Adirondack Theatre Festival Announces Staged Reading of BIG BABIES

Big Babies will be performed as part of Adirondack Theatre Festival's new play reading series. The readings will take place at 7:30 p.m. Wednesday, July 5, and Thursday, July 6, in the cabaret space of the Charles R. Wood Theater.

Exploring the lengths people will go to get the attention they need, the play centers on Marianne, who has found happiness as a surrogate mother for families looking to conceive. When she is told by her agency that after four pregnancies they have to let her go, a heartbroken Marianne reconnects with an old flame. She finds herself accidentally pregnant again. Rather than telling the father, she seizes the opportunity to be a surrogate once again.

The reading series provides a developmental growth opportunity for new works. Multiple shows from this series have been fully produced at ATF, including last summer's reading of Thirty Day Mourning Period, which is being performed this season under its new name: Knights of the Sales Office.

Tickets are $20 and are available at the Wood Theater Box Office, online at ATFestival.org or by calling (518)480-4878. The Wood Theater is located at 207 Glen Street in downtown Glens Falls.

Martha Banta, founder of ATF, will direct. The readings will be performed by Daiva Deupree (Film: Frances Ha), Jenn Harris (Off Broadway: Modern Orthodox), Mike Doyle (Film: Law & Order: Special Victims Unit), Colin Hanlon (Broadway: In Transit) and Lucas Papaelias (Off Broadway: Once). Matthew Wilkas is the playwright.

Playwright Bio

Matthew Wilkas is a New York City-based actor and writer. His play Big Babies was at the Vineyard Arts Project and Rattlestick Playwrights Theatre. His play Pageant Play, co-written with Mark Setlock, was produced at the Berkshire Theatre Festival and has been published by Dramatist Play Services. He appeared in Spider-Man: Turn Off the Dark on Broadway. He is also the star of the award-winning indie film Gayby, which debuted at the SXSW Festival in the spring of 2012, and went on to play several other festivals across the country and globe. Gayby has won sixteen festival awards, has been named one of the top ten independent films of 2012 by IndieWire and has been nominated for an Independent Spirit Award. For his performance in the film, Matthew was named one of Out Magazine's "Out100" and one of The Los Angeles Outfest Film Festival's "Five In Focus." Matthew has acted at Williamstown Theatre Festival, Huntington Theatre Company, Berkshire Theatre Festival, Rattlestick Playwrights Theater and Sundance Theatre Institute, under the direction of Michael Greif, Anna D. Shapiro, Will Frears, Carolyn Cantor, Mark Brokaw, Nicholas Martin and Trip Cullman. His television credits include guest appearances on Ugly Betty, Hope and Faith, All My Children, As the World Turns and Law and Order.

ATF Website: http://www.atfestival.org/event/big-babies/

About Adirondack Theatre Festival

Founded in 1994, ATF is a non-profit, professional theater. Each summer ATF produces a season of theater for an audience of both locals and tourists (9,000+) using professional artists from New York City and across the country. Last summer yielded a record-breaking season of sold-out performances, nearly doubling attendance and subscribership in just the past two years. ATF operates under a Small Professional Theatre Agreement with Actors' Equity Association. ATF is the only professional summer theater in the Capital District, Saratoga and Adirondack regions of upstate New York solely committed to producing new and contemporary works of theater. Its 23rd season is comprised entirely of new works.

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