MTC Announces Full Cast For CONTINUITY

Lynne Meadow (Artistic Director) and Barry Grove (Executive Producer) are pleased to announce the complete casting for the world premiere of Continuity, the new play by Lortel and Drama Desk Award nominee Bess Wohl (Small Mouth Sounds, American Hero) and directed by Tony Award nominee Rachel Chavkin (Hadestown; Natasha, Pierre & The Great Comet of 1812).

The production will feature Max Baker (1984, The Explorers Club), Jasmine Batchelor (The River), Rosal Colon ("Orange is the New Black," Between Riverside and Crazy), Curran Connor (Pidgeon, A Picture of Autumn), Garcia ("Tales of the City"), Darren Goldstein (Lillian Hellman's The Little Foxes, The Madrid), Alex Hurt (Cardinal, The Whirligig) and Megan Ketch (The Big Wedding, "American Gothic").

The production is part of MTC's The Studio at Stage II - The Harold and Mimi Steinberg New Play Series, and will begin previews Wednesday, May 8, 2019 prior to a Tuesday, May 21, 2019 opening.

A sheet of ice sits in the desert of New Mexico. A mad eco-terrorist plants a bomb in order to save humankind. A beleaguered film crew tries to get in one last shot before losing the light. In Continuity, storytelling and science collide with hilarious and devastating consequences. The play asks, "How do we keep going when hope can seem as fictional as a Hollywood ending?" and also, "What's for lunch?"

This world premiere is by Bess Wohl (Small Mouth Sounds) and helmed by the Tony-nominated director Rachel Chavkin (Hadestown; Natasha, Pierre and the Great Comet of 1812).

Continuity's creative team includes Adam Rigg (scenic design), Brenda Abbandandolo (costume design), Isabella Byrd (lighting design), and Mikaal Sulaiman (sound design).

The Studio at Stage II has been partially underwritten with a major grant from The Harold and Mimi Steinberg Charitable Trust.

Continuity was commissioned and produced by MTC with major support from the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation as part of The Sloan Initiative: Setting the Stage for Science and Technology. Additional support is provided by the National Endowment for the Arts and an Edgerton Foundation New Play Award.

In addition, MTC is pleased to announce 8 recent recipients of the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation Initiative commissions. The commissioned writers are Brittany K. Allen, Eboni Booth, Nick Gandiello, Jessica Huang, Barney Norris, Charly Evon Simpson, Deborah Stein, and Alexis Zegerman.

Since 2001, MTC has awarded a total of 88 commissions through the Sloan Foundation Program.

"We are delighted to be producing the uproarious and heartbreaking MTC/Sloan commissioned play Continuity and lining up an extraordinary slate of newly commissioned writers. We are very grateful to the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation for their support over the last 18 years in creating an invaluable opportunity for playwrights to bring vital topics to thrilling theatrical life," said Elizabeth Rothman, MTC's Director of Play Development.

"We are thrilled to see the inspired casting for the world premiere of Bess Wohl's Continuity, a side-splitting, slyly brilliant play about climate change that was commissioned and produced by the Sloan Foundation partnership with MTC," said Doron Weber, Vice President and Program Director at the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation. "This pioneering collaboration to develop and produce original science-themed plays, now in its second decade, is pleased to announce eight new play commissions by some of the most gifted playwrights working in the theatre today."

MTC first collaborated with the Sloan Foundation in 2000 on the production of David Auburn's Tony Award and Pulitzer Prize-winning drama Proof. MTC's partnership with the Sloan Foundation has expanded to include multiple annual commissions for emerging, mid-level, and established writers as well as a production grant to stage Sloan-related works. In addition to Proof, Sloan supported MTC's production of Charlotte Jones' Humble Boy in 2003 as well as the recent productions of Sloan commissioned writer Rebecca Lenkiewicz's adaptation of An Enemy of the People, Sharr White's The Other Place, Nell Benjamin's The Explorers Club, and Nick Payne's Constellations and Incognito.

Since partnering with the Sloan Foundation, MTC has commissioned the following writers: Kevin Armento, Jeff Augustin, Courtney Baron & Juliana Nash, Jaclyn Backhaus, Clare Barron, Stephen Belber, Nell Benjamin, Glen Berger, Nina Braddock, Sarah Burgess, Christopher Chen, Steven Cosson, EV Crowe, Lisa D'Amour, April De Angelis, Jessica Dickey, Charles Evered, Kendall Feaver, Stella Feehily, Halley Feiffer & Joshua Schmidt, Selina Fillinger, Gracie Gardner, Madeleine George, Melissa James Gibson, Daniel Goldfarb, Rinne Groff, Dipika Guha, Alan Harris, Jiréh Breon Holder, Tom Holloway, Philip Howze, Sam Hunter, Ron Hutchinson, Nathan Jackson, Branden Jacobs-Jenkins, Nick Jones, Deirdre Kinahan, Lucy Kirkwood, Bryony Lavery, Rebecca Lenkiewicz, Kenneth Lin, Ethan Lipton, Craig Lucas, Martyna Majok, Caroline V. McGraw, Michael Mitnick, Peter Morris, Hannah Moscovitch, Itamar Moses, Rona Munro, Brett Neveu, Jiehae Park, Nick Payne, Greg Pierce, Max Posner, Hannie Rayson, Melissa Ross, Heidi Schreck, Mark Schultz, Jen Silverman, Eric Simonson, Al Smith, Dava Sobel, Celine Song, Simon Stephens, Shelagh Stephenson, Andrew Thompson, Sarah Treem, Catherine Trieschmann, James Anthony Tyler, John Walch, Anne Washburn, Jason Wells, Michael West, Beau Willimon, Bess Wohl, Alexandra Wood, and Anna Ziegler.

Manhattan Theatre Club, under the leadership of Artistic Director Lynne Meadow and Executive Producer Barry Grove, has become one of the country's most prominent and prestigious theatre companies. Over the past four and a half decades, MTC productions have earned numerous awards including 7 Pulitzer Prizes and 23 Tony Awards. MTC has a Broadway home at the Samuel J. Friedman Theatre (261 West 47th Street) and two Off-Broadway theatres at New York City Center (131 West 55th Street). Renowned MTC productions include Choir Boy by Tarell Alvin McCraney; the 2018 Pulitzer Prize winner Cost of Living by Martyna Majok; Lillian Hellman's The Little Foxes; August Wilson's Jitney and The Piano Lesson; Heisenberg by Simon Stephens; The Father by Florian Zeller with translation by Christopher Hampton; Fool For Love by Sam Shepard; Airline Highway by Lisa D'Amour; Casa Valentina by Harvey Fierstein; Outside Mullingar and Doubt by John Patrick Shanley; The Commons of Pensacola by Amanda Peet; Murder Ballad by Julia Jordan and Juliana Nash; The Assembled Parties by Richard Greenberg; Wit by Margaret Edson; Venus in Fur by David Ives; Good People and Rabbit Hole by David Lindsay-Abaire; The Whipping Man by Matthew Lopez; Time Stands Still by Donald Margulies; Ruined by Lynn Nottage; Proof by David Auburn; The Tale of the Allergist's Wife by Charles Busch; Love! Valour! Compassion! by Terrence McNally; Crimes of the Heart by Beth Henley; and Ain't Misbehavin', the Fats Waller musical. For more information on MTC, please visit www.ManhattanTheatreClub.com.

Tickets for Continuity can be purchased online at www.nycitycenter.org, by calling CityTix at 212-581-1212, or by visiting the New York City Center box office (131 West 55th Street). New and renewing subscribers can join MTC's 2018-2019 season now by calling MTC Subscriber Services at (212) 399-3030. For more information, please visit www.manhattantheatreclub.com.

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