The Mad Ones' THE ESSENTIAL STRAIGHT & NARROW Begins Previews Tonight

Two years ago, The New Ohio Theatre and IRT Theater (new neighbors in the historic Archive Building on Christopher Street) kicked-off their exciting new developing and presenting initiative: the Archive Residency. The Archive Residency offers select independent theatre companies a two-year commitment of space, artistic support, and institutional continuity for the development and presentation of a new work.

Now in their second-year of the Archive Residency the companies are ready to show the fruits of this process.

CollaborationTown are currently presenting the World Premiere of Family Play (1979 To Present) through May 16, produced by CollaborationTown, written and created by Geoffrey Decas O'Donnell, Boo Killebrew and Jordan Seavey, co-created with Lee Sunday Evans and TJ Witham, and directed by Lee Sunday Evans.

The Mad Ones will present the World Premiere of The Essential Straight & Narrow May 22 - June 14, 2014, created by The Mad Ones and directed by Lila Neugebauer. Previews begin May 22 for a May 24 opening.

Immediately following these two shows, their two first-year resident companies will be presenting works-in-progress in the 2014 Ice Factory Festival. They include Rady&Bloom's The Upper Room and Vampire Cowboys' Untitled Vampire Cowboys Project. The Archive Residency will invite two additional companies into residency in September 2014.

The first year includes a one-month stay in IRT's 3B Development Series, and a one-week presentation in New Ohio's OBIE Award-winning Ice Factory summer festival. The second year includes additional time at IRT, and culminates with a fully realized, four-week run in the New Ohio's main season. Each fall, two more independent companies are invited into the Archive Residency, bringing the program to full strength with four companies in residence, each cycling through the two-year development process. Membership into the Archive Residency is by invitation only.

Shows take place at New Ohio Theatre, located at 154 Christopher Street between Greenwich and Washington Streets in New York City. Tickets are $18 and $15 for students and seniors, and can be purchased online at http://www.NewOhioTheatre.org or by calling the Vendini ticket line at 1-888-596-1027. For info visit http://www.NewOhioTheatre.org, Like them on Facebook at https://www.Facebook.com/NewOhioTheatre and follow on Twitter at @NewOhioTheatre.

The Mad Ones' World Premiere of The Essential Straight & Narrow runs May 22 - June 14. Performances are Wednesdays - Saturdays at 8pm with an added show on Sunday, June 8 at 8pm.

The latest from the Drama Desk-nominated The Mad Ones: a lo-fi ode to the Kodachrome 1970s, rock and roll antics, and the mystical American Southwest. The Essential Straight & Narrow recalls a roadside layover in Pinos Altos, New Mexico, where passing the time becomes reliving the past. Between original country rock songs, bouts of $10,000 Pyramid, and late night craft time, The Mad Ones turn out an intimate anthem about regret and reinvention.

The cast includes Marc Bovino, Joe Curnutte, Michael Dalto, Stephanie Wright Thompson, Clare Barron, Jonathan Bock, Blake DeLong, Maya Lawson, Matthew Summersgill and Merlin Whitehawk.

The creative team includes Laura Jellinek (Set Design), Mike Inwood (Lighting Design), Stowe Nelson (Sound Design) and Ásta Hostetter (Costume Design).

The Mad Ones are a New York City-based ensemble dedicated to creating visceral and highly detailed theatrical experiences that investigate cultural memory and nostalgia. The Mad Ones devise plays through the ongoing collaboration of performers/writers, designers, and director, with each artist playing an essential role in a piece's creation from the inception. Mad Ones productions appropriate popular American genres, playfully re-imagine world history, and incorporate live music in service of a delicately woven, wholly articulated, character-driven universe. For info visit http://TheMadOnes.org.

The Essential Straight & Narrow is made possible by the New York State Council on the Arts with the support of Governor Andrew Cuomo and the New York State Legislature, the Puffin Foundation, and a 2014 LMCC Process Space artist residency (http://LMCC.net). Presentation of The Essential Straight & Narrow is made possible, in part, through funding from the Foundation for Contemporary Arts and the National Endowment of the Arts.

CollaborationTown's World Premiere of Family Play (1979 To Present) runs through May 16. Performances are Mondays and Tuesdays at 7pm, and Wednesdays - Saturdays at 8pm. The running time is 1 hour and 50 minutes with no intermission.

Children of the 80's dig through three decades of their lives: humorous, mundane and revelatory moments between parents, siblings and friends, all fighting to love each other amidst radically shifting notions of family, gender, and sexuality. Part dissection of the past, part love letter to the present - a fast-paced, unsentimental memory play.

The cast includes Eboni Booth, Jorge Cordova, Geoffrey Decas O'Donnell, Mark Junek, Boo Killebrew and Therese Plaehn.

The creative team includes Geoffrey Decas O'Donnell (Scenic Design), Nick Houfek (Lighting Design), Beth Goldenberg (Costume Design), Brandon Wolcott (Sound Design), Stephanie Miller (Associate Director) and Sandy Yaklin (Associate Scenic Design and Technical Director). The production team includes Amanda Feldman (Producer) and Eric Marlin (Production Stage Manager).

The Essential Straight & Narrow from The Mad Ones on Vimeo.