Center Stage's Amy Herzog Festival Begins Today
By: BWW News Desk Mar. 18, 2015
From the pen of Amy Herzog, one of America's leading contemporary playwrights, comes two tales that span three generations of family. In After the Revolution, it is 1999, and Emma has learned a shocking revelation about her grandfather. Struggling with shaken moral and political views, she confronts her grandmother Vera for the truth. A decade later, Vera takes center stage in 4000 Miles, winner of 2012 Obie Award Best New American Play and a Pulitzer Prize nominee. Coping with a shocking loss, Vera's 21 year-old grandson Leo stumbles through the door of her West Village apartment. Over the course of a single month, these unlikely roommates frustrate, bewilder, and-eventually-connect, as they search for common understanding.
"I am completely delighted that the plays will be seen together for the first time. There are resonances between them that are usually lost," Amy Herzog says. "Since I wrote these plays based on my extended family and especially my grandmother, I've had two major life changes. My grandmother died in 2013 at age 96, and I had two children. My grandmother's death changed my feeling about the plays very much; now they seem to have the quality of a eulogy or remembrance, which they didn't when I wrote them.
"Both plays are concerned with the relationships between parents and children. Now that I am a mother, I'm more aware not just of how difficult being a parent is (that I'd sort of guessed), but how haphazard it can be."
Princess Grace Award recipient Lila Neugebauer directs both 4000 Miles and After the Revolution. Neugebauer, a close friend of Herzog's, recently directed The Wayside Motor Inn at Signature Theatre, Trudy and Max in Love at South Coast Rep and Red Speedo at Studio Theatre, DC. Neugebauer has worked all over the country and is co-artistic director of The Mad Ones at New Ohio Theatre. She is an Ensemble Theatre member, Drama League alumna and a New Georges Affiliated Artist.
Lois Markle plays Vera in 4000 Miles and After the Revolution. Markle performed at Center Stage in Old Times and Toys in the Attic, and has numerous Broadway credits, including The Grapes of Wrath and Hedda Gabler. Other festival actors who are returning to Center Stage are Susan Rome (Mel in After the Revolution), Peter Van Wagner (Morty in After the Revolution) and Mark Zeisler (Leo Joseph in After the Revolution). Rome is a constant presence in Baltimore and DC theater, having been seen in Center Stage's Vanya and Sonya and Masha and Spike, Enemy of the People and Mud Blue Sky, as well as multiple productions by Rep Stage, Theater J and the Baltimore Shakespeare Festival. Van Wagner was in Center Stage's Ah, Wilderness, and Zeisler was in Center Stage's Romeo and Juliet.
The rest of the festival cast makes their Center Stage debuts with the Amy Herzog Festival. Arye Gross plays Ben in After the Revolution, and has appeared in theater all over the country, and has had notable roles in films such as Minority Report and Tequila Sunrise, and TV shows such as Friends, Ellen and Castle. Gross' After the Revolution castmates include Ashton Heyl (Emma), a Yale School of Drama graduate who performed the role of Mel in a production of the play at the Williamstown Theatre Festival; Kelly McCrann (Jess), whose TV and film credits include Louie and Steven Spielberg's St. James Place; and Alejandro Rodriguez (Miguel), a Juilliard grad and associate director of programs at Artists Striving to End Poverty, who is a writer and director in addition to actor who has worked all over the country.
The actors rounding out the cast of 4000 Miles are Laura LaRocca (Bec), whose Off Broadway credits include Chemistry at the Soho Playhouse and The Cherry Orchard at LABA Theater; Josh Tobin (Leo Joseph-Connell), whose regional work includes As You Like It, Love's Labour's Lost, The Imaginary Invalid and Clybourne Park; and Jennifer Tsay (Amanda), whose New York credits include productions at the Flea, The Pearl Theatre and Random Access.
The Amy Herzog Festival runs March 18 to May 24. For more information, visit www.centerstage.org or call 410.332.0033.
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