On Her Shoulders to Present Staged Reading of THE YEARS BETWEEN, 11/18

On Her Shoulders will present a staged reading of The Years Between by Daphne Du Maurier, directed by Mary McGinley and edited by Susan Jonas. The Play in Context, a special component contextualizing the script in its historical time and place, will be delivered by Dr. Jonas at the top of the evening. Doors open at 6:30pm for a 6:45pm curtain; tickets are free to the public. The performance is at the New School, Wollman Hall, 65 West 11th Street. R.S.V.P to OnHerShouldersReservations@gmail.com.

This is the seventh offering in On Her Shoulders' inaugural season, which has been curated by Susan Jonas and produced by Melody Brooks, Andrea Lepcio and Lillian Rodriguez. This first year consists of one reading per month through March of 2014. For a complete season calendar, visit http://onhershoulders.weebly.com/index.html

Although best known as a novelist (notably Rebecca and The Birds.) Daphne Du Maurier's Second Stage play, The Years Between opened in January 1945, five months before VE Day, and ran for 617 performances. The protagonist, Diana Wentworth, has always stayed in The Shadows, supporting her husband, an admired colonel and MP. But when his plane crashes at sea in 1942 and he is presumed dead, life changes for Diana. She stands unopposed for her husband's seat in parliament, just as her relationship with a neighbor, Richard, heats up. Inspired by her own experience of the gulf that opened between herself and her war-hero husband on his return from duty, Du Maurier's drama reflects the changing times for women during and after the war. Diana becomes a popular and charismatic politician, advocating for women to march alongside men towards a new Britain, one in which people are guided by selflessness and duty towards their country. But when the choice becomes personal, will she choose patriotism or love, duty or happiness? In this new world formed by a long and costly war, will peace also have devastating casualties? This sophisticated and complex play anticipates many concerns that remain controversial and timely today.

Mary McGinley (Director) has been Artistic Director of the Carolinian Shakespeare Festival in NC for the past 15 years. She has worked as a director, dramaturg, performer and administrator at many regional theaters across the country and in the New York area. She is the director of Actors Alternative Studio where she teaches acting, Shakespeare and does private coaching. Mary is a member of the Lincoln Center Theatre Director's Lab and also teaches at Kean University in NJ. She received her M.F.A. in Directing from Mason Gross School of the Arts and her B.A. in Acting from Rutgers University. Besides classics she has worked extensively on new works with such playwrights as John Pielmeier and Bill Mastrosimone. She currently directs The Garden, A New Plays Project for New Millennium Theatre Works and leads Weird Sisters Consortium, an advocacy group for women working in Shakespeare. http://www.muse-of-fire.org/mary

Susan Jonas (Dramaturg) held leadership positions as a dramaturg, curator and producer at Classical Theatre of Harlem, Ensemble Studio Theatre, Classic Stage Company and The Acting Company. A Theatre Arts Analyst at the New York State Council on the Arts for a decade, she has also taught at Princeton, Brooklyn College, S.U.N.Y.-Stonybrook, and New York University. Dr. Jonas co-authored the 2002 "Report of the Status of Women in Theater," and co-founded "50/50 in 2020," a grassroots organization committed to achieving parity for women in theatre.

On Her Shoulders was founded in 2012 to present staged readings of plays by women from across the spectrum of time and place, with contemporary dramaturgs contextualizing--and in some cases adapting--them for modern audiences. The program seeks to make it impossible to deny or ignore the great tradition and value of women's contribution to the theatrical canon. On Her Shoulders intends to motivate producers and directors to champion and produce these plays in New York and regionally, and to incite audiences to demand to see them. The Play in Context, the dramaturgical and scholarly presentation component to the program, is sponsored in part by the League of Professional Theatre Women, a not-for-profit organization promoting visibility and increasing opportunities for women in theatre since 1982. www.theatrewomen.org.