About the Play:

Becky's New Car is a full-length comedy by Steven Dietz. Have you ever been tempted to flee your own life? Restless, married, and middle-aged, Becky is an office-manager of a small car dealership who experiences a complicated mid-life crisis when a handsome millionaire arrives to buy a large number of cars as gifts for his employees. Becky's New Car is a devious and delightful romp down the road not often taken and the soul of a woman pulled in two directions, romantically and socially. And will either road lead to happiness?

Becky's New Car is about life, love, marriage and the detours we make on the way to happiness. Is Becky Foster having a midlife crisis? She is caught in middle age, middle management and in a middling job with a boss who doesn't appreciate her, a 28 year marriage missing its spark, and a 20-something son living in the basement – with no prospects for change on the horizon. Then one night change stumbles through the door of the car dealership where Becky works in the form of an eccentric and grief-struck millionaire widower. Walter Flood falls for her at first sight and, assuming she is a widow, he offers her nothing short of an opportunity to step into a new life… and she takes it. In a way that most plays wouldn't dare, Becky's New Car offers audiences the chance to ride shotgun with Becky on her exhilarating ride down the road not taken. Yes, Becky is most definitely having a midlife crisis.

Becky's New Car premiered in 2008 at Seattle's ACT Theater and has since become a popular choice for high school and community theatre productions.

Cast: 3 female, 4 male

What people say:

"Becky's New Car is that perfect blend of hilarious comedy and substantial weight, a story about choices and consequences that could believably happen to anyone." — Broadway Hour

"Perhaps the highest praise that can be given to Steven Dietz's praiseworthy new comedy is that it's funny. Not ironic. Not hysterical in a slapsticky kind of way. Just gently and consistently funny — right up to the point that it's touching, and then even a little bit after that. Becky's New Car takes the audience on a smart, comic cruise through the perils of middle-aged longing and regret." — Variety

"On a classic mistaken-identity premise, playwright Steven Dietz has constructed a warmly humorous and nimble romantic farce that doesn't oversell itself, or ever sell its American Everywoman protagonist short. Dietz has created a comedy of modern manners … one that derives as much power from its humanity as its fine-tuned craftsmanship." — Seattle Times

"The world premiere production of Steven Dietz's warm and amiable new comedy is the perfect two-hour escape from the endless political campaign, stock market collapse, and other daily woes of modern life. You won't see a comedy this good on television or in the neighborhood multi-plex." — Talkin' Broadway

"Playwright Steven Dietz's new production is a laugh-out-loud amusement-park ride where the comedy spins out of control like a bumper car. Becky's New Car is witty and droll, with delicious deadpan humor and U-turn plot twists. But it turns out there's more under the hood of Becky's New Car than just the comedy. The story has depth. It has themes like confronting the unexpected. It has conflict such as a woman being pulled in two directions. It has, like Yogi Berra once suggested, a person coming to a fork in the road and taking it." — Everett Herald

About the Playwright:

Steven Dietz is one of America's most widely-produced contemporary playwrights, known for his quirky comedies that are popular at regional theatres. Since 1983, his thirty-plus plays have been seen at over one hundred regional theatres in the United States, as well as Off-Broadway. International productions have been seen in over 20 countries and his work has been translated into 10 languages. He teaches playwriting and directing at the University of Texas at Austin.