Japan Society Presents A Reading of Nagai's WOMEN IN A HOLY MESS 2/22

Japan Society kicks off its Spring 2010 Performing Arts season with a reading of thecontemporary Japanese play Women in a Holy Mess, by celebrated playwright Ai Nagai, in a newEnglish translation. Featuring a cast of New York-based American actors led by award-winning director Cynthia Croot, Women in a Holy Mess takes place on Monday, February 22 at 7:30 PM.

A hilarious portrayal of post-menopausal life, Ai Nagai's Women in a Holy Mess explores the lives ofthree women and the camaraderie they've maintained over the years. Tsunko, a woman in her 50s, justbroke up with her boyfriend, twenty years her junior. When two of her childhood friends come to herapartment and find it in total disarray, it doesn't take long for them to abandon cleaning the place and start adding to the chaos with their own stories, secrets and losses. Co-founder of the acclaimedJapanese theater company Nito-sha, Nagai has won numerous awards, including the prestigious Kishida Kunio Drama Award, given annually to the best new Japanese play.

The reading of Women in a Holy Mess takes place on Monday February 22 at 7:30 PM. Japan Society is located at 333 East 47 th Street between First & Second Avenues. Tickets are $10/$8 Japan Society members and may be purchased by calling the Box Office (212) 715-1258 or in person at Japan Society (M-F / 10 AM-4:45 PM).For more info call (212) 832 -1155 or visitwww.japansociety.org.

Ai Nagai (Playwright) is playwright, director and leader of the theater company Nito-sha, founded in1981 by Nagai and her fellow theater artist, Shizuka Oishi. She has won particular acclaim for herSengo Seikatsushi-geki Sanbusaku (Postwar Life History Play Trilogy). Her plays Miyo, Hikoki noTakaku Toberu wo and Ra Nuki no Satsui, written for the Seinen-za company and Theatre Echo, alsowon critical acclaim. The Nito-sha production of Ani Kaeru was awarded the 44th Kishida Kunio DramaAward. Nagai won the 2005 Asahi Drama Awards Grand Prize for Utawasetai Otoko-tachi (Men WhoWant to Make Us Sing), and was honored with the 1st Tsuruya Namboku Drama Award and 52ndYomiuri Literature Award for Hagi Ke no San Shimai (The Three Hagi Sisters), which was given areading at Japan Society in 2006.

Cynthia Croot (Director) is a NYC-based theater and radio director, writer and activist known for herinnovative international collaborations. Stage credits include Suzan-Lori Parks' Venus (Windybrow,South Africa), John Guare's The House of Blue Leaves (Perseverance Theater Company, Alaska), TheWinter's Tale (Colorado Shakespeare Festival), as well as productions in NYC at the Abingdon, PS122,Town Hall, Symphony Space, and the Guggenheim Museum. Croot was one of seven directorsnationwide to be selected for the 2007-2009 NEA/TCG Career Development Program for Directors, and has been awarded residencies at UCross and New Pacific Studios. In 2004, she served as a U.S.delegate in a cultural exchange between Columbia University and the University of Damascus, Syria.Last winter, she was one of a handful of US artists invited to speak at the Fajr International TheaterFestival in Tehran, Iran. Croot earned her MFA in directing at Columbia University, and is Assistant Professor of Theater at Whitman College, WA.

Since the inception of the Performing Arts Programin 1953, Japan Society has introduced more than 600 of Japan's finest performing arts to an extensive American audience. Programs range from the traditional arts of noh, kyogen, bunraku and kabuki tocutting-edge theater, dance and music. The Program also commissions new works, produces nationaltours, organizes residency programs for American and Japanese artists and develops and distributeseducational programs. 

Established in 1907, Japan Society has evolved into North America's majorproducer of high-quality content on Japan for an English-speaking audience. Presenting over 100 events annually through well established Corporate, Education, Film, Gallery, Language, Lectures, Performing Arts and Innovators Network programs, the Society is an internationally recognized nonprofit, nonpoliticalorganization that provides access to information on Japan, offers opportunities to experience Japanese culture, and fosters sustained and open dialogue on issues important to the U.S., Japan, and East Asia.

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