Cast Announced for Sarah Ruhl's EURYDICE

Director Nicole Hand has announced her cast for Promethean Theatre Ensemble's January production of Sarah Ruhl's Eurydice, a look at the Greek myth of Orpheus through the eyes of his doomed bride, whose voice is typically missing from her own story. Appearing as Eurydice will be Janeane Bowlware (below left),* of Promethean's Bury the Dead, Linchpin's King John and Red Tape'sChurch/Pullman. Her husband Orpheus will be played by JorDan Golding (below right), a recent graduate of Oberlin College who has also studied at the British American Drama Academy in London.

Eurydice's father will be Sandy Elias, who recently appeared in Griffin's Pocatello. Also in the cast are Jared Dennis* (Nasty/Interesting Man), Susie Griffith (Big Stone), Meghann Tabor* (Little Stone), Brendan Hutt* (Loud Stone).

Joining Hand on the creative team are Jeremiah Barr* (set designer and technical director), Jess Fialko* (lighting designer), Gary Nocco (costume designer), Arielle Valene (properties design), and Eric Backus (sound design). The stage manager will be Lexi Berkowitz*
* Promethean ensemble member
**Artistic Associate

Whisked down to the underworld on her wedding day, Eurydice tries to make sense of her memories and her passions, and poignantly reconnects with her long-dead father, even as her heartbroken groom seeks to wrench her back into the life she left behind.

Ruhl's atmospheric play combines off-kilter, playful comedy with a wistful yearning for meaning and human connection. The New York Times' Charles Isherwood, in reviewing the play's 2007 production at New York's Second Stage Theatre, called it "a weird and wonderful new play."

Ensemble member Nicole Hand's mainstage directing debut will draw upon the nostalgia of the past, incorporating music and design elements from the mid-20th century, while developing an original vocabulary of movement and soundscape in collaboration with the play's ensemble.

The play will be performed in the Athenaeum Theatre, Studio One, at 2936 N. Southport Ave. fromJanuary 6 - February 11, 2017.

*Indicates PTE Ensemble Member
**Indicates PTE Artistic Associate

BIOS
Sarah Ruhl (Playwright). Ms. Ruhl's plays include Stage Kiss, In the Next Room, or the vibrator play(Pulitzer Prize finalist, Tony Award nominee for best new play), The Clean House (Pulitzer Prize Finalist, 2005, The Susan Smith Blackburn Prize, 2004); Passion Play, (Pen American award, The Fourth Freedom Forum Playwriting Award from The Kennedy Center), Dead Man's Cell Phone (Helen Hayes award), Melancholy Play (a musical with Todd Almond), Eurydice, Orlando, Demeter in the City (NAACP nomination), Late: a cowboy song, Three Sisters, Dear Elizabeth, and most recently, The Oldest Boyand For Peter Pan on her 70th Birthday. Her plays have been produced on Broadway at the Lyceum by Lincoln Center Theater, off-Broadway at Playwrights' Horizons, Second Stage, and at Lincoln Center's Mitzi Newhouse Theater. Her plays have been produced regionally all over the country, with premieres often at Yale Repertory Theater, the Goodman Theater, Berkeley Repertory Theater, and the Piven Theatre Workshop in Chicago. Her plays have also been produced internationally and have been translated into over twelve languages.

Originally from Chicago, Ms. Ruhl received her M.F.A. from Brown University where she studied with Paula Vogel. An alum of 13P and of New Dramatists, she won a MacArthur Fellowship in 2006. She was the recipient of the PEN Center Award for a mid-career playwright, the Whiting Writers award, the Feminist Press' Forty under Forty award, and a Lilly Award. She proudly served on the executive council of the Dramatist's Guild for three years, and she is currently on the faculty at Yale School of Drama. Her book of essays on the theater and motherhood, 100 Essays I don't have time to write, was a Times Notable book of the year. She lives in Brooklyn with her family.

Nicole Hand (Director) is a founding member of PTE and the company's Literary Manager. Last year she directed the company's Evening of Shakespeare: Broken Hearts and Twisted Love. Also with Promethean, she has assistant directed The Lion in Winter, The Lark and Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Dead. On stage, she has appeared in the company's productions of Caucasian Chalk Circle, The Winter's Tale and the Evening of Shakespeare series. Nicole graduated twice from Northwestern University with a B.S. in Theatre and an M.S. Ed in Secondary Education and teaches Theatre and English in CPS.

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