(ATLANTIC HIGHLANDS, NJ) -- Magnolia Productions presents Becky's New Car by Steven Dietz from January 16-18, 23-24, 2026 at the Navesink Library. The play asks the question: have you ever been tempted to flee your own life?
Becky Foster is caught in middle age, middle management and in a middling marriage with no prospects for change on the horizon. Then one night a socially inept and grief-struck millionaire stumbles into the car dealership where Becky works. Becky is offered nothing short of a new life and the audience is offered a chance to ride shotgun in a way that most plays wouldn't dare.
Becky's New Car is a thoroughly original comedy with serious overtones, a devious and delightful romp down the road not taken.
The cast includes Samantha Ambler (Becky), John Correll (Joe), Andrew Gerber (Steve), Nicole Cebulko (Kenni), David Beil (Walter), Jennifer Zimmerman (Ginger), and Eric Parsler (Chris). The production is directed by Sharon Coyle with Anne Kaufman as stage manager.
Performances take place January 16, 17, 23 and 24 at 7:30pm; Matinees January 18 and 24 at 2:00pm. Tickets are available for purchase online. The Navesink Library is located at 149 Monmouth Avenue in Atlantic Highlands, New Jersey.
Steven Dietz’s forty-plus plays and adaptations have been seen at over one hundred regional theatres, as well as Off-Broadway and in twenty-five countries internationally. For the ’24-’25 season, Dietz was once again named one of the “Twenty Most Produced Playwrights in America” by American Theatre Magazine. Recent premieres include a newly updated Gaslight (from Patrick Hamilton); the intimate thrillers Mirror Lake and Vineland Place; as well as two comic mysteries adapted from Agatha Christie – Murder on the Links and Peril in the Alps.
Dietz was awarded the Steinberg New Play Citation for Bloomsday; the Kennedy Center Fund for New American Plays Award for both Fiction and Still Life with Iris; the PEN USA-West Award in Drama for Lonely Planet; and an Edgar® Award for Sherlock Holmes: The Final Adventure. Other widely produced plays include This Random World, Becky’s New Car, On Clover Road, Last of the Boys, and Yankee Tavern. Dietz co-adapted his play Shooting Star into the Meg Ryan movie, What Happens Later. He has directed at many of America’s major regional theatres. Previously a professor in the MFA Playwriting & Directing program at UT/Austin, Dietz continues to teach master-classes at theatres and universities across the country.
Magnolia Productions strives to bring you stories about women, by women and for women. They believe in female empowerment. They believe we all have a voice and we all have a story worth telling and hearing. Magnolia Productions was founded on the belief that art binds us all together. They believe that live theater has the power to heal. Through stories, foreign and familiar, we laugh, love and grieve. We enter a room as strangers, but soon find ourselves transported to a simple, universal truth: we are all in it together.
Magnolia Productions strives to include at least one benefit performance per production. They believe community theater should benefit the community, as well as create and shape new communities.
