Bob Ari: (Vince Lombardi) recently appeared at Cleveland Play House as Mark Rothko in Red, a role he reprised after a successful run at George Street Playhouse. Ari has acted on Broadway in Frost/Nixon (understudy Richard Nixon), The Constant Wife, Bells Are Ringing, and Laughter on the 23rd Floor. Off-Broadway appearances include The Late Christopher Bean, Die Mommie Die!, Jolson & Company, Picasso at the Lapin Agile, Baby Anger, and June Moon. He toured the United States in Frost/Nixon and toured Europe in West Side Story and Guys & Dolls. His many U.S. regional appearances include Pioneer Theatre Company in Dracula and 12 Angry Men; Fulton Theatre, Cat on a Hot Tin Roof; Olney Theatre Center, Witness for the Prosecution; Delaware Theatre Company, Born Yesterday and The Price; and Walnut Street Theatre, Hotel Suite and Art. Film and television includes Two Lovers, Wanted, Kissing Jessica Stein, Music of the Heart, Cradle Will Rock, Christmas Evil, Onion News Network, Delocated, The Good Wife, Law & Order, Law & Order: SVU, Cheers, and more. less recently appeared at Cleveland Play House as Mark Rothko in Red, a role he reprised after a successful run at George Street Playhouse. Ari has acted on Broadway in Frost/Nixon (understudy Richard Nixon), The Constant Wife, Bells Are Ringing, and Laughter on the 23rd Floor. Off-Broadway appearances include... more

Branton Box: (Paul Hornung) has extensive credits in both television and film including Private Practice, The Exes, 90210, NCIS, Chuck, Party Down, General Hospital, Charmed, The Bold and the Beautiful, She Spies, Austin Stories, 22, Bounty Killer, Going Greek, New Suit, L.A. Twister, and They Would Love You in France. He was recently cast to shoot films Hope’s Wish and Them That’s Got, which are both slated for production in early 2013. Box’s portrayal of Paul Hornung in Eric Simonson’s Lombardi at Cleveland Play House will be his stage debut. He is a native of south Texas. less has extensive credits in both television and film including Private Practice, The Exes, 90210, NCIS, Chuck, Party Down, General Hospital, Charmed, The Bold and the Beautiful, She Spies, Austin Stories, 22, Bounty Killer, Going Greek, New Suit, L.A. Twister, and They Would Love You in France. He was recently cast... more

Casey Stangl: (Director) is a Los Angeles based director of theatre, opera and television. Recent projects include Tony Kushner’s adaptation of The Illusion at A Noise Within; the West Coast premiere of Carson Kreitzer’s Slither for Chalk Repertory Theatre, performed at the Hollywood Forever Cemetery Masonic Lodge; The Car Plays for Moving Arts at La Jolla Playhouse; and the world premiere of a new adaptation with music of Noel Coward’s Peace in our Time at Antaeus Company (winner of the 2012 Los Angeles Weekly Best Production). Stangl works extensively with new plays, and her recent developmental work includes workshops of Samuel Hunter’s The Few for South Coast Repertory’s Pacific Playwrights’ Festival and the Perry-Mansfield New Works Festival; Mia McCullough’s Household Spirits at PlayPenn New Play Development Conference in Philadelphia; and Oedipus the Man, Kenneth Cavander’s adaptation of the entire Oedipus Cycle, at Antaeus Company. Nationally, Stangl’s work has been seen at South Coast Repertory, Actors Theatre of Louisville’s Humana Festival, Guthrie Theater, Denver Center Theatre Company, Woolly Mammoth Theatre Company, Portland Stage, Alabama Shakespeare Festival, Ensemble Studio Theatre Los Angeles, HERE Arts Center in New York, and many others. Opera credits include Music Academy of the West, Fort Worth Opera, Kentucky Opera, Portland Opera, Minnesota Opera Company, Pine Mountain Music Festival, Opera Omaha, Omaha Symphony, and Juilliard Opera Center in New York. Stangl was the founding artistic director of Eye of the Storm Theatre in Minneapolis – a company devoted to new work – for which she was named Minnesota Artist of the Year. less is a Los Angeles based director of theatre, opera and television. Recent projects include Tony Kushner’s adaptation of The Illusion at A Noise Within; the West Coast premiere of Carson Kreitzer’s Slither for Chalk Repertory Theatre, performed at the Hollywood Forever Cemetery Masonic Lodge; The Car Plays for Moving Arts... more

David Hardie: (Jim Taylor) is a graduate of the University of California Los Angeles (UCLA) Master of Fine Arts Acting program. Recent theatre credits include the role of Posthumous and Tybalt in the Orlando Shakespeare Theater productions of Cymbeline and Romeo and Juliet, and also the role of Bassanio in the Action Theater production of Merchant of Venice. Recent film credits include Nothing Special, written and directed by Angela Garcia Combs, and Sacred Whispers directed by Constantinos Isias. less is a graduate of the University of California Los Angeles (UCLA) Master of Fine Arts Acting program. Recent theatre credits include the role of Posthumous and Tybalt in the Orlando Shakespeare Theater productions of Cymbeline and Romeo and Juliet, and also the role of Bassanio in the Action Theater production of Merchant of... more

DeeDee Rescher: (Marie Lombardi) recently appeared onstage in Los Angeles in Prisoner of Second Avenue with Jason Alexander at El Portal Theatre; Shirley Valentine, Red Herring, Pursuit of Happiness, and Steve Martin’s The Underpants, The Laguna Playhouse; Everybody Say Cheese, Garry Marshall’s Falcon Theatre; and How the Other Half Loves, International City Theatre. Directly after traveling to Arizona Theatre Company with Lombardi, Rescher returns to California to reprise the role of Shirley Valentine at the Falcon Theatre. Television credits include a recurring role on ABC’s The Whole Truth with Rob Morrow and Maura Tierney; Disney’s Better with You, Good Luck Charlie, and Shout it Out; HBO’s The Comeback (with Lisa Kudrow); My Name is Earl; Malcolm in the Middle; Friends; Roseanne; and recurring roles on The Nanny and The King of Queens. Film credits include Skin Deep, Summer School, Once Bitten and the indelible lady bus driver in Ferris Bueller’s Day Off. Rescher has also lent her memorably husky voice to numerous animated films, cartoons and radio commercials. less recently appeared onstage in Los Angeles in Prisoner of Second Avenue with Jason Alexander at El Portal Theatre; Shirley Valentine, Red Herring, Pursuit of Happiness, and Steve Martin’s The Underpants, The Laguna Playhouse; Everybody Say Cheese, Garry Marshall’s Falcon Theatre; and How the Other Half Loves, International City Theatre. Directly... more

http://www.deedeerescher.com

Nick Mills: (Michael McCormick) recently appeared in the world premiere of Baby Talk at Ars Nova in New York, a multi-media one-man show that he created and performed. He was part of the original cast of Itamar Moses' Back Back Back at The Old Globe, as well as the Los Angeles premiere of How to Disappear Completely and Never be Found at The Theatre @ Boston Court. Next year he will be seen in the PBS film Admiral Rickover. Mills holds a Master of Fine Arts from the New York University Graduate Acting Program and a Bachelor of Fine Arts from the University of Evansville. less recently appeared in the world premiere of Baby Talk at Ars Nova in New York, a multi-media one-man show that he created and performed. He was part of the original cast of Itamar Moses' Back Back Back at The Old Globe, as well as the Los Angeles premiere of How to... more

http://www.nickmosesmills.com

William Oliver Watkins: (Dave Robinson) lives, works and plays in New York City. He has guest-starred on Robert De Niro's NY 22, Nurse Jackie, Law & Order: Prime, Law & Order: SVU, Rescue Me and Canterbury's Law. Recent stage credits include Ruined, Denver Center Theatre Company; BIOLIFE, Nuyorican Poetry Club; Snakeskin Suit and Nodding Off, The Ensemble Studio Theatre; Camp Logan, National Black Theater of Harlem; A Raisin in the Sun, Studio Arena; To Kill A Mockingbird, Great Plains Theatre; and Blues for an Alabama Sky, The Black Rep in St. Louis. He has trained with the legendary Wynn Handman, Margie Haber, Bob Krakower, and Tim Phillips. He holds a Bachelor of Fine Arts from Webster University, St. Louis.
less lives, works and plays in New York City. He has guest-starred on Robert De Niro's NY 22, Nurse Jackie, Law & Order: Prime, Law & Order: SVU, Rescue Me and Canterbury's Law. Recent stage credits include Ruined, Denver Center Theatre Company; BIOLIFE, Nuyorican Poetry Club; Snakeskin Suit and Nodding Off,... more

http://www.WilliamOliverWatkins.com

InsideCPH: Last season Cleveland Play House learned that our audiences and community are excited not only by the work on our stages, but by learning about how it gets there, too. This realization was the genesis of what’s become our new InsideCPH series. Our monthly InsideCPH events let you sit in on rehearsals, join exciting shop tours and designer demos, connect with CPH leaders and staff, and much more—all open to the public, and ALL FOR FREE! Already this season we’ve had four InsideCPH events. Bob Ari, star of Lombardi, led a group of over 40 people of all ages in a session titled “The Art and Craft of Acting with Bob Ari.” Attendees got hands-on experience in tools and techniques actors use to do their job, with an emphasis on the importance of ensemble. (check out some pictures on Facebook!)And last Sunday, 52 people braved the elements and came out for “The Whipping Man: Setting the Stage with Robert Mark Morgan.” We first had a conversation with Morgan, the show’s scenic designer, about the steps of his design process from the day he gets the job on through opening night. We then went into the Second Stage theatre to observe The Whipping Man cast’s first rehearsal on the set we’d just learned about, followed by a Q&A. (See photos below)The feedback from Sunday’s event has been terrific, too: “This program is the best incentive to open the joy of CPH to all ages”; “This event went beyond our expectations. Thank you!”; and “It was a great program and a learning process for everyone there. It was interesting watching the director change positions to make sure the stage is set for all to see and I loved hearing Robert's enthusiastic journey in creating the set design.” In fact, The Whipping Man has generated so much interest that we added two special events: a chance to attend the first rehearsal read-through and design presentations, and a chance to observe the cast and director at work in the rehearsal hall. If you missed these events, we still have many InsideCPH opportunities left this season (see below). All are open to the public, but you must RSVP to InsideCPH@clevelandplayhouse.com. Write us at that address if you have questions, as well. We’ll look forward to seeing you Inside CPH! -Corey Atkins UPCOMING INSIDE CPH EVENTSA CAROL FOR CLEVELAND “Adapting Cleveland” How does a 32 page novella like A Carol for Cleveland become a full-length play? Find out with this insightful discussion about writing and adaptation, with author Les Roberts and playwright Eric Coble. Saturday November 17th –11:00am-12:30pm BELL, BOOK AND CANDLE “Conjuring Costumes” They say that the clothes make the man (or woman!)—but how does a costume designer make the clothes? Explore all the aspects that a costume designer must consider when clothing character for the stage, with special guest designer presentation. The program will feature an exclusive tour of tour the CPH Costume Shop, as well. SAT 1/19—11:00am-12:30pm THE DEVIL’S MUSIC “Selling a Song”—In life you can sing a song, but on stage you have to sell it! Join guest artists and cast member from The Devil’s Music to find out how it’s done. MON 2/25—6:30-8:00pm GOOD PEOPLE “On Directing”—CPH Artistic Director Michael Bloom wrote the book on directing—literally. His Thinking Like a Director is one of the most popular directing resources available! Discover what it means to think like a director, then experience a special performance of our original Classroom Matinee touring production, Mike & Margie. Date TBD (SAT 3/23 or 3/30—4:00-6:00) *RICH GIRL/NEW GROUND THEATE FESTIVAL “How to Build a Play” Ever notice that “playwright” is spelled -ight not -ite? Just like a shipwright and other such artisans, playwrights skillfully build their work from scratch. Find out how to build a play—and what it takes to get it produced—in this exciting forum with Rich Girl playwright Victoria Stewart, and our 2012 Roe Green Award winner. Monday, 4/22—6:30-8:00pm less Last season Cleveland Play House learned that our audiences and community are excited not only by the work on our stages, but by learning about how it gets there, too. This realization was the genesis of what’s become our new InsideCPH series. Our monthly InsideCPH events let you sit in... more

Theatre Meets Football: It's rare that profesional sports and professional theatre coincide. Working on LOMBARDI gave us so many opportunities to do so - from promotional assistance and exhibit loans from the Pro Football Hall of Fame, to on-the-field access and brunch with VIPs from the Cleveland Browns, ending with meeting the real Green Bay Packers lineman Dave Robinson. Sports and arts can and do mix, in a community none of us had experienced before. Cleveland is an amazing city - we're diehard fans to both our sports teams and to our performing arts. Thank you for letting us exist in both those universes for 8 weeks!Meeting the real Dave Robinson was a great treat for the patrons and the cast on October 4. To hear tales from Dave about the real Vince Lombardi (he was MUCH tougher than depicted in the play...and it was true the players were family to Lombardi), the real Paul Hornung (who was quite a rascal and stories can't be posted here, haha!), was fantastic and surreal. Everyone came away with autographs, photos, handshakes, and a night they will never forget. less It's rare that profesional sports and professional theatre coincide. Working on LOMBARDI gave us so many opportunities to do so - from promotional assistance and exhibit loans from the Pro Football Hall of Fame, to on-the-field access and brunch with VIPs from the Cleveland Browns, ending with meeting the real... more

Keybank CPH College: Keybank Cleveland Play House College is now in full swing. We were very excited to have high school students, from all over Northeast Ohio, be introduced to the different leagues of the performing arts. On September 22, at a morning workshop here at CPH they created a league of their own. Right away, our students were thrown onto the field. Teaching artists Nina Domingue and Dr. Ellen Rooney revealed to the students the strategy of how to become a production team. They counted them off into two teams: the Cheesseheads and the Dawg Pound. The teams were asked to create two sidelines in a football game; the Cheesseheads who would cheer for the Green Bay Packers, and the Dawg Pound would cheer for the Cleveland Browns. The students got the ball rolling by chosing a director, two exciting mascot fans, with the rest of the team becoming motivational fans in the background. Students used different fabrics and feathers, and with the help of staples and glue, created outfits that were worthy to be on the field at real Browns and Packers games. The two teams formed their different sidelines, and then rehearsed a film sequence with them. The artists emphasized the different elements of production, like communication, conserving the voice and energy, establishing character, staying in the moment, creating high and lows, and taking directions. In the second half of the workshop, David Hardie who portrays (Jim Taylor in the Cleveland Play House production of Lombardi) stopped by CPH College to teach a master class to our students. He focused on natural readiness, being aware of one’s surroundings, and trusting the group. He then delivered a challenge to our students. They were split up into pairs and one student was asked to leave the room. The students who remained in the room were asked by Mr. Hardie to create an obstacle course for their fellow teammate to walk through. However, there was one criterion: that teammate would have their eyes closed and their partner would have to lead them through the course. During the activity, Mr. Hardie brought to the students’ attention the different components of acting, creating an objective and conquering obstacles. After the master class, the students were provided with lunch; afterwards, tickets were given to them to join their families to see Lombardi that afternoon. This whole day was free of charge for all our students. We are still taking applicants for the KeyBank Cleveland Play House College. Please contact us for more information on how to enroll your students. Call 216.400.7000 or email studentoutreach@clevelandplayhouse.com. less Keybank Cleveland Play House College is now in full swing. We were very excited to have high school students, from all over Northeast Ohio, be introduced to the different leagues of the performing arts. On September 22, at a morning workshop here at CPH they created a league of their... more

Common Threads: Lombardi & Good People: Taken alone, each play in CPH’s season is entertaining and vital, but fascinating connections emerge when you examine them together. The kind of pride and doggedness for which Vince Lombardi is known united the Packers and led them to greatness. But pride and unity can also create isolation and challenge. Margie Walsh, the protagonist of the Pulitzer prize-winning Good People, is another character who is deeply proud, though her pride has led her to a very different kind of life—that of a single mother who can’t keep a job, and whose disabled teenage daughter doesn’t know her father. Pride runs deep in Margie’s neighborhood, rough-and-tumble South Boston—or “Southie.” Michael Patrick MacDonald, author of All Souls: A Family Story from Southie says, “…there was also this attitude in the neighborhood that, you know, you didn’t need to go out into the bigger world, because we have it all, and that was kind of reinforced by not only the gangsters that ran the neighborhood, but their friends who are politicians…in the Massachusetts Senate, even.” less Taken alone, each play in CPH’s season is entertaining and vital, but fascinating connections emerge when you examine them together. The kind of pride and doggedness for which Vince Lombardi is known united the Packers and led them to greatness. But pride and unity can also create isolation... more

Pride and Prejudice and Pigskin: Football and Social Politics: “Player’s Association gots a plan now. No one’s going to be taken advantage of.” -Dave Robinson, Lombardi [This article is also available in the CPH Play Guide for Lombardi.  To view the full Play Guide, click the "related file" at the bottom of this post]The opposing team’s players aren’t the only thing tackled in Lombardi. The 50s and 60s were a time of great social and political change in the U.S., and football was taking on the issues, too. Read on to learn how perspectives on racial prejudice and players unions impacted the game—and American culture. Pay vs. Pride Labor unions, like the one Dave Robinson represents in the play, have been a prominent and often controversial feature of American life for more than a century, and began to evolve even earlier. From the Triangle Shirtwaist Company fire to Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker’s recent fight with public unions, differing views on what is ‘fair’ continue to shape our society. Throughout the early 19th century various unions were formed—from the Mechanics’ Trade Workers Union in 1827 Philadelphia to the somewhat shadowy Knights of Labor in 1869. Unions’ roots really began to take hold during the Industrial Revolution, which introduced a totally new way of life to America’s workers. Though productivity and manufacturing capabilities shot up, working conditions often failed to keep pace: long hours, hazardous working conditions, health risks, low pay, and child labor were all rampant. The American Federation of Labor, an alliance of craft unions, was one of the major forerunners of modern trade unions, and was established in Columbus, Ohio, in 1886. (It still exists as the ‘AFL’ in AFL-CIO.) The NFL Players Association, the labor union for NFL professional football players, was founded in 1956. It was initiated by two Cleveland Browns players, Abe Gibron and Dante Lavelli, to address concerns like league-wide minimum salaries, unpaid exhibition games, and assurance of continued pay for injured players. Lombardi was not in favor of the Players’ Union. When Packers player Jim Taylor approaches Lombardi about contract Pride and Prejudice and Pigskin: Football and Social Politics negotiations in the play, Lombardi says, “Pride! That’s what we play for! That’s what we used to play for when the game was a game and not a bunch of show business and reporters and all the rest of that malarkey!” Since the formation of the NFLPA, it has engaged in conflict with the team owners several times. The most recent was a 2011 lockout, which occurred for 18 weeks in the off-season when union members wanted better protections for retired players and improvements in safety, among other things, while the owners sought to extend the season to 18 games and change revenue sharing patterns. Both sides had to compromise to reach the agreement that allowed the 2011 season to proceed as planned. “One of the first things coach did when he came to Green Bay was let folks know that wherever any of his players are not welcome, all his players are not welcome.” -Dave Robinson, Lombardi Packer Green and Redskin White Lombardi said he saw his players as “neither black nor white, but Packer Green.” The same was not true for everyone in football. Modern professional football was integrated in 1946. Bill Willis, of the Cleveland Browns, is considered to be the first black starter in football. Marion Motley also played for the Browns that year. While most teams slowly made their way towards integration, Washington Redskins owner George Preston Marshall refused. He quipped, “We’ll start signing Negroes when the Harlem Globetrotters start signing whites.” In 1961, the Washington Redskins were the only professional team to never have had a black player. The Kennedy administration, elected on a procivil rights platform, was embarrassed that a segregated team represented the nation’s capital, and for the first time in history the federal government attempted to desegregate a professional sports team. In March of 1961, Secretary of the Interior Stewart L. Udall was informed that Redskins owner Marshall had recently signed a 30-year lease to play all home games, beginning October 1961, at the new D.C. Stadium—which was being built with public funds on land that was part of the National Capital Parks system. As the “residential landlord” of the parks area, the Interior Department could deny use of the stadium to any party practicing discriminatory hiring policies. Faced with this surprise ultimatum, Marshall countered, “Why Negroes particularly? Why not make us hire a player from any other race? ... Of course we have had players who played like girls, but never an actual girl player.” After reaching an agreement that let the Redskins play the 1961 season with an all-white team (a season which saw massive public protests and 17 straight games without a win), the Redskins had the first draft pick on Dec. 4. They selected Ernie Davis, the first black player to win the Heisman Trophy. In mid- December, Marshall divulged that he had secretly traded Davis to the Cleveland Browns, who wanted him to join the league’s leading rusher, Jim Brown, in their backfield. They had given the Redskins two black players: Bobby Mitchell, an established running back, and Leroy Jackson, a No. 1 draft choice. Several weeks later, the Redskins added another experienced African American athlete when they acquired offensive guard John Nisby from the Pittsburgh Steelers. Jackson rarely played, but Nisby and Mitchell became stars. Interestingly, professional football had been integrated prior to 1934, including Ohio teams. The Akron Pros were a professional team from 1908–1926. Fritz Pollard, the first African American head coach in the NFL, co-coached the Pros in 1921. Paul Robeson played for the team in 1921 as well. He was among the earliest stars of professional football, before winning acclaim as an actor and singer in such shows as Rogers and Hammerstein’s Showboat, where he introduced the song “Ol’ Man River” to the world. less “Player’s Association gots a plan now. No one’s going to be taken advantage of.” -Dave Robinson, Lombardi [This article is also available in the CPH Play Guide for Lombardi.  To view the full Play Guide, click the "related file" at the bottom of this post]The opposing... more

Lombardi Reading List: Our friends at the Cleveland Public Library have put together this excellent reading list for Lombardi fans.Check out the titles below and visit their website to view cover art and place a hold on any titles that interest you.  Happy reading!! Lombardi: A New American Play on Broadway by Eric Simonson based on the book When Pride Still Mattered: A Life of Vince Lombardi, written by David Maraniss Dramatists Play Service, c2011 When Pride Still Mattered: A Life of Vince Lombardi by David Maraniss Simon & Schuster, 1999 What It Takes to Be #1: Vince Lombardi on Leadership by Vince Lombardi, Jr. McGraw-Hill, 2001 American Sports Poems selected by R.R. Knudson & May Swenson Orchard Books, 1988 Lombardi: An Illustrated Life by Chris Havel Krause Publications, 2011 America's Game: The Epic Story of how Pro Football Captured a Nation by Michael MacCambridge Random House, 2004 Lombardi and Landry: How Two of Pro Football's Greatest Coaches Launched Their Legends and Changed the Game Forever by Ernie Palladino Skyhorse Publishing, 2011 Green Bay Packers: The Complete Illustrated History. 3rd ed by Don Gulbrandsen MVP Books, 2011 That First Season: How Vince Lombardi Took the Worst Team in the NFL and Set It on the Path to Glory by John Eisenberg Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2009 The Official Vince Lombardi Playbook: His Classic Plays & Strategies, Personal Photos & Mementos: Recollections from Friends & Former Players by Phil Barber; with a foreword by Vince Lombardi Jr. Lyons Press, c2009 Magnificent Seven: The Championship Games That Built the Lombardi Dynasty text by Bud Lea; foreword, Paul Horning; introduction, Bart Starr; afterword, Vince Lombardi, Jr. Triumph Books, c2002 Run to Daylight! by Vince Lombardi with W.C. Heinz; introduction by John Madden and Dave Anderson. Simon & Schuster, 1989, c1963 Giants: What I Learned About Life from Vince Lombardi and Tom Landry Pat Summerall and Michael Levin John Wiley & Sons, 2010 Football Skills & Drills by Tom Bass Human Kinetics, c2012 The Essential Vince Lombardi: Words and Wisdom to Motivate, Inspire, and Win by Vince Lombardi McGraw-Hill, c2003 Coach: A Season with Lombardiby Tom Dowling Norton, [1970] Lombardi by John Wiebusch Triumph Books, c1997, c1971 The Pro Football Hall of Fame 50th Anniversary Book: Where Greatness Lives edited by Joe Horrigan and John Thorn Grand Central Pub., c2012 Vince: A Personal Biography of Vince Lombardi by O'Brien, Michael Morrow, 1987 Complete Conditioning for Footballby Pat Ivey & Josh Stoner Human Kinetics, c2012 Lombardi and Me: Players, Coaches, and Colleagues Talk About the Man and the Myth by Paul Hornung Triumph Books, 2006 Vince Lombardi on Football edited by George L. Flynn; introduction by Red Smith Van Nostrand Reinhold Co., 1981, c1973 Run to Win: Vince Lombardi on Coaching and Leadership by Donald T. Phillips St. Martin's Press, 2001 Motion: American Sports Poems by Noah Blaustein University of Iowa Press, 2001 less Our friends at the Cleveland Public Library have put together this excellent reading list for Lombardi fans.Check out the titles below and visit their website to view cover art and place a hold on any titles that interest you.  Happy reading!! Lombardi:... more

Paul Brown: The Father of Football: [This article is also available in the CPH Play Guide for Lombardi.  To view the full Play Guide, click the "related file" at the bottom of this post]The Packers wouldn’t be The Packers if it weren’t for Vince Lombardi, but football wouldn’t be football as we know it if it weren’t for Cleveland’s own Paul Brown. In fact, Lombardi might not be Lombardi if it weren’t for Brown! (More on that later.) From training techniques, to the invention of new equipment, to advances in equality on the field and off, our own Cleveland Browns namesake was, as coach Bill Walsh once said, “the father of the modern game of football.” Paul Brown was born in 1908 and raised in Massillon, Ohio. Like Lombardi, he was the son of working class parents who instilled in their son the importance of hard work and perseverance. Also like Lombardi, he was not initially successful in football. As a young man, Lombardi’s small stature and poor eyesight kept him off his high school team—but he became the 5’8”, 180 lb. right guard in Fordham’s famed “Seven Blocks of Granite.” Likewise, Paul Brown’s slight, 150 lb. frame made him an unlikely candidate for Massillon Washington High School’s team—but the coach was impressed with his determination and by junior year Brown was the starting quarterback. He wasn’t as fortunate as a freshman at Ohio State, where he didn’t even make it past the Buckeyes’ tryouts. The tide turned when Brown transferred to Ohio’s Miami University. He again made starting quarterback, and guided the team to a 14-3 record in two seasons. It took Lombardi nearly 20 years to get a head coaching job; Brown’s ascent was quicker. Both Lombardi and Brown paid their dues as high school coaches, and as coaches (or in Lombardi’s case, assistant coach) at colleges and military training academies. During World War II, Navy Lieutenant Brown coached the Bluejacket football team at Great Lakes Naval Training Station outside Chicago. Around the same time, Arch Ward, influential sports editor of the Chicago Tribune, proposed a new eightteam league to compete with the NFL, called the All-American Football Conference. Just prior to the 1945 Bluejackets season, Ward visited Brown on behalf of the Cleveland franchise owner, “Mickey” McBride, to ask him to coach the new team. McBride offered $17,500 a year—more than any coach at any level—plus a stake in the team and a stipend while Brown finished his time with the military. The City of Cleveland was so excited about the coach that the new team was named for him—against his wishes—by popular demand! While McBride certainly knew the quality of coach he was hiring, he couldn’t have known the extent to which Brown would change the game itself. Brown’s innovations include: • First head coach to give his prospective players intelligence tests. • First to integrate pro football, two years prior to Branch Rickey and Jackie Robinson in baseball. • First professional coach to have players undergo classroom instruction, and to use film study. • Invented the first helmet with a facemask.• Created the first “practice squad,” then called the “taxi squad.” (Browns owner McBride also ran a cab company. Players who didn’t make the final roster cut, but might fill in for injuries, drove cabs!) On top of all of these major changes to football, Brown is also owed credit for the opportunity that made Lombardi a legend. When coach Scooter McLean was fired following a one-win season in 1958, Green Bay ownership phoned the now-legendary coach of the Browns looking for recommendations. Brown gave them the name of the offensive assistant who got the Giants to run to daylight: Vincent Thomas Lombardi. less [This article is also available in the CPH Play Guide for Lombardi.  To view the full Play Guide, click the "related file" at the bottom of this post]The Packers wouldn’t be The Packers if it weren’t for Vince Lombardi, but football wouldn’t be football as we know it... more

How a Leader is Made: “Leaders are made, they are not born. They are made by hard effort, which is the price which all of us must pay to achieve any goal that is worthwhile.” –Vince Lombardi [This article is also available in the CPH Play Guide for Lombardi.  To view the full Play Guide, click the "related file" at the bottom of this post]Cleveland Play House’s 2012-13 season is full of legends and icons—Vince Lombardi, Janis Joplin, Bessie Smith, even the Suze Orman-esque financial guru at the center of Rich Girl. With people like these, it’s easy to forget that they weren’t always the famous figures we now perceive them to be. This couldn’t be more true than with the great Vince Lombardi, who struggled for nearly twenty years to get to the position that secured his place in the starting line-up of ‘football’s greatest.’ Lombardi developed his personal playbook of hard work and discipline early. Born to Italian immigrants in Brooklyn, New York in 1913, Lombardi was raised in a devoutly Catholic household; in his late teens he planned to become a priest. Instead, he accepted a football scholarship to Fordham University in the Bronx, where he overcame small size to become famous as one of the team’s “Seven Blocks of Granite.” After college he began teaching physics and Latin at St. Cecilia’s High School in Englewood, New Jersey, while also working his way from assistant to head football coach. (It was during this time, in 1940, that he married Marie Planitz.) After 8 years there, he began a series of career moves: first at his alma mater back in the Bronx, then two years as an assistant coach to the great Red Blaik at West Point, and finally his first pro position, as offensive coordinator for the New York Giants, in 1954. Then one day in 1959, Vince Lombardi got a life-changing call from Wisconsin. The challenges of being married to a man who is married to football took their toll on his wife, Marie, who was known to drink heavily. In the Lombardi biography When Pride Still Mattered (on which playwright Eric Simonson based his Lombardi script), author David Maraniss writes, “[Lombardi] seemed preoccupied with football even on their honeymoon, and cut it short to get back to Englewood.” Lombardi was often frustrated during his nearly twenty years as a perpetual assistant. As a man known for a vicious bark—and equally fearsome bite—it may be surprising that Lombardi’s Catholic faith and Jesuit philosophy of “freedom through discipline” are what he often credits with his success. “I derived my strength from daily mass and communion,” he said. Of course, Lombardi’s determination to overcome obstacles became a hallmark of his coaching style with Green Bay, where his players knew him not only for his fiery temper but for his commitment to discipline, teamwork, and excellence. In 1959 Lombardi took over a team that had just had the worst season in Packers history, winning only one game, and led them on to win the NFL championships just two years later, in 1961 and 1962—and then three more years in a row in ’65, ’66, and ’67. He died unexpectedly from intestinal cancer in 1970 at the age of 57. In honor of the man—a coach whose team won the very first Super Bowl—the Super Bowl trophy was named after him. It seems a fitting tribute that Lombardi’s name is attached to the ongoing recognition of hard work and discipline in football’s biggest game. less “Leaders are made, they are not born. They are made by hard effort, which is the price which all of us must pay to achieve any goal that is worthwhile.” –Vince Lombardi [This article is also available in the CPH Play Guide for Lombardi.  To view... more

Play Guide - Lombardi: Click on the related files link below to view the Play Guide!Vince Lombardi had a playbook, and the information it contained was vital to his team being able to work together and make the most of every game. At CPH, we think our Play Guide is very much the same! Play Guides like this one, for every show in our season, will be available on-line the first week in September, and can help you get the most out of every CPH production.These guides offer fun and fascinating insight into the world of the play, unique perspectives connecting our community and its citizens to the work on our stages, and behind-the-scenes looks at the people who make that work happen. Unlike Lombardi’s playbook, we actually WANT to share ours, and we hope you’ll read them, print them and pass them along to friends and family. In this Lombardi Play Guide you’ll learn about the surprising—and surprisingly long—path that brought Lombardi to Green Bay, and the Cleveland connection that got him there. You’ll also get to hear about the woman leading the Lombardi cast to victory in our new, recurring InsideCPH feature, how you can play your part in helping make our work happen with our new CONNECTORS program, and even why you might have a hard time finding guacamole the Monday after the Super Bowl! We hope you enjoy the Play Guide—it ‘kicks off’ what’s sure to be another winning season for CPH.Click on the related files link below to view the Play Guide! less Click on the related files link below to view the Play Guide!Vince Lombardi had a playbook, and the information it contained was vital to his team being able to work together and make the... more

A Huddle with the Director: CPH: Was there anything that surprised you about this play? CS: I think one surprise is that it’s a play about more than football. If you are a football person, there is a lot of pleasure, but if you’re not a football person, there is so much in the family dynamics and the relationships… I think it’s really about that sense of how we relate to the people that are close to us, in our best and in our worst times. It’s very universal in that sense. It’s a play about fathers and sons, which sounds strange because it’s about this football icon, and I think people think of it as a ‘football play.’ There’s also quite a lot of humor in the play, particularly with the wife character. Not a lot is known about her and so I think that’s something that will be fun, to get to know her a little more.   CPH: Are you a sports fan? What kind of preparation are you doing to direct Lombardi? CS: I am a sports fan. I’m a football fan, and I’m also a big baseball fan. From a prep standpoint, I’m doing a ton of reading. There’s a lot of good stuff out there—there’s a biography of Lombardi that was written by David Maraniss [When Pride Still Mattered] that the playwright, Eric Simonson, really used as his main resource. There’s a wonderful documentary that Eric turned me onto, from 1965, called Run to Daylight, which was also the title of Lombardi’s book that he wrote with another guy. It’s basically training camp, and it’s not a great piece of filmmaking (laughs), but it’s a fantastic resource—just to see him in terms of his physicality, talking to the players, parts of some of his speeches. Some of that text is verbatim in the play. There’s also a maybe ten-second clip of Marie Lombardi, his wife, which, according to the playwright, is the only piece of footage of her that he was able to find.   CPH: Why do you think Lombardi has remained so iconic? CS: You know, the public is always interested in that last-place-to-first-place thing, and he was able to do that literally in the course of a year, using methodology that he had developed through his mentors and teachers for many, many years as a coach. He had wanted [a head coaching job] for years and years but had been passed over at various points in time. So he was very primed and ready, and he was also in an unusual situation in Green Bay where he was not just the coach but the general manager of the team. And even though he continued to foster that reputation of himself as, you know, “my way or the highway,” he actually was a little more canny then that. He would know when it was time to back off on somebody, or he knew which players could handle being called out in front of the rest of the team, and which ones really needed it privately. He was also a devout Catholic, and he was very much about those principles. So he was a kind of fascinating figure of contradictions in a way. But why he remains iconic—I really think it goes back to this idea of him feeling like a symbol of a more innocent time, and a point in history when our heroes still loomed large. And the other reality of it is he died before any of that could be tarnished.   EB: Do you and your design team have any early thoughts regarding the physical production? CS: The overall context for it is a football field. We’ll see images of a scoreboard, and a field, and stadium lights, and that sort of thing, which will place us in that world. But the play has a lot of locations. Even though it takes place in this one week in time, it does a lot of flashbacks. So a lot of projections will take us to places, and we’ll see some football footage as well. Another thing that we’re talking about is it being very automated. So platforms and tracks move in and out on their own steam—you know, we’re not seeing crew people pull them. The whole idea is that it looks a little bit like a well-executed football play. The technical elements moving in a giant power sweep, basically!   CPH: People often make a big deal out of a woman directing anything that’s typically considered “masculine”—like Katherine Bigelow and her war film The Hurt Locker. What do you think about that kind of scrutiny? CS: It’s one of the reasons why I was so delighted when they called me to do this, because, you know, it isn’t necessarily a “chick play,” you don’t immediately go, “Oh, well, we need a woman to direct this.” but anything that can help to redress the balance a little bit is a good thing! I do think that there is a sort of sense of when “women do work that’s like men that there’s a perceived kind of positive to that. I don’t really even know what that means, that idea of “writing like a man” or “directing like a man,” but I guess when something upends those kinds of expectations, that’s what people mean when they say that. I think it’s great that Michael Bloom is thinking about it, but for me (smiles), it’s just all about the work. less CPH: Was there anything that surprised you about this play? CS: I think one surprise is that it’s a play about more than football. If you are a football person, there is a lot of pleasure, but if you’re not a... more

Charlie Rose: An Interview with David Maraniss: October 4, 1999 - Charlie Rose interviewed Pulitzer Prize-winning author David Maraniss of The Washington Post about his book "When Pride Still Mattered", a biography of professional football coach Vince Lombardi. Playwright Eric Simonson later adapted this biography for the stage as LOMBARDI.Click here to listen to the interview, courtesy of the official web site of Charlie Rose. less October 4, 1999 - Charlie Rose interviewed Pulitzer Prize-winning author David Maraniss of The Washington Post about his book "When Pride Still Mattered", a biography of professional football coach Vince Lombardi. Playwright Eric Simonson later adapted this biography for the stage as LOMBARDI.Click here to... more

Paul Brown, 'The Father of Football':   The Packers wouldn’t be The Packers if it weren’t for Vince Lombardi, but football wouldn’t be football as we know it if it weren’t for Cleveland’s own Paul Brown. In fact, Lombardi might not be Lombardi if it weren’t for Brown! (More on that later.) From training techniques, to the invention of new equipment, to advances in equality on the field and off, our own Cleveland Browns namesake was, as coach Bill Walsh once said, “the father of the modern game of football.” Paul Brown was born in 1908 and raised in Massillon, Ohio. Like Lombardi, he was the son of working class parents who instilled in their son the importance of hard work and perseverance. Also like Lombardi, he was not initially successful in football. As a young man, Lombardi’s small stature and poor eyesight kept him off his high school team—but he became the 5’8”, 180 lb. right guard in Fordham’s famed “Seven Blocks of Granite.” Likewise, Paul Brown’s slight, 150 lb. frame made him an unlikely candidate for Massillon Washington High School’s team—but the coach was impressed with his determination and by junior year Brown was the starting quarterback. He wasn’t as fortunate as a freshman at Ohio State, where he didn’t even make it past the Buckeyes’ tryouts. The tide turned when Brown transferred to Ohio’s Miami University. He again made starting quarterback, and guided the team to a 14-3 record in two seasons.   It took Lombardi nearly 20 years to get a head coaching job; Brown’s ascent was quicker. Both Lombardi and Brown paid their dues as high school coaches, and as coaches (or in Lombardi’s case, assistant coach) at colleges and military training academies. During World War II, Navy Lieutenant Brown coached the Bluejacket football team at Great Lakes Naval Training Station outside Chicago. Around the same time, Arch Ward, influential sports editor of the Chicago Tribune, proposed a new eight-team league to compete with the NFL, called the All-American Football Conference. Just prior to the 1945 Bluejackets season, Ward visited Brown on behalf of the Cleveland franchise owner, “Mickey” McBride, to ask him to coach the new team. McBride offered $17,500 a year – more than any coach at any level – plus a stake in the team and a stipend while Brown finished his time with the military. The city of Cleveland was so excited about the coach that the new team was named for him—against his wishes—by popular demand!   While McBride certainly knew the quality of coach he was hiring, he couldn’t have known the extent to which Brown would change the game itself. Brown’s innovations include: -          First head coach to give his prospective players intelligence tests. -          First to integrate pro football, two years prior to Branch Rickey and Jackie Robinson in baseball. -          Invented the first helmet with a facemask. -          First professional coach to have players undergo classroom instruction, and to use film study. -          Created the first "practice squad," then called the “taxi squad.” (Browns owner McBride also ran a cab company. Players who didn’t make the final roster cut, but might fill in for injuries, drove cabs!)   On top of all of these major changes to football, Brown is also owed credit for the opportunity that made Lombardi a legend. When coach Scooter McLean was fired following a one-win season in 1958, Green Bay ownership phoned the now-legendary coach of the Browns looking for recommendations. Brown gave them the name of the offensive assistant who got the Giants to run to daylight: Vincent Thomas Lombardi.   In recognition of his incomparable achievements, Paul Brown was inducted into the Professional Football Hall of Fame in 1967. less   The Packers wouldn’t be The Packers if it weren’t for Vince Lombardi, but football wouldn’t be football as we know it if it weren’t for Cleveland’s own Paul Brown. In fact, Lombardi might not be Lombardi if it weren’t for Brown! (More on that later.) From... more

Eric Simonson on Writing the Lombardi Playbook : Playwright Eric Simonson spoke with Broadway World when LOMBARDI played in New York. In Wisconsin, where I grew up, it’s hard to get away from the “Lombardi mystique.” It’s in the ether there. I wasn’t old enough to watch Vince Lombardi coach, but I certainly knew his story, which was the Green Bay Packers' story, and I knew his sayings, which were plastered on locker-room and boardroom walls all over the state. When David Maraniss’ biography, When Pride Still Mattered, was published, I didn’t just read it, I devoured it. The book was a revelation—the first intelligent, thoughtful, and thorough biography of a man who, up until that point, had been presented to the public in two-dimensions. That was 1999. My interest in Vince Lombardi could fuel five plays. The man is a complex prism of attributes, desires, contradictions and flaws. I also thought, “What a great idea,” to put the story of Lombardi right smack dab in the middle of America’s entertainment crosshairs. The man is an American icon, a hero, perhaps a tragic hero—a tragic American hero. His story is our story and deserves to be told; to be heard, by everyone. I’ve always been interested in bringing theater to a cross-section of the public—and what better subject than a man who transcended age, time, race and class? My second full Lombardi play is a more story-driven rendering—less fractured and metaphysical, more chronological and dramatic. Not coincidentally, the play focuses not only on Lombardi the coach, but also Lombardi the family man. This was an effort to get to his human side, and show the blemishes in a man most people associate with perfection. The play also allows me the pleasure of letting my artistic side and my sports-loving side mingle and cross-pollinate. It’s a unique opportunity, and I don’t take it for granted. less Playwright Eric Simonson spoke with Broadway World when LOMBARDI played in New York. In Wisconsin, where I grew up, it’s hard to get away from the “Lombardi mystique.” It’s in the ether there. I wasn’t old enough to watch Vince Lombardi coach, but I certainly... more

Chasing Lombardi: Vince Lombardi is possibly the greatest football coach of all time. His ability to inspire his players led to the Green Bay Packers’ dynasty in the late 1960s. When reflecting on the greatest coaches ever in any sport, Lombardi always comes to mind. With the Cleveland Play House opening Lombardi on September 14, we started thinking about which of today’s NFL head coaches are the most like Lombardi. According to nfl.com, the current frontrunners are Tom Coughlin of the New York Giants and (dare I say it) Mike Tomlin of the Pittsburgh Steelers. Our pick? Bill Belichick. During his time with the New England Patriots, Belichick has appeared in 5 Super Bowls, which is tied for the second-most of all time. His career winning percentage of .639 ranks third in NFL history among coaches with at least 150 wins. Like Lombardi, Belichick doesn’t take any nonsense from his players; it’s his way or the highway. Both men even have signature outfits: Lombardi coached in a fedora and camel overcoat, while Belichick can be found on the sidelines wearing a Patriots hoodie with the sleeves cut off.  When his career is over, Belichick’s accomplishments may be the new standard by which great NFL coaches are evaluated. His considerable accomplishments have come through his exceptional personnel management and strategic genius. Having Tom Brady didn’t hurt, either. less Vince Lombardi is possibly the greatest football coach of all time. His ability to inspire his players led to the Green Bay Packers’ dynasty in the late 1960s. When reflecting on the greatest coaches ever in any sport, Lombardi always comes to mind. With the Cleveland Play House opening ... more