Rolling Premiere of PULP to Play Phoenix, Williamston & Know Theatre of Cincinnati

The National New Play Network, the country's alliance of nonprofit theaters that champions the development, production, and continued life of new plays, announces Pulp by Joseph Zettelmaier as its 53rd Rolling World Premiere. The play will receive three distinct productions - the first at NNPN Core Member Phoenix Theatre (Indianapolis, IN), February 11-March 6, 2016, will be followed by productions at Associate Members Williamston Theatre (MI) from September 22-October 23, and Know Theatre of Cincinnati (OH) in October. NNPN provides production support to the playwright and the partnering theaters, including assistance with the creation and the contracting of the premiere agreement, collaborative interactions between the theaters, and funds for the playwright's residency in each city to further develop the play.

In 1930's Los Angeles, washed-up PI Frank Ellery takes on the strangest case of his life. A noted literary agent has been gruesomely murdered, and the four suspects are his remaining clients, all writers for different pulp magazines. Frank dives into the mystery, and his world turns upside down as life begins to imitate literature. In this new comedy, science fiction, romance, adventure, and horror combine with one down-on-his-luck gumshoe who's about to learn what really lurks between the lines.

Joseph Zettelmaier is a Michigan-based playwright and four-time nominee for the Steinberg/American Theatre Critics Association Award for best new play, first in 2006 for All Childish Things, then in 2007 for Language Lessons, in 2010 for It Came From Mars and in 2012 for Dead Man's Shoes. Other plays include Ebenezer, And The Creek Don't Rise, The All Childish Things Trilogy, Dr. Seward's Dracula, Snow Angels, Blackwater Ballad, Night Blooming, Point of Origin, and The Stillness Between Breaths. Point of Origin won Best Locally Created Script 2002 from the Ann Arbor News, and The Stillness Between Breaths also won Best New Play 2005 from the Oakland Press. The Stillness Between Breaths and It Came From Mars were selected to appear in the National New Play Network's National Showcase of New Plays. He also co-authored Flyover, USA: Voices From Men of the Midwest at the Williamston Theatre (Winner of the 2009 Thespie Award for Best New Script). He also adapted Christmas Carol'd for the Performance Network. It Came From Mars was a recipient of 2009's Edgerton Foundation New American Play Award, and won Best New Script 2010 from the Lansing State Journal. His play Dead Man's Shoes won the Edgerton Foundation New American Play Award in 2011. He is an Artistic Associate at First Folio Theatre, an Artistic Ambassador to the National New Play Network and an adjunct lecturer at Eastern Michigan University, where he teaches Dramatic Composition. jzettelmaier.com

Photo credit: Zach Rosing

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