Dark Nights at The New Group Presents Talking Taboos 11/6

In its continuing series Dark Nights, The New Group welcomes filmmaker Todd Solondz in conversation with playwright Thomas Bradshaw. This event takes place Sunday, November 6 at 4:00pm. Reservations required at seats@thenewgroup.org (space is limited). Suggested donation: $20. Free to subscribers of The New Group.

Dark Nights at The New Group offers unique programming and enlightened conversation to coincide with the company's mainstage productions. On November 6, provocative playwright Thomas Bradshaw (Burning, beginning previews Off-Broadway at The New Group on October 26) interviews controversial filmmaker Todd Solondz (Welcome to the Dollhouse, Happiness, Palindromes) on writing about subjects that others won't touch. As a writer and director, Todd Solondz is known for unflinching storytelling and graphic depictions of behaviors that somehow reveal the humanity beneath. Fellow New Jersey native Thomas Bradshaw, whose plays are similarly daring explorations, will discuss with Solondz his strategies for delving into the things no one wants to talk about.

Todd Solondz' films include Welcome to the Dollhouse, Happiness, Storytelling, Palindromes, Life During Wartime and Dark Horse, which recently premiered at the Toronto Film Festival. Nominated for several Independent Spirit Awards (Best Screenplay - Life During Wartime, Best Director - Happiness, Best Director & Best Feature - Welcome to the Dollhouse), Solondz and his films have earned numerous accolades including a Golden Globe nomination (Best Screenplay - Motion Picture, Happiness) and the 1996 Sundance Film Festival Grand Jury Prize for Welcome to the Dollhouse.

Thomas Bradshaw's plays include Mary (The Goodman Theater); The Bereaved (Partial Comfort Productions, and subsequently produced at The State Theater of Bielefeld in Germany); Southern Promises (P.S. 122); Dawn (The Flea Theater); Job (The Wilma). He is the recipient of a 2009 Guggenheim Fellowship, the 2010 Prince Charitable Trust Prize and a 2011 New Voices New York Fellowship from the Lark Play Development Center. Prophet, Strom Thurmond Is Not A Racist, Cleansed, Purity, Dawn, and Southern Promises are published by Samuel French, Inc. A German translation of Dawn was presented at Theater Bielefeld and The National Theatre of Mannheim. Bradshaw is an Assistant Professor in the MFA program at Northwestern University. He was featured as one of Time Out New York's ten playwrights to watch and Best Provocative Playwright by The Village Voice. He was the Playwright in Residence at The Soho Theatre in London.

Dark Nights at The New Group is a series of cultural conversations and readings designed to create a dialogue between artists and audience.

Dark Nights generally coincide with mainstage productions at The New Group, creating a forum for public conversation and enhancing the cultural landscape. Past events have featured luminaries such as F. Murray Abraham, Stephen Adly Guirgis, Eric Bogosian, Zoe Caldwell, David Henry Hwang, Tony Kushner, Martha Plimpton, Hal Prince and Wallace Shawn. Dark Nights at The New Group collaborated with the 92nd Street Y for an event featuring Matthew Broderick and Kenneth Lonergan (The Starry Messenger), moderated by Leonard Lopate. Topics have ranged from gay adoption (in an event hosted by Rosie O'Donnell timed to The Kid) to an evening highlighting Sam Shepard's work (led by Ethan Hawke with music by the composers from A Lie of the Mind), to a panel on documentary theatre (featuring Marc Wolf performing Another American, his OBIE-winning play first produced at The New Group ten years ago).

Other upcoming Darks Nights at The New Group:

December 11, 2011 - Details to be announced.

February 12, 2012: Adapting Baal
Ethan Hawke and Jonathan Marc Sherman, with musical collaborators Shelby & Latham Gaines, explore the legacy of Brecht from the point of view of attempting to adapt Brecht's play Baal. With guests and music by GAINES, they will perform Brecht's poetry, excerpts of Baal, and a bit of Sherman's new play, Clive, derived from the Brecht.

April 1, 2012: Reflecting Rabe
David Rabe and others reflect on his career in an evening featuring readings from his plays and excerpts from his novels. Special guests TBA.

The New Group begins its 2011-2012 season with Thomas Bradshaw's Burning, with previews commencing October 26 in advance of an Official Opening on November 14. In emotionally charged intersecting stories spanning two eras, a contemporary black painter, who depicts shocking racial violence in his art but hides his race from the press, goes to Berlin for a gallery show only to find that his work has been misinterpreted. And in the mid-'80s an ambitious teenage boy, recently orphaned, comes to New York to become an actor and is taken in by a gay couple in the industry as they are preparing the debut of a new Broadway play. In searing and graphic tales of self-invention and sexual identity, Burning attacks the pretenses of the worlds of art and theatre.

Directed by Scott Elliott, Burning features Jeff Biehl, Reyna de Courcy, Barrett Doss, Hunter Foster, Andrew Garman, Drew Hildebrand, EVan Johnson, Danny Mastrogiorgio, Andrew Polk, Larisa Polonsky, Adam Trese, Vladimir Versailles and Stephen Tyrone Williams. Set Design is by Derek McLane. Lighting Design is by Peter Kaczorowski. Costume Design is by Clint Ramos. Sound Design is by Bart Fasbender. Video Design is by Wendall Harrington. Dialect Coach is Doug Paulson. Tickets for Burning may be arranged at www.telecharge.com or (212) 239-6200, or at the Theatre Row Box Office (12-8 PM daily). Tickets are $60.00 plus $1.25 restoration fee.
For more, please visit www.thenewgroup.org.

The New Group, led by founding Artistic Director Scott Elliott and Executive Director Geoff Rich, is an award-winning company with a commitment to developing and producing powerful, contemporary theater. In 15 seasons, The New Group has been honored with 9 Obie Awards, 28 Drama Desk nominations, 6 Lucille Lortel Awards and 3 Tony® Awards. The New Group was founded in 1995 by Artistic Director Scott Elliott as a place for artists to experiment, take risks and collaborate in an artist-driven environment. Notable productions include Ecstasy, This is Our Youth, Aunt Dan and Lemon, Hurlyburly, Abigail's Party, Rafta, Rafta..., The Starry Messenger, A Lie of the Mind, The Kid, Blood From a Stone, Marie and Bruce and many more. The New Group's first musical, Avenue Q, won three Tony Awards. Most recently, The New Group and Scott Elliott were honored with a 2010-2011 Drama Desk Special Award "for presenting contemporary new voices, and for uncompromisingly raw and powerful productions."