<DIV><p> <I>Educating Rita</I>, about a working-class Liverpool girl's hunger for education, is "simply a marvelous play, painfully funny and passionately serious; a hilarious social documentary; a fairy-tale with a quizzical, half-happy ending."&mdash;<I>Sunday Times</I></p> <p>"Like <I>Roots</I> and <I>Pygmalion</I> ... a touching play about the melancholic ways education often pulls people apart instead of bringing them together."&mdash;<I>Guardian</I></p> <p>"Mr. Russell has taken a look at two segments of English society and engineered a collision that is as full of regret as it is of promise ... the deft moments of its best comedy are splendidly refreshing."&mdash;<I>The Times</I></p> <p> <I>Educating Rita</I> premiered at the RSC Warehouse, London, in June 1980. Voted Best Comedy of 1980, it was subsequently made into a highly successful film with Michael Caine and Julie Walters.</p></DIV>