Mercedes Ruehl to Join Jeff Goldblum on Second Avenue in London

Tony Award winner Mercedes Ruehl will make her London stage debut opposite Jeff Goldblum in the previously announced West End run of Neil Simon’s The Prisoner of Second Avenue. Presented by the Old Vic, the play will begin previews on June 30 and open on July 13, directed by Terry Johnson.

Ruehl won a Tony for Simon's Lost in Yonkers, in which she co-starred with Old Vic artistic director Kevin Spacey. Her other Broadway credits include The American Plan, The Goat or Who Is Sylvia, I’m Not Rappaport, The Shadow Box, and The Rose Tattoo. She received an Academy Award for her film work in The Fisher King and has appeared in Big, Last Action Hero, Warriors and Slaves of New York.

Set in the 1970s, The Prisoner of Second Avenue follows the life of a married couple living in Manhattan’s Upper East Side after the husband, Mel (Goldblum), has lost his job. As the stress of an economic crisis and urban life pushes him toward a nervous breakdown, his family gathers to offer support, with wife Edna (Ruehl) stoically bearing the burden of his disintegration and self-pity.

The debut production of The Prisoner of Second Avenue opened on Broadway on November 11, 1971, starring Peter Falk and Lee Grant, and ran for 798 performances.