VATICAN FALLS Makes World Premiere at Teatro Il Vascello May 10

The World Premiere of Frank J. Avella's new play "Vatican Falls" will take place at Teatro Il Vascello in Rome, Italy, on May 10, 2011. The play is directed by Enrico Maria Lamanna. Featuring a cast that includes Ludovico Fremont, Giorgia Wurth, Alberto Alemanno, Maria Rosaria Carli, Nicola Nicchi, Gian Piero Rotoli, Gabriele Galli, Michele Cesari.

The play will be presented in Italian, with translation by Eveline Iacobone. Songs written by Claudio Procopio (music) and Frank J. Avella (lyrics).

http://www.teatrovascello.it/2011/schede/vaticano.htm
"Vatican Falls", a fictional work based on factual accounts and events, takes on the Catholic sex abuse scandal by chronicling the journey of one sex abuse survivor from chaos to clarity and back again. The play is a daring look at power, conscience and forgiveness and is dedicated to the survivors.

The multi-genre, non-linear story centers on Riccardo, late 20s, an Italian-American singer / songwriter based in Rome, Italy. He is a member of SCAR (Survivors of Catholic Abuse Refuge), a group of victims turned revolutionaries, who decide that retribution is the only way to counter the Church's unrepentant complicity in the scandal. Riccardo, who is one of SCAR's charismatic leaders, must ultimately confront his past and then decide how far he is willing to go to exact revenge on an impervious institution, realizing his choices could cost him the love of his life as well as his humanity.

"Vatican Falls" had a workshop in New York City and Cincinnati. The most recent reading was presented at the Dramatists Guild in NYC in May of 2010. www.VATICANFALLS.com

Coverage of the play is featured in the April 2011 edition of American Theatre Magazine: http://www.tcg.org/international/events/festivals.cfm#four

Frank J. Avella (Author) recently completed his fifteenth full-length play, "Consent," which examines bullying and gay teen suicide. A staged reading his work "The Mad Ones", which explores our current culture of celebrity and centers on a closeted Hollywood actor's dilemma with coming out, will take place at Roy Arias Off Broadway Theatre on June 7th 2011 at 7:30PM. His other plays include: "Less Than Six Degrees", "Greener", "The Bubble", "Iris", "Michael's #1 Fan", "About Christine", "Unhinging", "Screw The Cow", "Lexy", "3 Cains" and the book to the musical "Bluebirds in My Belfry", about the life of Hollywood superstar Betty Hutton. Seven of these have been produced on the NYC stage; one has been produced in Cincinnati and the musical had a sold-out workshop in North Carolina. Artistic Director of the NYC-based Impetus Ensemble (Impetusensemble.com), Frank did his Grad work in Cinema Studies and Dramatic Writing at NYU's Tisch School of the Arts. He is a member of the Dramatists Guild.

Enrico Maria. Lamanna is an award-winning director of theatre, film and television residing in Rome. He has directed the Italian-language National Premieres of "The Laramie Project", "The Last Hours of Henry Moss", "Hedwig and the Angry Inch", "Love! Valour! Compassion!", "Corpus Christi", "Edward Albee's The Goat...", "The Full Monty", "Nunsense", "Proof" and others. He has also directed National and World Premieres of the works of many Italian authors. For television, he directed Notturno Di Donna Con Ospiti, by Annibale Rucello. For film, he won a 2006 Golden Globe for Samuel Beckett's Atto Senza Parole. He won Jury First Prize for Angelo Come Te, which he also wrote. He studied at the Lee Strasberg Institute in NYC; and in Italy, with masters from the Conservatorio di S. Cecilia. He is a member of the Actors' Studio since 1984, and a member of Tribehollywood since 2007.