Page 73's A THICK DESCRIPTION OF HARRY SMITH Opens 6/28

Presentations of Page 73 Productions' developmental workshop of A THICK DESCRIPTION OF Harry Smith (Volume I) by Chicago-based playwright Carlos Murillo (DARK PLAY OR STORIES FOR BOYS) and directed by Kip Fagan (Page 73's JACK'S PRECIOUS MOMENT) will begin Thursday, June 28 at 2pm and continue Friday, June 29 at 2pm; Sunday, July 1 at 7pm and Monday, July 2 at 3pm (please note the altered performance time for the July 2nd performance) at Culture Project (45 Bleecker Street). Tickets are $10 and can be purchased online at page73.org/harrysmith.

Half folk-rock concert, half live radio show, Thick Description explores the often true life stories of ethnomusicologist and Lower East Side guru Harry Smith.. Best known for editing the seminal Anthology of American Folk Music, Smith led a peculiar life emblematic of American bohemia in the 20th Century. Unfolding like a psychedelic episode of A Prairie Home Companion, Harry Smith uses reworked folk songs, radio vignettes of real and imagined episodes of Harry Smith's life, Foley work, and a wide variety of storytelling styles to reveal an alternative conception of American identity.

Page 73 Productions' "Page 2" provides significant resources to a playwright to work for several weeks with a director, actors, and designers and then to present their plays as works-in-progress to the public.

The cast will feature Lucas Papaelias (ONCE; Page 73's JACK'S PRECIOUS MOMENT), who will also serve as musical director. He's joined by Kate Ferber (ONE CHILD BORN: THE MUSIC OF Laura Nyro), Birgit Huppuch (TELEPHONE, A MAP OF VIRTUE), Joe Jung (BLOODY BLOODY Andrew Jackson), Sean Patrick Reilly (THE BEAUTY QUEEN OF LEENANE, EMANCIPATION), Chris Sullivan (NICE WORK IF YOU CAN GET IT, LOMBARDI), and Joe Tippett (FISH EYE, SEVEN MINUTES IN HEAVEN).

The design team includes Daniel Kluger (sound), Jessica Pabst (costumes) and Seth Reiser (sets and lights).

Additionally, on July 2nd at 4:00pm there will be an "Interstate 73" reading of Jason Gray Platt's play A FRONTIER, directed by Soho Rep Artistic Director Sarah Benson (BLASTED) at Manhattan Theatre Club's rehearsal studio (311 West 43rd Street, 8th Floor). Reservations for this free reading are required and can be made by visiting www.page73.org/afrontier.

Living in an abandoned amusement park, four children enact the origin myths that founded their society in Jason Gray Platt's new play A FRONTIER. Watched over by their teacher, the group waits patiently for the population of the civil war-torn country to return. But cracks are beginning to form in their belief, and the children start to wonder whether they have been led astray.

The cast for the "Interstate 73" reading of A FRONTIER will include Andrew Garman (BURNING, THE UGLY ONE), Rachel Resheff (THE BIG MEAL), Ephraim Birney, and Ruby McCallister.

Page 73's "Interstate 73" consists of a group of young playwrights who meet at the Page 73 offices twice a month to discuss and work on their new plays. At a playwright's request, the writer receives a public or closed reading of a play. The 2011-2012 "Interstate 73" playwrights are: Amy Evans, Meghan Kennedy, Krista Knight, Scott Organ, Jason Gray Platt, Max Posner, Sarah Sander, and Matt Schatz.

Carlos Murillo is an internationally produced playwright and director. His plays include MAYDAY MAYDAY TUESDAY, A THICK DESCRIPTION OF Harry Smith, DIAGRAM OF A PAPER AIRPLANE, DARK PLAY OR STORIES FOR BOYS, MIMESOPHOBIA, A HUMAN INTEREST STORY, OFFSPRING OF THE COLD WAR, SCHADENFREUDE and many others. DARK PLAY OR STORIES FOR BOYS premiered at The Humana Festival of Actors Theatre of Louisville, and has received productions throughout the US and in Germany, Hungary, Poland, and Slovakia. His plays have been seen at Theatre @ Boston Court, Actors Express, Salt Lake Acting Company, Circle X, The NYC Summer Play Festival, Soho Rep, En Garde Arts, The Hangar Lab, Collaboraction, Walkabout Theatre, Theatre Seven, Minneapolis' Red Eye, Seattle's Group Theatre and others. His work has been seen at the Sundance Theatre Lab, The Public, Bay Area Playwrights Festival, The Watermill Center, The Playwrights' Center in Minneapolis, The Kennedy Center, Portland Center Stage, South Coast Rep and others. His plays have been published by Dramatists Play Service, Playscripts, Smith & Kraus, and Theatre Forum. Awards include The Ofner Prize from the Goodman, The National Latino Playwriting Award (1996 & 2006), The Otis Guernsey Award from the William Inge Theatre Festival, a Jerome Fellowship, and a Minnesota State Arts Board grant. Carlos is currently working on commissions for Steppenwolf and Adventure Stage in Chicago. He is the Head of the BFA Playwriting Program at The Theatre School and is a resident playwright of New Dramatists in New York and Chicago Dramatists.

Jason Gray Platt's work has been produced and developed around the country by American Repertory Theater, Round House Theater, Red Bull Theater, Ensemble Studio Theatre, Clubbed Thumb, Abingdon Theatre Company, The Inkwell, The Inconvenience, Page 73, and Samuel French. At Vassar he was awarded the Marilyn Swartz Seven award for best play in 2005, and the Molly Thacher Kazan Memorial Prize for distinction in the theater arts in 2006. He was also the runner-up for the 2007 Princess Grace Award in playwriting and a finalist for the 2011 O'Neill Conference. Originally from Arizona, Jason now lives in Brooklyn and works for The Wooster Group. BA: Vassar; MFA: Columbia.

PAGE 73 Productions – under the leadership of Executive Directors Liz Jones and Asher Richelli and Associate Director Michael Walkup – develops and produces the work of early-career playwrights who have yet to have their work professionally produced in New York. Page 73 produces at least one New York or world premiere by an early-career playwright each year. Page 73 also offers production-oriented development opportunities that help usher the works of early-career playwrights from first draft to final script. In addition to "Page 2" and "Interstate 73", the company also hosts the P73 Playwriting Fellowship, a year-long program supporting one playwright's creative and career development, and a week-long Summer Residency at Yale for 4 early-career playwrights.

Page 73 produced the world premieres of ELLIOT, A SOLDIER'S FUGUE by Quiara Alegría Hudes, directed by Davis McCallum (2007 Pulitzer finalist and prequel to Quiara's 2012 Pulitzer Prize-winning play WATER BY THE SPOONFUL), SIXTY MILES TO SILVER LAKE by Dan LeFranc directed by Anne Kauffman and co-produced with Soho Rep (2010 New York Times Playwriting Award); CREATURE by Heidi Schreck, directed by Leigh Silverman and co-produced with New Georges; JACK'S PRECIOUS MOMENT by Samuel D. Hunter directed by Kip Fagan and EDGEWISE by Eliza Clark directed by Trip Cullman and co-produced with The Play Company, as well as the New York premieres of 1001 by Jason Grote, directed by Ethan McSweeney (Time Out New York - Top 10) and LIDLESS by Frances Ya-Chu Cowhig, directed by Tea Alagic. The company received from the League of Professional Theatre Women their 2008 Lucille Lortel Award for "innovative and creative work dedicated to the emerging dramatist".

For more information about Page 73 Productions, please visit www.page73.org.

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