Roundabout Theatre Company Reveals 2024 Underground Reading Series
The Reading Series will feature new works by Dylan Guerra, Matthew Libby, Alex Lin, Ankita Raturi, and Arun Welandawe-Prematilleke.
By: Chloe Rabinowitz Jan. 17, 2024
Roundabout Theatre Company has revealed the 2024 Roundabout Underground Reading Series, a five-night event that includes nightly readings of new works written by emerging artists, with post-show receptions. The Reading Series will feature new works by Dylan Guerra, Matthew Libby, Alex Lin, Ankita Raturi, and Arun Welandawe-Prematilleke.
The Roundabout Underground Reading Series is February 12 – 16, 2024 at 5:00PM at the Black Box Theatre in the Harold and Miriam Steinberg Center for Theatre (111 West 46th Street).
Roundabout Underground exists to provide a new generation of playwrights with their debut New York productions, at Roundabout’s 62-seat Black Box Theatre at the Harold and Miriam Steinberg Center for Theatre. To encourage the widest possible audience, all seats are $30.
A part of Roundabout’s New Play Initiative, Roundabout Underground is now in its 16th season. Its mission is focused on discovering new writers, producing their New York debuts, and providing them long-term development and production support. In addition to the Black Box production, every Underground playwright receives a commission for a future play.
The playwrights whose work has been featured as part of Roundabout Underground are Stephen Karam (Speech & Debate, 2007), Steven Levenson (The Language of Trees, 2008), Adam Gwon (Ordinary Days, 2009), Kim Rosenstock (Tigers Be Still, 2010), David West Read (The Dream of the Burning Boy,2011), Andrew Hinderaker (Suicide, Incorporated, 2011), Joshua Harmon (Bad Jews, 2012), Meghan Kennedy (Too Much, Too Much, Too Many, 2013), Jeff Augustin (Little Children Dream of God, 2015), Lindsey Ferrentino (Ugly Lies the Bone, 2015), Jenny Rachel Weiner (Kingdom Come, 2016), Mansa Ra (Too Heavy for Your Pocket, 2017), Martín Zimmerman (On the Exhale, 2017), Ming Peiffer (Usual Girls, 2018), Alex Lubischer (Bobbie Clearly, 2018), Selina Fillinger (Something Clean, 2019), Daniel Zaitchik (Darling Grenadine, 2020), Sanaz Toossi (English, 2022), Dave Harris (Exception to the Rule, 2022), Harrison David Rivers (the bandaged place, 2022), and York Walker (Covenant, 2023).
THE GRIEF EATER NEAR NORTH BENDER
By Dylan Guerra, Directed by Dustin Wills
Monday, February 12 at 5:00PM
People are getting eaten, others are losing their memory; the Grief Eater is back in North Bender with a vengeance. It's up to Byron and his thrown-together team of aggressive, half-drunk, selfish, heartbroken North Bender citizens to stop the monster before it devours the existence of everyone they love.
NO ONE PLAYS BADMINTON IN AMERICA
By Ankita Raturi, Directed by Rebecca Wear
Tuesday, February 13 at 5:00PM
Citra and Melati are highly ranked youth badminton players, ready to represent Indonesia internationally. While Melati starts traveling to play in major tournaments on her own, Citra immigrates with her family to Washington D.C., leaving her badminton dreams behind. As they navigate coming of age, each has what the other wants. A play about young athletic excellence, young long-distance friendship, and young love (mostly hormones). Above all, No One Plays Badminton in America is a love letter to badminton that asks what it means to figure out who you are away from home.
DATA
By Matthew Libby, Co-Directed by Adam Coy and Tyne Rafaeli
Wednesday, February 14 at 5:00PM
Maneesh is a brilliant entry-level programmer at Athena Technologies, a prominent data-mining firm in Silicon Valley. Content to work in the low-stress environment of User Experience, Maneesh has a crisis of conscience when he is offered a transfer to the more-central Data Analytics team, and learns the true nature of Athena’s work. Torn between the idealism of his friend Riley and the fierce company loyalty of his mentor Jonah, Maneesh is forced to come to terms with his unique American identity, and decide the personal and societal cost of his work — all while learning the extent to which Athena is willing to go to hide its secrets.
CHINESE REPUBLICANS
By Alex Lin
Thursday, February 15 at 5:00PM
When high-flying finance it-girl Katie Liu loses the promotion of a lifetime to a nepo-baby colleague, she embarks on a treacherous endeavor to make a labor union out of her Republican work aunties. Welcome to the world of Chinese Republicans, where the best bags are Birkin, the best shoes are Prada, and the best president is Reagan.
THE PRESENT
By Arun Welandawe-Prematilleke, Directed by Devin E. Haqq
Friday, February 16 at 5:00PM
On an island in the Indian Ocean there is no past, only the present. Progress moves at rapid speed and a new high-rise pops up almost daily over The Remains of the old city, until digging for foundations leads to the digging up of ghosts. A play about the defiant act of remembrance.
TICKET INFORMATION
A very limited number of FREE tickets to the reading series will be available to the general public. Tickets can be reserved by emailing undergroundreadings@roundabouttheatre.org.
PERFORMANCE SCHEDULE
There will be one reading each night at 5:00PM, Monday, February 12 – Friday, February 16 at the Black Box Theatre in the Harold and Miriam Steinberg Center for Theatre (111 West 46th Street).
BIOGRAPHIES
Adam Coy (co-director, Data) is a Ukrainian-Tejano director, curator of vibes, and actor based in New York City, originally from San Antonio. Directing: Holes in the Shape of My Father (Public Theater UTR), What Else is True, Crave, and Zabelle (Egg & Spoon). Associate: Broadway Doubt (Roundabout) Assisting: Off-Broadway Spain (Second Stage), The Coast Starlight (Lincoln Center), Tambo & Bones, Wish You Were Here, Selling Kabul (Playwrights Horizons). Adam is Associate Artistic Director of Egg & Spoon Theatre Collective, alumni of Roundabout Directors Group, the 21-22 Playwrights Horizons Directing Fellow, and a TCG Rising Leader of Color. BFA in Acting, Syracuse University.
DYLAN GUERRA (playwright, The Grief Eater Near North Bender) is a Brooklyn-based queer Latine writer/director originally from Miami. His short film Didn't Think I'd See You Here is an official selection for the 2024 Sundance Film Festival. He was on the Emmy-nominated writing team of Max's “The Other Two” (Season 3) on which he also appeared as an actor. He currently is developing a queer horror film he wrote and is set to direct with Picturestart & GetLftd. He has four different television series in development with A24, Temple Hill/Animal Pictures, Jax, and Family Owned Entertainment. As a playwright, he is the recipient of Playwrights Horizon's Winegarten Commission and MTC's Sloane Commission. He has been a member of Ars Nova's Playgroup, EST's Youngblood and P73's Interstate 73. His solo-show Find Him recurred Off-Broadway at Ars Nova. His most recent play The Astronomers was presented in part at the American Museum of Natural History in Fall 2023 in collaboration with MTC. Dylan was a writer and host of AMC's online horror-comedy entertainment platform Fear HQ where he created the online series “Slasher Town.”
Devin E. Haqq (director, The Present) is an Emmy nominated producer, a member of the Roundabout Directors Group Cohort 4, a member of the Fiasco Theatre Acting Company, and a Finalist for the 2020 HBOAccess Directing Fellowship. He made his stage directorial debut in 2020 with a much celebrated production of the critically acclaimed Pass Over by Antoinette Nwandu at Luna-Stage/">Luna Stage in West Orange, NJ. Devin has since gone on to direct workshops and staff as an associate director on productions for such organizations as The Public Theater, Roundabout Theatre Company, The Folger, Shakespeare's Globe, NYU Tisch School of the Arts, Fiasco, and the National Black Theatre.
MATTHEW LIBBY (playwright, Data) is a writer and actor, based in Brooklyn. A 2022-2023 Dramatists Guild Foundation Fellow, his plays Dataand Sisters won, respectively, the 2020 Kendeda Playwriting Prize and the 2023 Neukom Award; he has additionally been a Theater Masters Visionary Playwright, two-time Princess Grace Award finalist, and three-time O’Neill Playwrights Conference semifinalist. His work has been produced and developed by Alliance Theatre, New York Stage and Film, Northern Stage, Pioneer Theatre Company, The Kennedy Center, and others. As a TV writer, he's developing a pilot for Hulu with producer Beau Willimon. BS: Stanford University (cognitive science). MFA: NYU Tisch.
Alex Lin (playwright, Chinese Republicans) is just a girl from Jersey. Plays developed at Second Stage, NYTW, MTC, the O'Neill, South Coast Rep, Playwrights Realm, Central Square Theatre, and Theater Mu. Guest lectures at CMU, Rutgers, and Union College. As an actor, Actors Theatre of Louisville (The Wolves), New Victory (In the Land of Mauve & Gold), HVSF (Julius Caesar), Ma-Yi (The House of Billy Paul), Jewish Plays Project (Zionista Rising), and Commonwealth Shakespeare (Henry VI Part III, Richard III). Susan Smith Blackburn Prize nominee and Weissberger Award nominee.
Tyne Rafaeli (co-director, Data) directs for stage, screen and audio. Recent productions include Jen Silverman’s Spain (Second Stage), Keith Bunin's The Coast Starlight (Lincoln Center Theatre), Brian Watkins' Epiphany (Lincoln Center Theatre), Sylvia Khoury’s Selling Kabul (Playwrights Horizons); Ming Peiffer's Usual Girls (Roundabout), Craig Lucas' I Was Most Alive With You (Playwright's Horizons) and Lauren Yee’s In a Word (Cherry Lane). Her work has also been seen at The Public, MTC, Atlantic, Williamstown Theatre Festival, La Jolla, CSC and MCC amongst others. TV: “The Good Fight,” “Single Drunk Female,” “Evil.” Upcoming TV: “Tell Me Lies” & “Elsbeth.”
ANKITA RATURI (she/her, playwright, No One Plays Badminton in America) is a currently Queens-based writer and teaching artist who grew up in Capital Cities, pediatric gastroenterology offices, and the bisexual closet. She writes hyper-theatrical works in Hindi/Urdu, English, and sometimes Bahasa Indonesia about living between cultural identities and contending with the ongoing legacies of colonization. 2022 Winner of the Bret Adams and Paul Reisch Foundation’s Ollie Award. New play development: Ma-Yi Theater Company, South Coast Repertory, Ensemble Studio Theatre, Playwrights Realm, Cygnet Theatre, Artists at Play, The COOP, Atlantic Pacific Theatre, Theater Masters, Hypokrit Theatre Company, New York Shakespeare Exchange, Pete’s Candy Store, Natyabharati. Devised work with Charlotte Murray: Fresh Ground Pepper, Corkscrew Theater Festival, Dixon Place. B.F.A. in Drama: NYU/Tisch. M.F.A. in Playwriting: UC San Diego.
REBECCA WEAR (director, No One Plays Badminton in America) Select directing credits include Hometown Boy (Actor’s Express, Atlanta, World Premiere), Mongrel (Know Theatre of Cincinnati, World Premiere), The Chinese Lady (Artists At Play, Los Angeles, West Coast Premiere),Kim’s Convenience (Co-production: Aurora Theatre and Horizon Theatre, Atlanta); TEA (HERO Theatre, Los Angeles); Obedient Steel (HERE Arts Center, New York, World Premiere), Samsara (Coeurage Theatre, Los Angeles), and site specific locations including Pyramid Hill Sculpture Garden (Cincinnati) and Metro Baptist Church (New York). Associate directing credits include 2017 Pulitzer Prize Winner, Sweat (Oregon Shakespeare Festival, Arena Stage, World Premiere). Rebecca has developed plays with Ojai Playwrights Conference, Geffen Playhouse, The Playwrights Realm, East West Players, IAMA, Boston Court Pasadena, Cygnet Theatre, Artists At Play, Echo Theater, Circle X, Rogue Artists Ensemble, and others. Her work has been Ovation Recommended (Los Angeles), Suzi Recommended (Atlanta), awarded Annual Best of Cincinnati, and more. She was a 2023 Pfaelzer Award Finalist (New York Stage and Film); 2019 National Directing Fellow (SDCF, NNPN, O'Neill, Kennedy Center); and is a HERO Theatre Resident Director. Up next: Kairos (Know Theatre of Cincinnati, World Premiere).
ARUN WELLANDAWE-PREMATILLEKE (playwright, The Present) is a Sri Lankan playwright, actor and director. Born in Helsinki, Arun has lived and studied in Colombo, London and New York and his work is representative of an international, intersectional world-view. He served as Associate Artistic Director at Mind Adventures Theatre Company from 2011 to 2017. His plays include Paraya, Only Soldiers and, The One Who Loves You So, for which he received the Gratiaen Prize for Literature and was published by Perera Hussein books in Sri Lanka. His work focuses primarily on queerness, class and our relationships to national histories.
Dustin Wills (director, The Grief Eater Near North Bender) is a theatre and opera director based in New York City. Upcoming productions include Tchaikovsky's Eugene Onegin (Heartbeat Opera), Mozart’s Le Nozze di Figaro with Anthony Roth Costanzo (Little Island NYC), Jeremy O Harris’ A Boy’s Company Presents: Tell Me If I’m Hurting You, and some unannounced secret stuff (!!) Recent theatre: Hansol Jung’s Wolf Play (2023 Lucille Lortel Award for Outstanding Direction and Production), John J. Caswell Jr.’s Wet Brain (Playwrights Horizons/MCC), Kate Tarker’s Montag (Soho Rep), and Awful Event! (Baryshnikov Arts Center Residency). Recent opera: Handel’s Alcina, Mozart’s Die Zauberflöte and Stravinsky’s соловей. Dustin has devised new work with Teatro L’Arciliuto in Rome, Italy, created large-scale puppetry pageants with Creative Action, trained with Augusto Boal in Theatre of the Oppressed legislative performance, and for a couple of years gave rogue tours of the Vatican. He is an SDCF Callaway Award finalist, Princess Grace Award recipient, a Drama League alum, and Boris Sagal directing fellow. He teaches in the Directing and Playwriting programs at the David Geffen School of Drama at Yale with a focus on new play development and directing for opera.
The Harold and Miriam Steinberg Center for Theatre opened in March 2004 with an acclaimed premiere of Lynn Nottage’s Intimate Apparel starring Viola Davis, directed by Dan Sullivan. Since that landmark production, the center has expanded beyond the Laura Pels Theatre to include the Black Box Theatre and now a new education center. The Steinberg Center continues to reflect Roundabout’s commitment to produce new works by established and emerging writers as well as revivals of classic plays. This state-of-the-art off-Broadway theatre and education complex is made possible by a major gift from The Harold and Mimi Steinberg Charitable Trust. The Trust was created in 1986 by Harold Steinberg to promote and advance American Theatre as a vital part of our culture by supporting playwrights, encouraging the development and production of new work, and providing financial assistance to not-for-profit theatre companies across the country. Since its inception, the Trust has awarded over $70 million to more than 125 theatre organizations.
Roundabout Underground’s home is a 62-seat Black Box Theatre, which is also used year-round by Roundabout’s education department for its activities including student productions and professional development workshops.
Roundabout Theatre Company celebrates the power of theatre by spotlighting classics from the past, cultivating new works of the present, and educating minds for the future. A not-for-profit company, Roundabout fulfills that mission by producing familiar and lesser-known plays and musicals; discovering and supporting talented playwrights; reducing the barriers that can inhibit theatergoing; collaborating with a diverse team of artists; building educational experiences; and archiving over five decades of production history.
Roundabout Theatre Company presents a variety of plays and musicals on its five stages: Broadway’s Todd Haimes Theatre, Studio 54 and Stephen Sondheim Theatre, and Off-Broadway’s Harold and Miriam Steinberg Center for Theatre, which houses the Laura Pels Theatre and Black Box Theatre.
Roundabout Theatre Company has been working to prioritize and actively incorporate anti-racism, equity, diversity, inclusion, and accountability throughout the institution. Read more about the company’s progress and timeline at edi.roundabouttheatre.org.
Roundabout productions are supported, in part, with public funds from the New York City Department of Cultural Affairs in partnership with the City Council, the New York State Council on the Arts with the support of Governor Hochul and the New York State Legislature.
Roundabout’s current and upcoming 2023-2024 productions include: Jonah by Rachel Bonds, directed by Danya Taymor; Doubt: A Parable by John Patrick Shanley, directed by Scott Ellis; and Home by Samm-Art Williams, directed by Kenny Leon. The 2024-2025 season includes Yellow Face by David Henry Hwang, directed by Leigh Silverman; The Counter by Meghan Kennedy, directed by David Cromer; English by Sanaz Toossi, directed by Knud Adams; Liberation by Bess Wohl, directed by Whitney White; and The Pirates of Penzance by W.S. Gilbert and Arthur Sullivan, adapted by Rupert Holmes, choreographed by Warren Carlyle, directed by Scott Ellis.
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