newTACTics Festival to Continue with THREE WISE GUYS

THREE WISE GUYS by Scott Alan Evans & Jeffrey Couchman, directed by Scott Alan Evans+, is up next as part of TACT's newTACTics Festival.

Based on the stories "Dancing Dan's Christmas" and "The Three Wise Guys" by Damon Runyon, the show features Jeremy Beck*+, Joel Hurt Jones+, Karl Kenzler*+, Ron McClary*+, Dana Smith-Croll*+, Richard Thieriot*+, and Emily Walton+.

Readings are set for this week, Wednesday, June 14th, 7:00pm and Thursday, June 15th, 7:00pm.

Synopsis: Christmas Eve, 1932. Three New York wise guys on the run from a hotheaded racketeer journey from a Manhattan speakeasy to a swanky Long Island mansion to a ramshackle barn in Pennsylvania, inadvertently spreading holiday cheer everywhere they go. Based on two short stories by Damon Runyon (Guys and Dolls), this effervescent comedy fizzes with laughter and heart.

Scott Alan Evans (Playwright/Director) is the Executive Artistic Director of TACT/The Actors Company Theatre, the award-winning Off-Broadway company in New York City dedicated to discovering lost or underappreciated plays of literary merit. He is the author of the play The Triangle Factory Fire Project (Dramatist Play Service); the musicals Goose! Beyond the Nursery (3 Outer Critic Circle Award nominations); Charlotte and Shaw (Eugene O'Neill semi-finalist), and numerous classical adaptations. His Off-Broadway directing credits includes: Home, Incident at Vichy, The Cocktail Party, Three Men on a Horse, Beyond Therapy and She Stoops to Conquer, among others.

Jeffrey Couchman (Playwright) has worked in Hollywood, collaborating on screenplays for various studios, and has written the book and lyrics for two musicals: Blood and Fire and Battleship Potemkin (most recently performed in Berlin at Gallisas Theaterverlag). His fiction has been published in many literary journals. He is the author of the well-received book "The Night of the Hunter": A Biography of a Film and editor of an annotated edition of two film scripts by James Agee, "The African Queen" and "The Night of the Hunter": First and Final Screenplays (part of The Works of James Agee), a series published by University of Tennessee Press. He is currently translating a new German musical, Zeppelin, into English.

Damon Runyon was an American newspaperman and short story writer, best known for his stories celebrating the world of Broadway in New York City. To readers of his generation, a "Damon Runyon character" evoked a distinctive social type from the Prohibition era demi-monde. The adjective "Runyonesque" references these characters as well as a distinctive vernacular style mixing formal speech and colorful slang, almost always in present tense and devoid of contractions. Runyon's fictional world is known to the general public through the musical Guys and Dolls based on two of his stories, "The Idyll of Miss Sarah Brown" and "Blood Pressure," and the film Little Miss Marker (and its two remakes: Sorrowful Jones in 1949 and again as Little Miss Marker in 1980), among others.

All readings will take place at the TACT Studio at 900 Broadway, Suite 905, preceded by a complimentary wine reception and followed by a moderated talkback with the playwright, director, and cast.

Performances are open to the public and free of charge, and reservations are required. Please click on this link to fill out the reservation form, or send an email to newTACTics@tactnyc.org with any questions.

* Indicates TACT Company Member
+ Member, Actors Equity Association

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