Joshua William Gelb’s Blind Alley Guy Plays Incubator Arts June 23-July 2

Joshua William Gelb's Blind Alley Guy: Notes for an Unfinished Play by Eugene O'Neill plays June 23 - July 2

Performances are June 23, 24, 25, 27, 28, 30, July 1, 2
8pm curtain

Don't miss this summer's production by Joshua William Gelb, who nytheatre.com refers to as
"a director worth paying attention to".

A sociopathic gangster goes to the electric chair in the last play Eugene O'Neill ever attempted (and failed) to write.

Exactly two months after completing what would come to be considered his masterpiece, Long Day's Journey into Night, Eugene O'Neill conceived of a new drama about a gangster sentenced to death in the electric chair. For two years he developed this idea, drafting pages of handwritten notes. By then it was 1943 and O'Neill, at 55 years old, was beset by tremors in his hand so terrible he couldn't even hold a pencil. He abandoned writing in June of that year, ten years before his death. Blind Alley Guy would be the last play he would ever attempt.

Blind Alley Guy: Notes for Unfinished Play by Eugene O'Neill is highly physical, mashing clowning in the manner of Chaplin with the brooding tragic style of O'Neill's great work. Trapped in a cycle of varying edits and re-writes, the White Family is portrayed as frantic puppets of an unseen and obviously uncertain creator, hysterically reenacting moments of their story as they hurtle in no particular direction toward utter devastation.

Blind Alley Guy was devised and produced through the Carnegie Mellon University School of Drama as part of the New Works Festival.

Featuring: Elixabeth Alderfer, Joshua Isaacs*, Daniel allen Nelson* and Justin Nestor
*Appearing courtesy of Actor's Equity

Conceived and Directed by Joshua William Gelb
Text by Eugene O'Neill
Text arranged by Kevin Mullins

Scenic Design: Josh Ethan Smith
Sound Design: Joshua William Gelb
Assistant Director: Lio Sigerson
Stage Manager: Chris Gerling

Joshua William Gelb is a director and librettist currently working towards his Masters in directing at CMU's School of Drama, where Blind Alley Guy originated and where he will graduate next year as a John Wells Fellow. With frequent collaborator, Stephanie Johnstone, Gelb is continuing work on a new media-infused rock musical called Sometimes in Prague, which was presented last summer at The Tank, performed in concert at Joe's Pub, and will be presented this July as part of the Ice Factory. Other work includes A Musical Fantasia on Piratical Themes, Tully (In No Particular Order), and with Room5001 Theater his revisionist, all-male Man of La Mancha and adaptation of America's "first musical," The Black Crook.

About Incubator Arts Project
The Incubator Arts Project supports independent, experimental performing artists through a series of programs aimed at offering production opportunities and guidance with long-term growth and artistic sustainability. Its programs primarily support world premieres of original work and also include a concert series, work in progress opportunities and artist salons and roundtables.

The Incubator Arts Project grew out of the Incubator, a project of the Ontological-Hysteric Theater. In 2010, the Ontological-Hysteric Theater announced that it would leave its permanent home, St. Mark's Church, and that the Incubator would take over the space and operate year-round.
Beginning in 1993, the Ontological-Hysteric Theater, in addition to its primary support of the work of Richard Foreman, opened its doors to emerging, independent artists. Since 1993 the emerging artists program at the Ontological took many forms, including the Obie-winning Blueprint Series for emerging directors. In 2005, the OHT reorganized the programs under the name INCUBATOR, creating a series of linked programs to provide young theater artists with resources and support to develop process-oriented, original theatrical productions. By 2010, the program had quadrupled in size, involving a range of artists and increased support. The programs included the centerpiece Residency program for premieres, two annual music festivals, a regular concert series, a serial work-in-progress program called Short Form, and roundtables and salons aimed at keeping Incubator artists involved year-round. In May, 2010, the Incubator received an OBIE grant.

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