Cape May Stage Presents ‘On the Couch’ with Nora Armani

CAPE MAY — Cape May Stage, South Jersey’s premier Equity theatre, is pleased to present an unforgettable evening with one of the world’s most intriguing international vagabonds!
Told through song and dance, the self-penned On the Couch with Nora Armani is a one-woman piece about identity, belonging, multiple cultural provenances and the coincidences that complete our journey of the quixotic. On the Couch with Nora Armani will play Fri., Sept. 17 at 8 pm at the Robert Shackleton Playhouse at the corner of Bank and Lafayette Streets in downtown Cape May.
Tired of being told by casting directors that she’s either “too ethnic” or “not ethnic enough”, the multi-talented Nora Armani took it upon herself to create her own one-woman show. Speaking to us from her couch, the unexpected appearance of a long-lost love causes her to deviate from the planned script and embark, instead, on an intensely personal look into her own past and hybrid culture.
Oscillating between humor and nostalgia – with moments of poignancy liberally interspersed – Armani recounts her intriguing personal story: her growing up in Nasser’s post-revolution Egypt, memories of the Bosporus and Istanbul, her travels to the Scottish Highlands, Alexandria and its port, and Hollywood and its follies. The story is sprinkled with stories passed from generation to generation, about her grandparents’ expulsion from Armenia by the Turks and pre-1915 Anatolian summers. At the center of this narrative is a woman painfully struggling to discern her place among the memories of her ancestry, her culture, and her troubled past.
Armani has performed the play on tour in Los Angeles, Chicago, Detroit, Philadelphia, Montreal, New York (Segal Theatre, CUNY, The Workshop Theatre) and Boston with a limited run in London, at the New End Theatre directed by François Kergourlay. She performed the French version Sur le divan avec Nora Armani as a première preview at Salle Cortot in Paris, and later throughout France, including performances for the Ambassadors of Armenia (now the Minister of Foreign Affairs) and Jordan. Other performances of the English version were presented at the October Gallery in London, the Poetry Café in Covent Garden, the London School of Economics and Goodenough College.
July 2004 marked the play’s New York debut, and in 2005 it was “back by popular demand” at the Workshop Theatre in Manhattan as part of the Midtown International Theatre Festival.
Born in Egypt of Armenian parents, Armani was educated in England and, after years spent in the United States, currently dividing her time between London and Paris, Nora Armani is the epitome of the word “transnational”. Her repertory includes Shakespeare, Shaw, Beckett, Hammerstein and Guitry while her own creations Sojourn at Ararat, Nannto, Nannto and On the Couch with Nora Armani have earned her extensive international tours and many accolades on four continents in over twenty cities.
Later this month, she will be going to Los Angeles to play an FBI agent in an independent production. Awards include Best Actress twice in Armenia (Stage and Screen) and two Drama-Logue awards in Los Angeles. www.noraarmani.com.
Tickets are $35 for adults, $30 for seniors, and $12.50 for students. Call (609) 884-1341 for reservations and information or visit the theatre’s website, www.capemaystage.com.