Enda Walsh's THE NEW ELECTRIC BALLROOM Plays St. Ann's Warehouse, Now Thru 11/22

Enda Walsh, playwright of the critically acclaimed The Walworth Farce, premiered his new play, The New Electric Ballroom at St. Ann's Warehouse in Brooklyn last night to a full house. The play premiered at the 2008 Edinburgh Fringe Festival, winning the 2008 Edinburgh Fringe First Award. The production is brought to St. Ann's by the Irish theatre company Druid Ireland and is directed by Edna Walsh.  It runs at St. Ann's Warehouse through November 22nd.

Druid Ireland's The New Electric Ballroom, Enda Walsh's "most intoxicating and original piece of writing," according to the New York Times' Charles Isherwood, is a companion piece to The Walworth Farce, which made its American Premiere at St. Ann's Warehouse in April 2008, earning Walsh the distinction of being deemed one of Ireland's freshest new voices. The story unfolds in a small fishing town on the west coast of Ireland, where, night after night, two aging sisters re-enact a night in the early ‘60s with a seductive rock singer at the New Electric Ballroom. On this particular night, enter Patsy, the fish monger.

"The New Electric Ballroom affirms Mr. Walsh's growing reputation as a contender to take his place in the long, distinguished line of great Irish playwrights," says The New York Times.

Walsh is among Ireland's most widely produced contemporary playwrights, having written extensively for the stage, radio and film. He was a founding member of Corcadorca Theatre Company in Cork in 1994, where he produced his breakthrough play Disco Pigs that won the Stewart Parker Award and the George Devine Award. His screenplay Hunger won numerous awards including the 2008 Caméra d'Or at the Cannes Film Festival for Best First Film, Best Film awards at the Sydney and Jerusalem Film Festivals and the Gold Hugo Award at Chicago International Film Festival, among many others.

Druid was founded in Galway in 1975 by graduates of the National University of Ireland, Galway, Garry Hynes, Mick Lally and Marie Mullen - the first professional theatre company in Ireland to be based outside Dublin. The company has had two artistic directors: Garry Hynes (1975-91 and 1995 to date) and Maeliosa Stafford (1991-94). Druid has always worked to reinvigorate perceptions of classic dramatic works and to engage with new dramatic works of a challenging, innovative and daring kind. Recent productions in 2008 and 2007 include The Cripple of Inishmaan by Martin McDonagh, The New Electric Ballroom by Enda Walsh (Edinburgh Fringe First Winner 2008), The Walworth Farce by Enda Walsh (Edinburgh Fringe First Winner 2007) and Long Day's Journey into Night by Eugene O'Neill. Other acclaimed Druid productions include three works by John B. Keane, Sive (2002), Sharon's Grave (2003) and The Year of the Hiker (2006), and Martin McDonagh's The Beauty Queen of Leenane (1996).

Tickets for The New Electric Ballroom range in price from $35 to $78 and may be purchased online through St. Ann's website at www.stannswarehouse.org or thorugh the box office at 718-254-8779.  The production will run through November 22.

For more information, visit St. Ann's website at www.stannswarehouse.org.