South Coast Rep Announces Arkin, Weston & More For Playwrights Fest

Brothers will play brothers when Adam and Matthew Arkin take on the roles of Joey and Kevin Colletti in the reading of Steven Drukman's The Prince of Atlantis-just one of five exciting new works scheduled to be read at this year's 14th Annual Pacific Playwrights Festival (PPF) April 29 - May 1.

This is the first time that Adam Arkin (SCR's Brooklyn Boy, TV's "Sons of Anarchy") and Matthew Arkin (SCR's Our Mother's Brief Affair) have appeared onstage together. Adam Arkin plays older brother Joey, who finds himself in a minimum-security prison just as the son he gave up for adoption writes to say he'd like to meet him. Matthew Arkin is Kevin, the younger brother assigned to keep the son from discovering the truth. Dámaso Rodriguez will direct the play, which will also star Michael Weston ("House") and Amy Landecker (A Serious Man).

Shelley Butler (SCR's A Wrinkle in Time) will direct Catherine Trieschmann's How the World Began, with Kirsten Potter playing a teacher who ignites a controversy with an off-hand remark in biology class. Jarrett Sleeper is the student upset by her remark, and Joe Spano is his grandfather.

David Chambers (SCR's The Intelligent Design of Jenny Chow) will direct THE DROLL {Or, a Stage-Play about the END of Theatre} by Meg Miroshnik, a graduate student at the Yale School of Drama. Set in a world reminiscent of Puritanical England, it imagines a theatrical troupe trying to mount a secret production of Hamlet. The Players will include Tessa Auberjonois, Nathan Baesel, Matt McGrath and Laura Heisler, with other roles still to be cast.

Loretta Greco (SCR's Goldfish) will direct Annapurna, Sharr White's drama about a dying poet endeavoring to understand why his wife disappeared 20 years earlier-and why she's suddenly come back. Stay tuned for casting developments.

And Octavio Solis will direct a musical he's written with Adam Gwon entitled Cloudlands, in which an 18-year-old embarks on a dangerous path after she learns her mother is having an affair. Courtney Stokes plays the teenager; Heather Ayres is her mother. Daniel Guzman, Ethan Le Phong and Robert Mammana round out the cast.

Anchoring the 14th annual Pacific Playwrights Festival are productions of Lauren Gunderson's Silent Sky, a beautiful historical drama based on the life of turn-of-the-century astronomer Henrietta Leavitt, and Itamar Moses' Completeness, a romantic comedy about two graduate students who find that love is the most complicated algorithm of all.

Since its creation in 1998, PPF has grown into one of the leading festivals of new plays in the country, devoted to showcasing some of the best new work on SCR's radar, in hopes of generating lively conversation, future world premieres and subsequent productions for myriad playwrights. Over the years, the festival has helped launch some of the most prominent plays in the American theatre, including Donald Margulies' Shipwrecked! An Entertainment, Lynn Nottage's Intimate Apparel, Nilo Cruz's Anna in the Tropics, Rolin Jones' The Intelligent Design of Jenny Chow and David Lindsay-Abaire's Pulitzer Prize-winning Rabbit Hole.

The Pacific Playwrights Festival is made possible with support from The Shubert Foundation, the Elizabeth George Foundation, the National Endowment for the Arts and the Pacific Playwrights Festival Honorary Producers (Sophie and Larry Cripe, Yvonne and Damien Jordan, John and Sue Murphy, Thomas B. Rogers and Sarah J. Anderson, and Linda and Tod White). Special thanks to The Harold and Mimi Steinberg Charitable Trust and The Edgerton Foundation for supporting South Coast Repertory's development of new plays.

The Wyndham Orange County Hotel is the official hotel of the Pacific Playwrights Festival, and Coast Magazine is the media partner.

TICKET PRICES for the 14th Pacific Playwrights Festival are $12 per individual reading, and $31-$66 for Silent Sky and Completeness. The festival runs April 29-May 1. Tickets can be purchased online at www.scr.org, by phone at (714) 708-5555 or in person at the SCR box office.

(Please note: Theater professionals interested in attending the festival should contact Kimberly Colburn at (714) 708-5841 or kimberly@scr.org. A special festival package consisting of one ticket to each of the seven events is available.)

LOCATION: South Coast Repertory is located at 655 Town Center Drive in Costa Mesa, at the Bristol Street/Avenue of the Arts exit off the San Diego (405) Freeway in the Folino Theatre Center, part of the Segerstrom Center for the Arts. Parking is available off Anton Blvd. on Park Center Drive.

ABOUT SCR: Tony Award-winning South Coast Repertory, under the artistic direction of David Emmes and Martin Benson, is widely recognized as one of the leading professional theaters in the United States. Founded in 1964, SCR is committed to theater that illuminates the compelling personal and social issues of our time, not only on its stages but through its education and outreach programs. While its productions represent a balance of classic and modern theater, SCR is renowned for its extensive new play development programs, including the Pacific Playwrights Festival. Of SCR's more than 450 productions, 117 have been world premieres with subsequent stagings achieving enormous success across America and around the world. SCR-developed works have garnered eight Pulitzer Prize nominations with Margaret Edson's Wit winning the prize in 1999 and David Lindsay-Abaire's Rabbit Hole in 2007. Located in Costa Mesa, California, in 2002 SCR opened the Folino Theater Center, an expanded three-theater complex that includes the 507-seat Segerstrom Stage, the 336-seat Julianne Argyros Stage and the 94-seat Nicholas Studio.

ABOUT THE PLAYWRIGHTS

Lauren Gunderson received her MFA from NYU Tisch School of the Arts, her BFA from Emory, and is an NYU Reynolds Fellow in Social Entrepreneurship. Emilie: La Marquise Du Châtelet Defends Her Life Tonight was commissioned and premiered at SCR in 2009, and is now published by Samuel French. Fire Work was developed at The O'Neill's National Playwrights Conference, and won the 2011 Aurora Theatre Company's Global Age Project. Her 2011 three-city rolling world premiere of Exit, Pursued By A Bear includes Synchronicity Theatre, Crowded Fire and ArtsWest Theatre. The Space-capades of Dr. Wonderful and Her Dog premieres at The Kennedy Center this October. She is currently developing two musicals for the Kennedy Center, one with Harry Connick, Jr. and John Rando, and a play for SF Playhouse. She has developed plays with Second Stage Theatre and Primary Stages, Marin Theatre Company, New Repertory Theatre, Playwrights Foundation, Crowded Fire, Aurora Theatre Company, Magic Theatre, Kitchen Dog Theater, Synchronicity Theatre, Actor's Express, Portland Center Stage, WordBRIDGE, Brave New Works and others. She received a Sloan Science Script Award (2008) for her screenplay Grand Unification. She teaches and speaks on the intersection of science and theatre, and writes for The Huffington Post. www.LaurenGunderson.com.

Itamar Moses is the author of the full-length plays Outrage, Bach at Leipzig (produced at SCR in 2006), Celebrity Row, The Four of Us, Yellowjackets, Back Back Back and The Den, the musicals Fortress of Solitude (with Michael Friedman) and Nobody Loves You (with Gaby Alter), and the short play collection Love/Stories (or But You Will Get Used to It). His work has appeared Off-Broadway, at regional theatres across the country, and in Canada, and is published by Faber & Faber and Samuel French. He has received new play commissions from the McCarter Theatre, Playwrights Horizons, Berkeley Repertory Theatre, The Wilma Theater, Manhattan Theatre Club, South Coast Repertory, Lincoln Center and the Goodman Theatre. He holds an MFA in Dramatic Writing from NYU and has taught playwriting at Yale and NYU. He is a member of the Dramatists Guild, MCC's Playwriting Coalition, and is a New York Theatre Workshop Usual Suspect. On television, he writes for both "Men of a Certain Age" on TNT and "Boardwalk Empire" on HBO. He was born in Berkeley and now lives in Brooklyn.

Steven Drukman is thrilled to return to the Pacific Playwrights Festival, where his play Truth and Beauty was presented in 2002. His play The Bullet Round-read as part of South Coast Repertory's NewSCRipts-received its world premiere at Arena Stage in Portland, Oregon, in 2009. His newest play, The Innocents, premiered this month at Asolo Repertory Theatre. In This Corner (on the Louis/Schmeling bouts) premiered January 2008 at The Old Globe and won the Critics' Circle "Best New Play" award. Other produced plays: Another Fine Mess (Portland Center Stage, Pulitzer Prize Nomination for Drama, 2003), Going Native (Long Wharf Theatre), Flattery Will Get You (Connecticut Repertory Theatre), Collateral Damage (Illusion Theater, Minneapolis) and Snowmaiden (Bob Hope Theatre, Dallas). Drukman's work has been developed by Mark Taper Forum, Intiman Theatre, Sundance Theatre Lab, Williamstown Theatre Festival, Playwrights Horizons, New York Theatre Workshop, Lark Play Development Center and many others. Awards: Edgerton Award for New Plays, Craig Noel Award, Paul Green Award, Alfred P. Sloan Award, Ovid Foundation, and Boston Theatre Works. Other writing: The New York Times, The Village Voice, The International Herald Tribune, The Nation and others. He is the former senior editor of American Theatre magazine. Drukman teaches playwriting at NYU.

Adam Gwon was named one of "50 to Watch" by The Dramatist magazine and won the 2008 Fred Ebb Award for excellence in musical theater songwriting. Gwon's projects include Ordinary Days (Roundabout Theatre Company, South Coast Repertory, London's West End), as well as the upcoming The Boy Detective Fails (book: Joe Meno) and Bernice Bobs Her Hair (book/lyrics: Julia Jordan). His other honors include the ASCAP Harold Adamson award, the MAC John Wallowitch award and a MAC award nomination for best song, as well as commissions from South Coast Repertory, Signature Theatre, Broadway Across America, and the EST/Sloan Project. Recordings: Ordinary Days (Ghostlight Records). Fellowships: MacDowell Colony, Dramatists Guild. Education: NYU's Tisch School of the Arts.

Meg Miroshnik's plays include The Tall Girls and The Recessions are Coming!. Her work has been produced by Perishable Theatre, Yale Cabaret, Brown University's New Plays Festival; developed by South Coast Repertory, WordBRIDGE, A.R.T. Institute, The Powerhouse Theater; and published in Best American Short Plays, 2008-2009 (Applause, 2010). Her play The Fairytale Lives of Russian Girls is the winner of the 2011-2012 Kendeda Graduate Playwriting Award and will be produced by ALLIANCE THEATRE in February 2012. She is the recipient of a commission from South Coast Repertory and was a visiting instructor in Theater at Wesleyan University during the Fall 2010 semester. Meg is currently an MFA candidate at the Yale School of Drama (graduation expecTed May 2011), studying playwriting under Paula Vogel.

Octavio Solis is a San Francisco playwright whose works The Pastures of Heaven, Lydia, Lethe, Gibraltar, The Ballad of Pancho and Lucy, Bethlehem, Dreamlandia, El Otro, Man of the Flesh, Prospect, El Paso Blue, Santos & Santos and La Posada Mágica have been mounted at Yale Repertory Theatre, the Mark Taper Forum, the Oregon Shakespeare Festival, the Denver Center for the Performing Arts, the Magic Theatre, Intersection for the Arts, South Coast Repertory, the San Diego Repertory Theatre, the San Jose Repertory Theatre and Cornerstone Theatre. Solis has received the NEA 1995-97 Playwriting Fellowship, the Will Glickman Playwright Award, the 1998 TCG/NEA Theatre Artists in Residence Grant, the 1998 McKnight Fellowship Grant from the Playwrights Center in Minneapolis, and the National Latino Playwriting Award for 2003. Solis is a Thornton Wilder Fellow for the MacDowell Colony, a New Dramatists alum and a member of the Dramatists Guild.

Catherine Trieschmann's plays include The Bridegroom of Blowing Rock (Weissberger Award), crooked, The World of Others, Hot Georgia Sunday and Small and Selfish Creatures. Her work has been produced Off-Broadway at Women's Project & Productions, the Bush Theatre (London), the New Theatre (Sydney), American Theatre Co., Florida Stage, Summer Play Festival, Actors Theatre of Louisville, Theatre In The Square, the Edinburgh Fringe Festival and FringeNYC. It has been developed with Manhattan Theatre Club, Lark Play Development Center, LAByrinth Theatre Co., Williamstown Theatre Festival, Florida Studio Theatre, Ars Nova and Dallas Theater Center. She has received commissions from South Coast Repertory and Manhattan Theatre Club. Her work is published by Samuel French, Methuen, Smith & Kraus and is featured in The Best New Playwrights of 2009. She also wrote the screenplay for the film Angel's Crest, featuring Jeremy Piven and Kate Walsh. Originally from Athens, Georgia, she currently resides in a small town in western Kansas.

Sharr White's plays have been developed or produced at theatres across the country, including Actors Theatre of Louisville, Oregon Shakespeare Festival, Marin Theatre Company, Lincoln Center Theater's Directors Lab, Key West Theatre Festival and South Coast Repertory. White's The Other Place is just finishing its world premiere Off-Broadway with MCC Theatre, directed by Joe Mantello and starring Laurie Metcalf. The Other Place is a recipient of the 2010 Playwrights First Award and the Blanche and Irving Laurie Foundation's Theatre Visions Fund Award. White's Sunlight was a South Coast Repertory commission, appeared at the 2008 Pacific Playwrights Festival, and was subsequently the recipient of the 2009 Skye Cooper New American Play Prize as well as a National New Play Network rolling world premiere, with productions at Marin Theatre Company (premiere), Seattle's ArtsWest, Phoenix Theatre, and New Jersey Repertory Company. White's Six Years was produced at the 30th Anniversary Humana Festival of New American Plays and was the recipient of a New York Foundation for the Arts fellowship.

14TH ANNUAL PACIFIC PLAYWRIGHTS FESTIVAL LINEUP

Fully-Produced World Premieres

SILENT SKY
by Lauren Gunderson
directed by Anne Justine D'Zmura
(Through May 1 on the Segerstrom Stage)

PPF Schedule:
Friday, April 29, at 8 p.m.; Saturday, April 30, at 2:30 & 8 p.m.; Sunday, May 1, at 2:30 p.m.

In the early 1900s, women astronomers weren't taken seriously. But when Henrietta Leavitt studied the stars, what she found there altered her life-and changed our universe forever.

COMPLETENESS
by Itamar Moses
directed by Pam MacKinnon
(Previews April 17 - 21; Runs April 22 - May 8 on the Julianne Argyros Stage)

PPF Schedule:
Friday, April 29, at 7:45 p.m.; Saturday, April 30, at 2 & 7:45 p.m.; Sunday, May 1, at 2 & 7:45 p.m.

Megabytes and microbes collide in a 21st century romantic comedy about the timeless confusions of love.

Staged Readings

(schedule subject to change)

THE PRINCE OF ATLANTIS
by Steven Drukman
Friday, April 29, at 1 p.m. on the Segerstrom Stage

Joey is a successful businessman. His brother Kevin has never amounted to anything. But the tables begin to turn when Joey goes to jail just as his long-lost son turns up.

HOW THE WORLD BEGAN
by Catherine Trieschmann
Friday, April 29, at 3:30 p.m. on the Julianne Argyros Stage

Folks in Plainview, Kansas, get up in arms when a new teacher, a transplant from New York City, makes an offhand comment in her biology class-about the origins of life.

THE DROLL
{Or, a Stage-Play about the END of Theatre}
by Meg Miroshnik
Friday, April 29, at 8 p.m. and Saturday, April 30, at 2:30 & 8 p.m. in the Nicholas Studio

In a world where theatre has been banned by government edict-where zealots rule with an iron fist-young Nim Dullyn sets out to reclaim the art of the stage for himself-and the world.

ANNAPURNA
by Sharr White
Saturday, April 30, at 10:30 a.m. on the Julianne Argyros Stage

Out of friends, out of luck, and out of time, Ulysses is resigned to spending the remaining weeks of his life in solitude until Emma walks in...much as she walked out 20 years ago.

CLOUDLANDS
Book by Octavio Solis
Music by Adam Gwon
Lyrics by Octavio Solis and Adam Gwon
Sunday, May 1, at 10:30 a.m. on the Segerstrom Stage

The mystery of her mother's secret life leads a young woman to become lost in the labyrinth of her own heart in this stunning new musical drama about desire and its transgressions.

 

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