Bill Camp, Edie Falco, Greg Hildreth and More Perform Plays by 9- and 10-Year-Olds in STIRRING THE POT Today

The 52nd Street Project makes a difference in the lives of countless Hell's Kitchen (Clinton) kids by pairing them with theater professionals who mentor them through the creation of original theater.

Perhaps the most poignant presentations made by the Project are those in its semi-annual Playmaking series, which features the Project's youngest Hell's Kitchen mentees - 9- and 10-year-olds who have just begun their theatrical education - writing for accomplished professional actors and revealing their work to a public audience for the first time.

Accomplished actors including Bill Camp (The Night Of), Edie Falco (Nurse Jackie, The Sopranos), Greg Hildreth (Peter and the Starcatcher, Frozen on Broadway), Mozhan Marnò (House of Cards, The Blacklist) and others will perform in Stirring the Pot: The Spicy Plays, the Project's Fall 2017 Playmaking show.

Stirring the Pot will run today, December 8, through Sunday, December 10, at The 52nd Street Project's Five Angels Theater (789 Tenth Avenue, 2nd floor, NYC). Performances will take place Friday & Saturday at 7:30pm, and Saturday & Sunday at 3pm. Admission is free, but reservations must be made in advance at 52project.secure.force.com/ticket or 212.333.5252. For more information, visit www.52project.org.

The Playmaking process begins with a nine-week playwriting course. At the end of the course, the kids are taken (along with their volunteer adult dramaturge/director) out of town for a retreat in the countryside. After writing his/her own plays, each child is given a professional cast to complete the expression of his or her personal vision. The finished plays enjoy a run of public performances.

The kids writing the one-acts are Alexander Breton, Kylee Chester, Melanie Correa, Xavier Espinal, Ivan Garcia, Amirah Hancock, Sarah Lopez, Liam Petard, Evaluna Santoni and Alexander Torres.

The adult dramaturg-directors are Chelsea Hackett, Krystel Lucas, John Manolis, Nick Mills, Alex O'Daly, Michael Propster, John Sheehy, Jeremy Stoeller, Monica Trausch and James Yaegashi.

The adult performers are Kristen Adele, Mayaa Boateng, Bill Camp, Neil D'Astolfo, José Duràn, Edie Falco, Arielle Goldman, Charlotte Graham, Greg Hildreth, Jeniffer Kim, Chalia La Tour, Carl Hendrick Louis, Mozhan Marnò, Ben Mehl, Reynaldo Piniella, Mallory Portnoy, Lynne Rosenberg, Stephen Wallem and Mitchell Winter.

Avi Amon is composing original music for the show.

The 52nd Street Project was founded in 1981 by actor/playwright and 1994 MacArthur Fellow Willie Reale in response to a deepening need to improve the quality of life for New York's inner-city children. Reale, an actor, playwright, and company member of The Ensemble Studio Theater (EST), used his company privileges to reach out to the children of the neighborhood by creating theatrical endeavors specifically for them. This was done with the cooperation and support of EST and its across-the-street-neighbor, the Police Athletic League's Duncan Center. The Project is now an independent not-for-profit organization that creates over eighty new plays and serves over 130 children every year.

The 52nd Street Project has been a place where many preeminent theater-makers have volunteered their efforts to mentor kids from Hell's Kitchen. To name just a few: Bobby Cannavale, Billy Crudup, Peter Dinklage, Edie Falco, Nancy Giles, Jonathan Groff, Sonia Manzano, Frances McDormand, Oliver Platt, Martha Plimpton and Lili Taylor.

The Project is about making children proud of themselves. The Project is not about teaching children to act, although they will learn to. It is not about teaching them to write plays, although they will learn that as well. What it is about is giving a kid an experience of success. It is about giving a kid an opportunity to prove that he or she has something of value to offer, something that comes from within that he or she alone possesses, something that cannot be taken away.

In order to make The 52nd Street Project experience available to children in other locations, The Project has published a manual and other supporting materials, which have been distributed as far as Vancouver and South Africa. There are now projects underway across the country in places such as Los Angeles; Chicago; Trenton, NJ; Williamstown, MA; Providence, RI; and London, England.

For more information, like the 52nd Street Project on Facebook or follow @52ndStProject on Twitter.

To post a comment, you must register and login.