Pictured: David Catlin

Lookingglass Theatre Company has announced the complete cast and creatives for the return of the HARD TIMES, adapted and directed by Artistic Director and Ensemble Member Heidi Stillman from the book by Charles Dickens and in association with The Actors Gymnasium.

The production features Ensemble Members David Catlin (Mr. Sleary/Stephen Blackpool), Raymond Fox (Thomas Gradgrind/Slackbridge) and Louise Lamson (Rachel, Oct. 4 – Dec. 17) and Artistic Associates Atra Asdou (Rachel, Dec. 19 – Jan. 14) and Troy West (Josiah Bounderby), with Audrey Anderson (Sissy Jupe), Amy J. Carle (Mrs. Sparsit), Raphael Cruz (Bitzer), Cordelia Dewdney (Louisa Gradgrind), Marilyn Dodds Frank (Mrs. Pegler), Nathan Hosner (Harthouse) and JJ Phillips (Tom Gradgrind).

The creative team includes Ensemble Members Daniel Ostling (returning scenic designer) and Mara Blumenfeld (returning costume designer), Artistic Associates Brian Sidney Bembridge (returning lighting designer), Andre Pluess (returning sound designer and original composition) and Sylvia Hernandez-DiStasi (returning circus choreography) with Amanda Herrmann (props design), Isaac Schoepp (rigging) and Eva Breneman (dialect coach). The stage manager is Jeri Frederickson.

A Dickensian carnival of characters inhabits the streets of smoke-choked Coketown: grim Mr. Gradgrind’s school churns out joyless students; poor Stephen Blackpool toils in the nearby mines; and mill-owner Mr. Bounderby, full of bluster and bombast, presides over it all. Only when a traveling circus alights nearby, and young orphan Sissy Jupe enters their world, does a ray of hope shine through.

HARD TIMES runs October 4, 2017 – January 14, 2018, at Lookingglass Theatre Company, located inside Chicago’s historic Water Tower Water Works, 821 N. Michigan Ave. at Pearson. For more information visit lookingglasstheatre.org.