti follows the romantic misadventures and culinary triumphs of Giulia Melucci. In this one-woman show, audiences are treated to tales of good food and bad boyfriends. Giulia is a single New Yorker who really knows how to deliver in the one room where it counts - the kitchen. Publishing pro by day and domestic diva by night, she knows how to whip up mouth-watering Italian cuisine. Unfortunately, her prowess with pasta is not matched by her taste in men. Featuring a complete meal prepared onstage and served to a few lucky ticket-holders, this heartwarming hilarious cook-in answers the question, "Is the cure for a broken heart...pasta?"


ANTOINETTE LaVECCHIA Broadway: A View From The Bridge (Cort). Off Broadway: A World Apart (The Flea); How To Be A Good Italian Daughter (in spite of myself) (Cherry Lane); The Bottle House (The Public Theater); Puccini: A Composer's Journey (Carnegie Hall); String of Pearls (Primary Stages); Magic Hands Freddy (Soho Playhouse); Kimberly Akimbo (Manhattan Theater Club); The Sweepers (Urban Stages); The Tempest (Lincoln Center Institute). Regional: Kimberly Akimbo, Laramie Project(Hartford TheaterWorks - CT Critics Circle Award)You Say Tomato, I Say Shut Up! (National Tour); Superior Donuts (Pittsburgh Public Theater); Heartbreak House (Two River); Comedy of Errors (Shakespeare on the Sound); The Little Dog Laughed (Portland Center Stage); Tough Titty (Williamstown); On The Razzle (Wilma). Film / TV: Lily of the Feast (short), The Face (short), The David Dance, Delirious, Jesus' Son, The Sopranos, Law and Order, Law and Order: SVU, Guiding Light, One Life To Live. Education: MFA, NYU; Moscow Art Theater. Awards: Fox Fellowship, Anna Sosenko Assist Trust Grant and Drama League Directing Fellowship. Teaching: NYU Graduate Acting, The Actor's Center. Antoinette is currently preparing her second original piece, Village Stories, about the small Italian village in which she was born.

JACQUES LAMARRE (Playwright) Writing: Jacques Lamarre Has Gone Too Far (Hole in the Wall Theatre), Gray Matters (Emerson Theatre Collaborative, Midtown International Theatre Festival), Stool (New Works New Britain, New York 15-minute Play Festival finalist), The Family Plan (libretto for short opera by Phillip Martin, Hartford Opera Theatre), Rapunzel and The Pied Piper of Hamelin (American Stage Festival). Co-writer for international drag diva Varla Jean Merman's touring comedy shows including Girl with a Pearl Necklace, I'm Not Paying for This, Anatomically Incorrect, Victory Lapdance, VJM Loves a Foreign Tongue, Varla Jean & The Mushroomheads, The Loose Chanteuse, The Book of Merman, and their 2012 collaboration, Topping Myself. Film / TV: co-writer for feature film Varla Jean & The Mushroomheads (Provincetown, New York, Seattle, Atlanta, Connecticut and San Francisco Frameline Festival selection); Fleet Enemas - two online commercials (Seriously. They are on YouTube). Theatre Administration: Sales, marketing and communications work for American Stage Festival, Hartford Stage, Yale Repertory Theatre/Yale School of Drama, and TheaterWorks. Jacques is currently the Director of Communications and Special Projects for The Mark Twain House & Museum and a theatre critic for the Manchester Journal-Inquirer and BroadwayWorld.com .

ROB RUGGIERO (Director) Is currently Producing Artistic Director at Hartford TheaterWorks, where he has directed more than forty productions including HIGH, Take Me Out, Lobby Hero, Rabbit Hole, and The Little Dog Laughed; he also conceived, developed and directed Ella (starring Tina Fabrique) playing regional theaters nationwide since 2005. Broadway: Looped (starring Valerie Harper in a Tony Award nominated performance); HIGH (starring Kathleen Turner). Off-Broadway: All Under Heaven (also starring Valerie Harper), as well as conceiving and directing the original musical revue Make Me a Song: The Music of William Finn (Drama Desk / Outer Critics Circle Nominations). Regional: Rob has been recognized nationally for directing both plays and musicals. His work has been seen at major regional theatres around the country, including: Arena Stage, Cincinnati Playhouse in the Park, The Guthrie Theater, The Pittsburgh Public Theater, and The Repertory Theatre of St. Louis. For Goodspeed Musicals, Rob directed 1776, Big River, Camelot, Annie Get Your Gun, Show Boat and Carousel.

GIULIA MELUCCI (Author) was born and raised in Brooklyn, New York where she still lives, but in a more fashionable neighborhood. She is the deputy director of public relations at Vanity Fair and has previously worked at Harper's Magazine, Spy Magazine, domino, Atlantic Monthly Press, Viking, Dutton and Scribner. She graduated from Sarah Lawrence College in 1988. I Loved, I Lost, I Made Spaghetti, her first book, has been published in Australia, Holland, Germany, Poland, Brazil, and Turkey, as well as in The United States.


Under the leadership of Artistic Director David Saint, George Street Playhouse has become a nationally recognized theatre, presenting an acclaimed mainstage season while providing an artistic home for established and emerging theatre artists. Founded in 1974, the Playhouse has been well represented by numerous productions both on and off-Broadway - recent productions include the Outer Critics' Circle Best Musical Award-winner The Toxic Avenger, the Outer Critics Circle, Drama Desk and Drama League nominated production of The Spitfire Grill and the recent Broadway hit and Tony and Pulitzer Prize winning play Proof by David Auburn, which was developed at GSP during the 1999 Next Stage Series of new plays. In addition to its mainstage season, GSP's Touring Theatre features four issue-oriented productions that are seen by more than 40,000 students annually. George Street Playhouse programming is made possible in part by funds from the New Jersey State Council on the Arts/Department of State, a partner agency of the National Endowment for the Arts. I Loved, I Lost, I Made Spaghetti is made possible in part through the generous support of The Karma Foundation.