Rebecca Night Replaces Annaleigh Ashford in Roundabout's Importance of Being Earnest Benefit

Screen star Rebecca Night will step in for Tony winner Annaleigh Ashford as Cecily Cardew in tonight's Roundabout Theatre Company benefit performance of Oscar Wilde's The Importance of Being Earnest. Ashford has withdrawn from the one-night event due to a scheduling conflict. The staging is planned for 7:30pm at the American Airlines Theatre.

As previously announced, the Earnest benefit will also star five-time Tony winner Angela Lansbury as Lady Bracknell, Tony winner Jayne Houdyshell as Miss Prism, Tony winner John Glover as Reverend Canon Chasuble, Tony nominee Daniel Davis as Lane, Simon Jones as Merriman and Tom Rhoads as Algernon Moncrieff, with real-life couple Hamish Linklater and Tony nominee Lily Rabe appearing as onstage couple John Worthing and Gwendolen Fairfax.

The Importance of Being Earnest is a comedy of mistaken identity which ridicules codes of propriety and etiquette. Dashing men-about-town John Worthing (Linklater) and Algernon Moncrieff (Rhoads) pursue fair ladies Gwendolen Fairfax (Rabe) and Cecily Cardew (Night). Matters are complicated by the imaginary characters invented by both men to cover their on-the-sly activities—not to mention the disapproval of Gwendolen’s mother, the formidable Lady Bracknell (Lansbury).

Michael Wilson will direct the one-night event.