First American Full-Length Play Written for Streaming, WAITING FOR THE HOST, to be Made Available for Viewing

On April 2, 2020, New York playwright Marc Palmieri was asked by a local Queens church to read the role of Jesus in a Zoom recording of the Passion, to stream during its pandemic-lockdown on-line Easter services. Finding the experience to be stuff of hilarious backstage comedy, Marc Palmieri sat down the same night and wrote Waiting For The Host, the first American full-length play composed for an on-line experience.

Play publisher Dramatists Play Service jumped at the opportunity to represent this first of its kind, and the play landed in the hands of Artistic Director of Penn State Centre Stage Rick Lombardo, who would premiere the play two weeks later (under the Working Title Streaming Passion) under his direction. An audience of some 1,000 viewers arrived at "curtain time," momentarily crashing the website.

After that American debut, the play was professionally produced again in New Jersey by The Theatre Project (Mark Spina, Art. Dir), then at Syracuse's Redhouse Arts, directed by Tony Award-nominee Hunter Foster.

Now, another first. Palmieri's "Zoom play" will have its international premiere in Singapore at Pangdemonium Theatre. Artistic Director Adrian Pang found that the experience of American life in the pandemic lockdown in Waiting For The Host was so similar to that in Singapore, that he and Marc could seamlessly adapt the setting to that country.

Pangdemonium, one of Singapore's leading professional theatres, is excited to welcome both Singaporean and American audiences. The play will be streamed online via SISTIC LIVE every Thursday to Sunday starting from 15 October 2020 to 1 November 2020, 9pm, Singapore time. An additional performance for audiences in the United States will stream on Sunday, 18 October 2020, 8pm (EST).

Early bird booking is now underway through 7 October 2020 at www.pangdemonium.com and SISTIC. DBS/POSB. Ticket price is SGD$45 (excluding SISTIC fee).

Waiting For The Host begins on the last night of Passover in April, 2020. While theatres, playgrounds, schools and houses of worship are shuttered by a modern plague, the rector of a small church seeks to record a theatrical reading of the story of the Passion for the church website. As exes bicker and technology confuses, this social distant endeavor quickly becomes chaotic. Still, in the effort, the group finds a strange, painful closeness, and that their comic and clumsy reading has become a kind of desperate prayer. In Act Two, ("Still Waiting"), the pandemic lockdown is well into its second month. Members of the church find themselves bitten by the "acting bug" since their reading and seek to launch a community theatre. They decide to showcase their skills with an "updated" version of medieval Biblical plays, and find they win the support of an unexpected guest.

The production is directed by Tracie Pang and stars Mina Kaye, Neo Swee Lin, Petrina Kow, Adrian Pang, Gavin Yap, Keagan Kang, and Zachary Pang.

Marc Palmieri's other plays include the New York Times' "Critic's Pick" Levittown (2009 Theatre at Saint Clements, NYC), The Groundling, Carl the Second and Poor Fellas, among others. All are published by Dramatists Play Service. His play for middle schoolers, S(cool) Days is being released by Brooklyn Publishers in September, 2020. He has had plays workshopped at South Coast Rep, The Lark, Rattlestick Playwright's Theatre, Axis Company, Redhouse Arts and many more. His screenplays include Miramax Films' Telling You starring Peter Facinelli and Jennifer Love Hewitt (1999). He has published in numerous anthologies, including Fiction, and The Global City Review. multiple annual Smith & Kraus The Best Stage Monologues and The Best Stage Scenes and in collections of short plays and monologues by Applause Books. Marc attended Wake Forest University where he minored in Theatre after being drafted by The Toronto Blue Jays. He received his M.A. and M.F.A. from The City College of New York. Marc lives in New York City and is currently a full-time faculty member at Mercy College's School of Liberal Arts in Dobbs Ferry teaching in the Communications Department. He is represented by literary agent Mary Harden.

Pangdemonium is a proudly Singaporean theatre company with a mission to tell stories which are challenging, inspiring, relevant, accessible, and above all, of the highest artistic, entertainment and production value. It also actively nurtures new talent by creating opportunities for aspiring artists and technical practitioners to work in a professional, challenging and nurturing environment.

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