Rising Phoenix Repertory Announces BLOOD STROKES Will Continue Cino Nights Series

Following the sold out performances and overflow crowds at its first ten Cino Nights presentations (of new plays by Gary Sunshine, Mando Alvarado, Courtney Baron, Florencia Lozano, Kristen Palmer, Emily DeVoti, Lucy Thurber, Jessica Dickey, Adam Szymkowicz, and Laura Eason) Rising Phoenix Rep continues the series on September 25th at 7 p.m. with BLOOD STROKES by Daniel Reitz.

In the play, FAGGOT is the newest, most inflammatory, most polarizing in-yer-face-queer iTunes sensation. His concerts are getting bigger, the uproar louder, the costumes more outlandish, the "fans" more thuggish. Homo hero? Cynical instigator? Political activist? Performance artist? Tonight, the unwelcome truth waits in the dressing room.

The production will be directed by Reitz and features Tom Bozell, Joel Johnstone, and Chet Siegel.
Inspired by Joe Cino and his Caffe Cino-one of the original birthplaces of Off-Off-Broadway theatre and early home to such writers as Doric Wilson, Robert Patrick, John Guare, Sam Shepard, Lanford Wilson, and William M. Hoffman-New York Innovative Theater Award winning company Rising Phoenix Rep has commissioned twenty playwrights to write new, full-length plays for the Seventh Street Small Stage, the intimate back room space at Jimmy's No. 43 in the East Village, where the company has mounted critically acclaimed and award winning productions of new plays for the past six years.

Rising Phoenix Rep artistic director Daniel Talbott described the series as a place to tap into the raw, inspired, inventive, and pioneering work of the Caffe Cino, where the love of theatre and new work was joined with a scrappy, do-it-yourself work ethic. All shows will be rehearsed for a week and then fully mounted and produced, warts and all, for one night only with free admission.

Cino Nights are currently scheduled through June 2012 and will celebrate the spirit of indie theatre as a home for new plays and theatre artists as well as hopefully honor what has been said of the Caffe Cino: "the first studio of theater where playwrights can experiment as painters and poets have done for a century, free from the tyranny of audience, box-office, church, and criticism." The plays will be fully produced for one night only on a more or less monthly basis. The remaining playwrights, in the order their plays will appear, are:

Daniel Reitz's BLOOD STROKES will premiere on September 25, 2011; directed by Daniel Reitz and featuring Tom Bozell, Joel Johnstone, and Chet Siegel.

Crystal Skillman: October 23, 2011

Megan Mostyn-Brown: November 13, 2011 

Charlotte Miller: December 11, 2011 

Keith Reddin: January 2012

Dael Orlandersmith: February 2012

Jonathan Blitstein: March 2012

Brooke Berman: April 2012

Melissa Ross: May 2012

Daniel Talbott: June 2012

Cusi Cram: June 2012

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