Covina Center For The Performing Arts

Download the 2008 Season Ticket Order Form

Because of our flexible seating plan, we will have the ability to utilize Equity Actors under the 99 Seat Equity Waiver Plan. Our loyal fans will appreciate that we have adopted a new “Every Seat is the Best in the House” guarantee.

In addition to Stage Arts Repertory productions, the Center’s performing arts calendar will include a “Celebrity Series” hosting professional name artists, “Cabaret in the Champion Circle” series, Saturday Movie Matinee Series, Art Exhibitions and serve as the primary performing center for local schools and community performing groups. The Center will also support local businesses with the ability to host conferences and seminars and a new Dinner Theatre program in which audiences can enjoy a prix fixe (fixed price) dinner at one of our fantastic local restaurants.

For information on the Educational Programs and Opportunities the Covina Center for the Performing Arts offer please click here.

Artists on the Board
Having performed in 16 shows, directed two
and been the Associate Artistic Director since
2000, Wendy Friedman is a familiar face to
audiences andperformers of the Covina Valley
Playhouse.

Wendy knew she had found a unique place to perform when in 1994 she fi rst was cast at
CVP as the self centered Chick Boyle in Crimes of the Heart. Then in 1995, while auditioning for the part of Vera in Mame, Wendy recognized a laugh in the dark. “I knew that melodious laugh,” she recalls, “But couldn’t quite place it.”

Associate Artistic
Director:
Wendy Friedman

That laugh belonged to Alex Nigian, the current Artistic Director of CCPA, and she had first heard it when auditioning for him at the previous home of CVP, in West Covina. “I was auditioning for Truvey in Crimes of the Heart. He offered me the chance to understudy the part, but no guaranteed performances. I thought, how dare he offer a graduate of UCLA, with a BA in Theatre an understudy without performances. I think my pomposity kept me from having a lot of fun and little did I know that I would eventually get to play that part, under his direction, over ten years later.”

That same year, almost on a dare, she accepted the role of Shirley Valentine in the one-woman play of the same name. “I had seen the movie, and knew the story line, but the challenge of a one-woman show was intriguing.” One of Wendy’s favorite acting stories happened while in that show. “Shirley Valentine is a wonderful part; she tells a series of stories about her children and husband, detailing how she put her dreams on hold to raise her family and be a wife. Each story fl ows into another, but when you are on stage alone and forget the next story, you are in trouble. I had just fi nished a story about her son playing the Nativity innkeeper in his fi rst play, and how he got fl ustered, totally forgot his lines, and told Mary and Joseph that there was plenty of room in the Inn. Then it happened, I went blank. I began adlibbing, making up lines that I (Shirley) would never be an actor, having to remember all those lines, everyone staring at you.., then, thankfully, I remembered the next story, and continued with the published lines.”

Despite all the enjoyment she has had performing, Wendy says her most gratifying work has been off stage at CVP. “Keeping the art of theatre alive is essential, and I found that CVP was a wonderful place to teach, perform and give back to this community. I am confi dent that CCPA will build upon that solid foundation and exceed all of our expectations.