SHINSAI: THEATERS FOR JAPAN Benefit to Feature Michi Barral, Cindy Cheung and More, 3/11

Michi Barral, Cindy Cheung, Joel de la Fuente, Angel Desai, Ann Harada, Jennifer Ikeda, Paul Juhn, Peter Kim, Ken Leung, Li Jun Li, Jennifer Lim, Angela Lin, Paolo Montalban, Olivia Oguma, Jon Norman Schneider, Thom Sesma, Sab Shimono, Jade Wu, Jonny Wo, James Yaegashi and Stacey Yen will be featured in Shinsai: Theaters for Japan, a two performance benefit to raise funds that will go directly to Japanese theater artists devastated by last year's great earthquake (Shinsai).   Shinsai: Theaters for Japan, will be performed this Sunday, March 11 at 3pm and 8pm at the Great Hall at Cooper Union (Seventh Street at Third Avenue). 

Under the direction of Tony Award-winning director Bartlett Sher, this assemblage of some of New York's leading Asian-American actors will perform a series of ten minute plays and musical numbers by an eclectic group of award-winning American and Japanese writers and composers including Edward Albee, Shoki Kokami, Oriza Hirata, Richard Greenberg, John Guare, Kumiko Shinohara, John Kander, Fred Ebb & Joseph Stein, Tony Kushner & Jeanine Tesori, Nen Ishihara, Toshiki Okada, Toshiro Suzue and Yoji Sakate.  Playwrights Philip Kan Gotanda, Richard Greenberg, Suzan-Lori-Parks, Naomi Iizuka and Doug Wright will contribute original work to the benefit which will also feature a segment from the 1976 musical Pacific Overtures revised, with new lyrics, especially for the occasion by its creators librettist John Weidman and composer-lyricist Stephen Sondheim. 

Tickets to Shinsai: Theaters for Japan, priced at $25 for each performance, are available at The Public Theater box office (425 Lafayette Street), by phone at (212) 967-7555 or by visiting www.publictheater.org

An effort which unites many of New York City's theatre companies, including Atlantic Theater Company, Lincoln Center Theater, Manhattan Theatre Club, New York Theatre Workshop, The Play Company, Playwrights Horizons and The Public Theater, the New York performances of Shinsai: Theaters for Japan will be just one of many presentations taking place on March 11, the first anniversary of the quake.   All proceeds from the performances, as well as from performances taking place at regional theaters throughout the country that day, will be sent from the Dramatists Guild Fund to the Japan Playwrights Association, who will in turn distribute the monies to those members of Japan's theatre community who were stricken by the earthquake. 

For additional information: visit  www.tcg.org/shinsai.