World Premiere of Lisa Phillips Visca's "Raise Me Up"

Santa Monica, CA, March 23, 2013 --(PR.com)-- Do you believe in love at first sight? Do you believe in soul mates? Do you believe in eternal love? By the time the final curtain falls, you'll believe. This is a true story about a “moonstruck” couple’s forbidden love, the hilarity and drama from their deeply passionate Italian-Greek families, and how they spent their last day on Earth together. Raise Me Up is Lisa Phillips Visca’s joyful and touching tribute to her parents, Louis and Daphne Padula, capturing their eternal passion and the surreal ending to their classic love story. Raise Me Up will lift your spirits and touch your soul.

"An unforgettable love story with humor and heart." -- Martin Short

Written by Lisa Phillips Visca (Sophia; Turning Thirty & More than a Pretty Face; Climax) a “…remarkable new talent.” -- Christopher Knopf, past President, Writers Guild of America, West

Directed by Internationally acclaimed Director Chris DeCarlo (Arnold Schulman’s Sleeping Ugly; Jerry Mayer’s Aspirin & Elephants; Alan Ross’s Elizabeth Shakespeare)

Featuring: Marla Adams* (The Young and the Restless; The President’s Man; Jerry Mayer’s You Haven’t Changed A Bit and Other Lies); John Del Regno (Born on the 4th of July; Another 48 Hours; Joan of Arcadia; Without a Trace); Serena Dolinsky (Moliere’s The Fools; Arnold Schulman’s Sleeping Ugly; Moonlight Madness; Love in Bloom); Ben Feuer* (All God’s Creatures; The Rest of My Life; A New Game; Murder by the Book; Of Mice and Men); Mitch Lerner (Forty Days and Nights; Super Cyclone; How to Deal; The Big Douche Chill; Women and Men and Women); Michael Marinaccio* (Li’l Tokyo Reporter; Boulevard Zen; The Online Gamer; Tony ’n’ Tina’s Wedding); Lenora May* (Confessions of a Shopaholic; Mistresses on ABC; Scandal; Grey’s Anatomy; Jerry Mayer’s Black and Bluestein); Stuart Pankin* (Not Necessarily the News; Fatal Attraction; The Artist; Desperate Housewives; Tartuffe; Sly Fox); Evelyn Rudie* (Audition: The Musical; Funny, You Don’t Look Like A Grandmother; Author! Author! – an evening with Sholom Aleichem); Joey Shea* (One Life to Live; The Practice; My Sexiest Mistakes; As The World Turns)

Produced by Santa Monica Playhouse, Associate Producer Lisa Phillips Visca

Fridays and Saturdays at 8pm, Sunday at 3:00pm; March 23 through May 19, 2013

$25 general admission; $22.50 students, teachers, seniors and members of the military; $17.50 for groups of 8 or more; $15 for under 12’s. For reservations, visit http://SantaMonicaPlayhouse.com or call the Playhouse Box Office at 1-310-394-9779 ext 1. Group Sales, please call ext 2.

Santa Monica Playhouse Main Stage 1211 4th Street Santa Monica, CA 90401. By public transportation: take the Santa Monica Blue Bus or the LA Metro Rapid #720 and exit at 4th and Wilshire.

Santa Monica Playhouse is supported in part by the Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors through the Los Angeles County Arts Commission.

* Member Actors’ Equity Association