The cake.

Uptown Players' founding producer Craig Lynch announces the 2010 season.

Frequent Uptown director-actor Coy Covington with his "Zanna Don't" star Ryan Cowles, who recently toured the world in "Hairspray."

Dallas actors Stan Graner, Arianna Movassagh and Tony Martin at the Uptown Players season announcement soiree.

Actor T.A. Taylor with Uptown producer Jeff Rane.

Jeff Rane and actress-singer Arianna Movassagh gab about Uptown's 2010 season.

Two shows in Uptown's 2010 season will be at the Kalita Humphreys Theater in--get this--Uptown.

Actors Cedric Neal, Sherry Etzel and Natalie King at the Uptown bash.

Amy Fisher and Andi Allen sample the Uptown cake.

  

Uptown Players announced its 2010 season—its ninth—at an event Monday that featured excited subscribers, actors and directors. Not to mention cake so good, it's a sin.

The big news for the gay-focused company is that two shows will be produced in the Kalita Humphreys Theater, the space vacated by Dallas Theater Center as it moves into the Wyly Theatre at the new Dallas Center for the Performing Arts. Uptown's other productions will remain in its current home, the K.D. Studio Theatre, which, as it was pointed out, is not in Dallas' Uptown neighborhood. The Kalita, however, is.

Uptown founding producer Craig Lynch said that the company's longterm goal is still to get its own building (the Dream Theatre Campaign), but those plans are on hold due to the sour economy. Asked about the possibility that the Kalita might turn into a new home for Uptown, he said, "I don't want to put all our eggs in one basket. We'll have to wait and see how it works out. It could happen that we go there and our patrons don't like the space, or the parking, or whatever."

Since its debut in 2001, Uptown Players has grown into a popular theater that now has about 1,000 subscribers and entertains an estimated 12,000 patrons per season. The 2010 lineup includes several premieres and two tributes to showtunes, including one in which actors will perform the songs written for his or her gender. Probably.

Here's how the new Uptown season shakes out:

• Broadway Our Way: Legally Divas. This popular annual fundraiser has a great gimmick: Male actors sing Broadway tunes meant for females and vice versa. Andi Allen again directs. Jan. 15-24 at K.D. Studio Theatre.
• Peter Shaffer's brilliant psychodrama Equus, about a young man and his strange relationship with a group of horses will be the first Uptown show on the Kalita Humphreys stage. The 1973 drama was revived recently in London and in New York starring Harry Potter actor Daniel Radcliffe. Bruce R. Coleman directs for Uptown. Feb. 26-March 21.
• The regional premiere of the Tony-nominated 2004 musical comedy Dirty Rotten Scoundrels, by David Yazbek and Jeffrey Lane, based on the 1988 movie. Cheryl Denson directs. April 23-May 16 at the Kalita Humphreys Theater.
• The regional premiere of Paul Rudnick's comedy Regrets Only, about a high society Manhattan couple, their "bridezilla" daughter and a well-known gay designer. The debate over gay marriage drives the plot. Directed by TheaterJones contributor Coy Covington. June 11-27 at the K.D. Studio Theatre.
• Fordidden Broadway's Greatest Hits, the popular parody showcase that makes loving fun of Broadway standards. B.J. Cleveland directs. Aug. 6-29 at K.D. Studio Theatre.
• The American premiere of Closer to Heaven, the musical written by Neil Tennant and Chris Lowe of the technopop group Pet Shop Boys, with a book by Jonathan Harvey, author of the play Beautiful Thing. The musical, which uses Pet Shop Boys songs and has a story about a young Irishman trying to make it big in London, has previously only played in the U.K. and Australia. Bruce R. Coleman directs. Oct. 1-24 at the K.D. Studio.

Tickets for all shows, except Broadway Our Way, are $25-$35. For more information, call 214-219-2718 or visit www.uptownplayers.org.