Lauren Gunderson's I AND YOU Comes to Stages Repertory Theatre This May

Seth Gordon, Associate Artistic Director of Repertory Theatre of St. Louis and director of past Stages productions The Whipping Man, The Spiritualist and The Unexpected Man, returns to Stages Repertory Theatre to direct the Regional Premiere of Lauren Gunderson's I AND YOU, running May 4 - 22, 2016.

On the night before a high school assignment is due, Anthony arrives unexpectedly at his bedridden classmate's house to seek her help with the project. They awkwardly join forces to plumb the mysteries of Whitman's "Leaves of Grass"...unaware that a deeper mystery has brought them together. Winner of the 2014 ATCA/Steinberg New Play Award and a Susan Smith Blackburn Prize finalist, I AND YOU is a quick-witted mashup of poetry and punchy slang, adolescent uncertainty and profound beauty.

I AND YOU will star Mateo Mpinduzi-Mott (Marie Antoinette) and Melissa Molano (The Book of Maggie, Dollhouse).

On the creative team are: Properties Designer - Jodi Bobrovsky; Lighting Designer - Renee Brode; Costume Designer - Nara Lesser; Sound Designer - Phillip Owen; and Scenic Designer - Jon Young.

I AND YOU had its World Premiere in 2013 at Marin Theatre Company, after an appearance at the Pacific Playwrights Festival at South Coast Repertory, in 2012. Since then, it's been produced throughout the country, including Geva Theatre (2014) and The Repertory Theatre of St. Louis (2015).

Special Q&A performances including a post-show chat with the creative team will be held on the following days:
Sunday, May 8, 3:00p
Thursday, May 12, 7:30p
Sunday, May 15, 3:00p
Thursday, May 19, 7:30p

Regular performances play Wednesdays, Thursdays 7:30p, Fridays, Saturdays 8:00p, Sundays 3:00p at Stages Repertory Theatre, 3201 Allen Parkway Houston, TX 77019. This show is approximately 80 minutes long. Tickets: $21 - $65; 713.527.0123 or www.stagestheatre.com.

About Playwright Lauren Gunderson - Lauren is a playwright, screenwriter and short story author from Atlanta, GA. She received her BA in English/Creative Writing at Emory University, and her MFA in Dramatic Writing at NYU Tisch, where she was also a Reynolds Fellow in Social Entrepreneurship.

She was named on of the most produced playwrights in America by American Theatre Magazine in 2015, was awarded the 2016 Lanford Wilson Award from the Dramatist Guild, and was awarded the prestigious 2014 Steinberg/ATCA New Play Award for her play, I AND YOU (also a Susan Smith Blackburn Blackburn finalist). That play was an NNPN Rolling World Premiere that started at Marin Theatre Company and has seen over 30 productions nationwide. Bauer, commissioned by San Francisco Playhouse, premiered there and in NYC at 59E59 in 2014 with The New Yorker calling it "beautifully written... brings it audience to tears". Her play Silent Sky (Jane Chambers Award finalist) premiered at South Coast Rep in 2011 and was further developed and rewritten for TheatreWorks, which opened to raves calling it "sheer magic". Her 2011 3-city rolling world premiere of Exit, Pursued By A Bear, was featured in American Theatre Magazine and The Week, and has reached over 20 communities across the US winning "Best Comedy" accolades. Bear is now published by Playscripts, as is her comedy, Toil And Trouble and The Taming which the SF Chronicle called "a laugh riot with timely food for thought."

Her first musical, The Amazing Adventures of Dr. Wonderful and Her Dog! commissioned by The Kennedy Center, opened in DC to rave reviews and continues its life in a state-wide tours. Her first children's book based on the Dr. Wonderfrul will be released by Two Lions Publishing this fall. Emilie: La Marquise Du Chatelet Defends Her Tonight (published by Samuel French) was commissioned and premiered at South Coast Rep in 2009, and has run across the country and in England. By And By premiered at Shotgun Players in Berkeley. Fire Work was developed at The O'Neill National Playwrights Conference, and is a 2011 winner for Aurora Theatre's Global Age Project, and will premiere at Theatre First in 2014. She has developed plays with Second Stage, Red Bull, and Primary Stages in NYC; New Rep in Boston; Playwrights Foundation, Crowded Fire, TheatreWorks, Aurora Theatre, and The Magic Theatre in San Francisco; Kitchen Dog Theatre in Dallas; Synchronicity, Actor Express and Horizon Theatre in Atlanta; JAW at Portland Center Stage in Portland; WORDBridge, Brave New Works, and others.

Her work has received national praise and awards including being a Steinberg/ATCA New Play Award finalist, a Susan Smith Blackburn finalist, a Jane Chambers Award finalist, and winner of the Berrilla Kerr Award for American Theatre, Global Age Project, Young Playwright's Award, Eric Bentley New Play Award and Essential Theatre Prize.

She has been commissioned by South Coast Rep (3 times), San Francisco Playhouse (2 times), The Denver Center Theatre Company, Crowded Fire, CentralWorks, The Kennedy Center, The Alliance Theatre's Collision Project, Marin Theatre Company, Actors Express Theatre, Dad's Garage Theatre, Theatrical Outfit, City University of New York and Synchronicity Performance Group.

She received a Sloan Science Script Award (2008) for her screenplay Grand Unification. Leap was published with Theatre Emory's Playwriting Center (2004), her first collection of plays, Deepen The Mystery: Science and the South Onstage, is published with iUniverse (2006).and her short story, "The Ascending Life", won the Norembega Short Fiction Award and was published in the anthology, The Shape of Content; her science play Background was published in ISOTOPE: A Journal of Nature and Science Writing. Her string theory poem "Hook of a Number" was published in the anthology Riffing On Strings and her monologue "Mass" was published in The Science Creative Quarterly 2015.

She is writing a film for The Weinstein Company and has developed TV for MTV.

She has spoken nationally and internationally on the intersection of science and theatre and Arts Activism, and teaches playwriting in San Francisco. She is a Playwright in Resident at The Playwrights Foundation, a Dramatists Guild member, and was a member of Just Theatre's New Play Lab. She writes for The Huffington Post, The Wall Street Journal, tweets @LalaTellsAStory, and curates HowToPlaywright.com.

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