The Theatre Group at Santa Barbara City College continues its 2024-25 season with a new production of Neil Simon’s “Lost in Yonkers (1991),” with direction by Jonathan Fox, scenic and lighting design by Patricia L. Frank, costumes by Pamela Shaw, sound design by Barbara Hirsch, and stage management by Nina Steele.

Guy Challen, Peter Fuller and Luke David Hamilton in a scene from The Theatre Group at SBCC’s production of Neil Simon’s 'Lost in Yonkers.' (Ben Crop)
Guy Challen, Peter Fuller and Luke David Hamilton in a scene from The Theatre Group at SBCC’s production of ‘Lost in Yonkers.’ (Ben Crop)

The cast that features Leesa Beck, Robert Moris Castillo, Guy Challen, Peter Fuller, Luke David Hamilton, Jenna Scanlon and Leslie Ann Story.

City College says of the play: “Considered by many to be legendary comic playwright Neil Simon’s greatest work, ‘Lost in Yonkers’ is a memory play set in Yonkers, NY in 1942. 

“At the heart of the story is the tale of two boys: 15-year-old Jay Kurnitz and his 13-year-old brother Arty, who are suddenly forced to move in with their strict grandmother and an assortment of quirky and mysterious relatives.

“As they struggle to adapt in the strange new world of Yonkers, secrets emerge, adventures ensue and the boys experience a life they never dreamed possible.”

“A writer’s youth,” wrote Graham Greene, “is his capital.” While this is true of virtually every real writer, it seems especially apt when considering the oeuvre of the comic playwright, Neil Simon.

(I am also reminded of something the great population biologist, Dr. Paul Erlich, once said to me: “Inside, you know, we never get to be more than about fifteen.”)

Simon, in any case, parlayed his unhappy, unstable New York childhood into a stack of blue chips reaching to the heavens. A wisecrack is the best return for a wound, and Simon was the supreme master of the wisecrack.

New York City’s geography also plays a big role in Simon’s plays. To be sure, if an anthropologist would find little to distinguish the culture of one of the city’s five boroughs from the others, the residents of the individual boroughs tend to view the other four as foreign countries.

Simon, interestingly, treats them all as interchangeable. Perhaps this is because he, unlike so many other Jewish writers, grew up in international Manhattan, not provincial Brooklyn.

Most of his characters, I think, are based on himself and his extended family. That he was able to translate these painful specifics into a comic universal is all the testament we need to his great, quasi-heroic talent.

Performances of “Lost in Yonkers” will take place Oct. 9-26, in the Garvin Theatre on SBCC’s West Campus, 900 block of Cliff Drive.

Showtimes are 7:30 p.m., Thursdays through Saturdays, 2 p.m. Sundays, with previews at 7:30 p.m. Oct. 9-10. (the Sunday, Oct. 13 performance will be live-captioned for those who need hearing assistance).

Tickets for the previews are $20 general, $17 for seniors and SBCC staff, $10 for students; for Thursday evenings and Sunday matinees $27 general, $22 seniors and SBCC Staff, $16 students; and for Friday and Saturday evenings $29 general, $24 seniors and SBCC staff, $19 students.

Tickets can be purchased by calling the Box Office, 805-965-5935 or online at www.theatregroupsbcc.com.