New Georges (Susan Bernfield, Artistic Director; Sarah Cameron Sunde, Associate Director), the OBIE Award-winning downtown theater company founded in 1992, and Hip-Hop Theater Festival will present the premiere of OBIE Winning Actress/Pulitzer-nominated playwright Eisa Davis' "ANGELA'S MIXTAPE," directed by Liesl Tommy. Ms. Davis who was recently seen on Broadway in last season's award-winning musical Passing Strange will portray herself and Linda Powell, last seen on Broadway in the Tony-nominated revival On Golden Pond, will portray her aunt, professor and activist Angela Davis. "ANGELA'S MIXTAPE" will be performed at the Ohio Theatre, 66 Wooster Street (between Spring and Broome Streets). Previews begin Monday, April 6, and the official Opening Night will be Thursday, April 9 at 7:00 p.m. Performances will run through May 2.
Eisa Davis is a writer and performer whose plays include Bulrusher (2007 Pulitzer Prize finalist), Warriors Don't Cry, Hip Hop Anansi, Paper Armor, Six Minutes and Umkovu. She is a resident playwright at New Dramatists, and her playwriting honors include the Helen Merrill Award and the John Lippman New Frontier Award. This summer, her play The History of Light will be presented at the Contemporary American Theater Festival in West Virginia. As an actor she won an OBIE for her performance in Stew and Heidi Rodewald's Public Theater/ Berkeley Repertory Theatre production of Passing Strange, which also moved to Broadway. Film director Spike Lee filmed the final three Broadway Passing Strange performances and premiered the film at this year's Sundance Film Festival. Eisa has starred in many theatrical productions in New York and at regional theatres around the country. On Broadway she was also seen in The Violet Hour, and Off-Broadway in Belize and June and Jean in Concert. Her television appearances include: "The Wire," "Law & Order," and "Soul Food." Film appearances include: Passing Strange, Welcome to the Rileys, Robot Stories, The Architect, Confess, Apparition of the Eternal Church, and Happenstance. As a singer-songwriter her solo debut full-length album Something Else is available online at i-Tunes and CD Baby.
New Georges' (www.newgeorges.org) notable productions have included: Jenny Schwartz's God's Ear; Wendy Weiner's Hillary: A Modern Greek Tragedy With a (Somewhat) Happy Ending; Susan Bernfield's Stretch (a fantasia); Sheila Callaghan's Dead City (a winner of the 2007 Susan Smith Blackburn Prize); Deb Margolin's Three Seconds in the Key (winner of the 2005 Kesselring Prize); Lisa D'Amour's Anna Bella Eema; Jenny Lyn Bader's None of the Above; and Carson Kreitzer's Self Defense, or death of some salesmen. The company, in addition to producing regular seasons, is a play and artist development organization, providing essential resources and opportunities to a community of venturesome artists.
Hip-Hop Theater Festival (www.hhtf.org) was founded in 2000 and continues to invigorate the fields of theater and Hip-Hop by: nurturing the creation of innovative work within the Hip-Hop aesthetic; presenting and touring American and international artists whose work addresses the issues relevant to the Hip-Hp generation; and serving young, urban communities through outreach and education that celebrates contemporary language and culture. "ANGELA'S MIXTAPE" is being presented with New Georges and Hip-Hop Theater Festival as a joint world premiere with Synchronicity Performance Group (Atlanta), who produced it in 2008. The complete schedule for "ANGELA'S MIXTAPE" (April 6 through May 2) will be: Mondays through Saturdays at 8:00 p.m. The opening night performance on Thursday, April 9 will start at 7:00 pm. The ticket price will be $20.00 for general admission (including students and seniors), with a $35.00 reserved premium ticket also available. Monday night performances are "pay-what-you-will" at the door only. TDF vouchers will be accepted. The box office number for reservations is 212-868-4444 or www.smarttix.com. For more information and group rates call 646-336-8077.
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