NYTB to Continue New Works Series with Michael Cooper's 'TIMELINES' and Timothy Huang's PETER AND THE WALL, 6/23

New York Theatre Barn will present the next installment of their New Works Series, featuring musical theater writers Michael Cooper and Timothy Huang on Monday, June 23rd at 7:30pm at the DR2 Theatre (Daryl Roth Theatre, 101 E. 15th Street). Tickets are $15.00 ($10.00 for students) and are available for purchase in advance at www.web.ovationtix.com/trs/pe/9916053.

At the intersection of who you were then, and who you will become...is who you are. Beginnings. Endings. Crossroads. Timelines features a collection of brand new songs, remixes, and reflections by Jonathan Larson Award winning composer/lyricist Michael Cooper. Directed by Dev Bondarin, with Musical Direction and Arrangements by Yan Li, Timelines stars Joanna Carpenter, Sarah Corey, Lizette Cruz, David Foley, Jr. (NEWSical, Shrek First National Tour), Amber Hurst-Martin, and Ryan Stutz.

MICHAEL COOPER is a MAC Award nominated songwriter, recipient of the 2005 Jonathan Larson, Daryl Roth, and TRU Daniel Marshall Multicultural Awards. BA in Theatre from Williams College; MFA from NYU Graduate Musical Theatre Writing Program. Sunfish, for which he co-wrote book and lyrics and produced, was awarded the top jury honor at the Daegu International Music Theatre Festival, South Korea in June 2013. Sunfish received its regional premiere at Stoneham Theatre, MA (Broadwayworld Award Best Musical) and was showcased at the 2010 ASCAP Workshop with Stephen Schwartz, the 2006 NAMT Festival of New Musicals, the TRU Reading Series, and was a finalist in Alliance Theatre's Kendeda Playwriting Competition. Other credits include: It Shoulda Been You (Additional Lyrics), world premiere at George Street Playhouse (directed by David Hyde Pierce and starring Tyne Daly) and Village Theatre Issaquah, WA; Rites of Passage, Museum Pieces, and The Dome (Prospect Theater Company); The Strange Affair of Dr. Crippen (Theatrebuilding Chicago); Lizardman! (Audience Favorite, Short Attention Span Festival and recently performed by The Albany Symphony's Dogs of Desire) and Luna Park, commissioned by SUNY Cortland. Selected for The York Theatre's NEO5 Concert Series, the ASCAP Johnny Mercer Songwriting Project, and the Johnny Mercer Writers Colony at Goodspeed Musicals. Associate Producer for Zombie, an award-winning short film based on the novella by Joyce Carol Oates. www.michaelcoopermusicandlyrics.com

DEV BONDARIN (Timelines Director) is a freelance director and the Associate Artistic Director of Prospect Theater Company, where she curates and directs the annual musical theater lab, which has produced over 45 new, short musicals by established and emerging musical theater writers under her guidance. Directing credits include: King Lear (American Bard Theater Company, two NY Innovative Theater Awards nominations), Reefer Madness: The Musical (Gallery Players, NY Innovative Theater Award nomination for Outstanding Musical Production), A Home Across the Ocean (MTWorks), Raised By Lesbians (FringeNYC), and many readings and workshops with various companies in NYC. MFA in Directing, Brooklyn College; BA, Brandeis University; SDCF Observership recipient; Member: Lincoln Center Directors Lab. Associate Member: SDC and The League of Professional Theatre Women. www.devbondarin.net

YAN LI (Timelines Musical Director/Arranger) is a composer, lyricist, music director, pianist, and teacher. His work has been featured at the West End Theatre, Signature Theatre, 54 Below, Goodspeed, the Puerto Rican Traveling Theater, the Duplex, Pearl Theatre, the New York Musical Theatre Festival (NYMF), and the Toronto Fringe Festival. Yan wrote the music for Sweet Nothings and Enjoy the Ride (both with words by Jason Purdy) and Blind (words by Julia Gytri), which was recently performed as part of the National Asian Artists Project's "Discover: New Musicals" series. He also wrote music, lyrics and book for Left and Misprint (Toronto Fringe Festival "Pick of the Fringe" Award 2009). With Jason Purdy, Yan is currently writing Ghost Stories, commissioned by Leviathan Lab, and contributing songs to Cliffnotes the Musical for Prospect Theater Company. Recently, he sound designed Interrupted - A Devised Piece for World Wide Lab (Irondale Center) and participated as a composer/lyricist in Acting Upstage's Noteworthy program, and as composer for Prospect Theater Company's Street Seen. As music director, Yan has worked across North America and as far abroad as Nigeria and South Korea. Recent shows include And the World Goes Round (Interplayers), Dear Edwina (Play Group Theatre), Brindlebeast (Theater Resources Unlimited), Damascus Square (industry readings), Sunfish (Daegu International Musical Festival - "Top Jury Honor" winner), The Great NYC Treasure Hunt (Prospect Theater Company/New York Musical Theatre Festival), Marco Polo and Evergreen (Prospect Theater Company), and Vital Signs (St. Clement's Theatre). Yan is also active in the opera and art song world. He is an artistic apprentice at American Opera Projects and has worked with opera companies throughout North America as a repetiteur and composer. As a pianist, percussionist, and occasional accordionist/harmonica-ist, he has played with symphonies, gigged with rock bands, and toured with an Edith Piaf impersonator. Yan has a BA in Composition & Theory from the University of Victoria, an MFA from NYU's Graduate Musical Theatre Writing Program (Tisch Fellowship recipient), and an ARCT diploma in Piano Performance from the Royal Conservatory of Music. He is a Founding Artist of Blue Bridge Repertory Theatre and a proud member of the Asian American Composers and Lyricists Project, SOCAN (The Society of Composers, Authors, and Music Publishers of Canada), and the Dramatists Guild. This summer, he's going to learn to be a beekeeper. www.yanlicomposer.com

TIMOTHY HUANG returns to New York Theatre Barn with Peter and the Wall after presenting Timothy Huang: Chinese or Crazy? Peter and the Wall tells the stories of Peter Saer, an American man who must travel to Japan to identify and claim the body of his dead husband, a visiting Nisei American and Kotoku Wamura, the real-life mayor of Fudai from the 1940s till the late 1980s and his crusade to build an unprecedented sixty-foot seawall to protect his town from potential tidal waves. Crossing boundaries of time and space, this musical weaves from two threads a single story of men who stand up for their conviction in the face of adversity and conventional logic to discover they have more in common than anyone might suspect. Peter and the Wall was conceived as part of the 2013 Dramatists Guild Fellowship and subsequently selected for the 2013 Rhinebeck Writers Retreat. Starring Nic Rouleau (The Book of Mormon), Marc de la Cruz (If/Then), EJ Zimmerman (Avenue Q), Eric Badique, Daniel J. Edwards, Yuko Kudo, Gen Parton Shin, & Hana Slevin, with Music Direction by Mark T. Evans.

Huang's Costs of Living was a selection of the 2012 ASCAP Musical Theater Workshop, the BMI 2012 Master Class hosted by Stephen Sondheim, a finalist for the 2012 American Harmony Prize, and a nominee for the 2013 Weston Playhouse New Musical Award and the 2013 Jerry Bock Award. He is the recipient of a 2013 Jerry Harrington Award, a 2012 Fred Ebb Award finalist, and is a member of the Lehman Engel Musical Theater Workshop at BMI.

New York Theatre Barn (NYTB) is a non-profit theatre company dedicated to developing and producing new musicals that tell untold stories while practicing artistic process. The company is primarily drawn to stories that challenge traditional musical theatre subject matters, often themes that are rooted in current events and history that reflect our diverse world, and that forge new forms through experimentation.

For more information, go to www.nytheatrebarn.org.

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