THE SANTALAND DIARIES And THE HEIDI CHRONICLES Among NVA's 9th Season

New Village Arts (NVA), Carlsbad's award-winning professional theatre, has announced its' Ninth Season of programming.  Executive Artistic Director Kristianne Kurner and Managing Director Alex Scollon are thrilled to announce the new season, along with expansion plans for NVA in its current location.  In Season 9, New Village Arts continues to explore the human experience, this time focusing on the amazing workings of the mind.  All areas are covered - from genius, to neurological afflictions, to the power of love.  With two regional premieres, two American classics and three thought-provoking comedies, Season 9 is New Village Arts' most exciting and ambitious season yet!

As a show of the support and belief that the City of Carlsbad has for New Village Arts in Carlsbad Village, the City Council has voted to allow New Village Arts to take over the lease for the rest of the building they currently call home.  This addition of over 3,100 square feet of space will enable New Village Arts to serve as an arts incubator for visual and performing cultural arts, with space reserved for rehearsals, education programs and additional gallery space.  New Village Arts will make the space available for local arts programs and create a thriving Downtown arts center in Carlsbad Village.

Season 9 kicks off with a new annual event: the NVA Summer Comedy Festival.  Each summer, NVA will present a series of events centered around one of our favorite things to do: laugh.  The mainstage production will be David Ives' hysterical and philosophically clever Time Flies, directed by Associate Artistic Director Joshua Everett Johnson.  Time Flies is a series of short plays, with a cast of six actors who make quick changes between being mayflies, a washing machine and a roman slave, to name a few.  On off-nights of Time Flies, NVA is very pleased to present a production originally produced at the Playwrights Project in San Diego: Emily Reit's Prom Night, directed by Ruff Yeager.  Prom Night expands on every teenager's nightmare of over-protective parents - way over-protective.  Playing with Prom Night will be David Ives' Sure Thing, another hilarious exploration of relationship.  Also part of the NVA Summer Comedy Festival, NVA is pleased to present the unforgettable musical performance of Billy Watson and the International Silver String Submarine Band, appearing on Monday, August 10th at 7:30 PM.  The NVA Summer Comedy Festival will be a specially priced event for all of our regular patrons along with the numerous tourists who visit Carlsbad Village in the summer months - a great way to spend your evening after a day at the beach.

NVA's regular season opens with the regional premiere of Jonathan Marc Sherman's Things We Want, directed by Lisa Berger in her NVA debut.  Things We Want follows three brothers desperately trying to find meaning in their life, and the quirky upstairs neighbor who throws everything out of whack.  The play features Associate Artistic Director Joshua Everett Johnson along with Ensemble members Adam Brick, Tim Parker and Rachael VanWormer and is a funny, intense exploration of American youth intended for mature audiences only.

The season continues with Steve Martin's Picasso at the Lapin Agile.  Picasso invites us to an imaginary meeting between two of the 20th century's greatest minds: Pablo Picasso and Albert Einstein in a small bar in Paris in 1904.  Through humor and beauty, the play explores the meaning of genius and introduces us to many unforgettable characters.  Ensemble member Dana Case will direct this meaningful comedy, with Ensemble Members Tom Zohar as Einstein and Tim Parker as Picasso.

Next up will be a new holiday event for NVA: David Sedaris' The Santaland Diaries.  Based on Sedaris' short story of the same name, this play introduces us to an out-of-work actor who finds seasonal work as "Crumpet" the elf at Santa Land in Macy's Herald Square.  Executive Artistic Director Kristianne Kurner spent a holiday season working as an elf at Macy's in New York and is thrilled to direct this production.  One of NVA's favorite actors, Daren Scott, will create the role of "Crumpet."

2010 will start with one of NVA's most ambitioUs Productions, Peter Brook and Marie Helene Estienne's The man Who.  Loosely based on Oliver Sacks' best-selling book The Man Who Mistook His Wife for a Hat, the play is a theatrical experience that explores the pathways of the mind.  Multiple characters will be created by an award-winning cast of four actors, Ron Choularton, Sandra Ellis-Troy, Manny Fernandes and Walter Murray, and one musician.  Ms. Kurner will direct this unforgettable production.

It's been twenty years since Wendy Wasserstein's The Heidi Chronicles won every major theatre award when it premiered in New York City.  NVA travels with Heidi Holland as she journeys through life in the 1960's, 70's and 80's and looks at what has changed and what has stayed the same.  Ensemble Member Amanda Sitton will direct the production and Ms. Kurner will create the role of Heidi.  At the season announcement party, this was the show that patrons were most excited about!

The season will conclude with a return to something that NVA does best: big American classics.  Ms. Kurner will direct Tennessee Williams' Summer and Smoke.  A young man and woman grow up next door to each other - she as a proper minister's daughter and he as a hedonistic doctor's son.  Throughout their lives they are alternately drawn to and apart from each other.  Associate Artistic Director Joshua Everett Johnson creates the role of John, the doctor's son, and special guest JoAnne Glover (of Moxie Theatre) joins the cast as Alma.  Williams has called Alma his favorite female character, and it is easy to see why.

Performances will be held on Thursdays and Fridays at 8 PM, Saturdays at 3 PM and 8 PM and Sundays at 2 PM.  San Diego residents are encouraged to take the Coaster to Saturday matinee shows.  The first two performances of all runs are "pay-what-you-can" previews.  Please contact the box office for subscription information: 760-433-3245 or visit www.NewVillageArts.org.

An ambitious new season and a larger theatrical space - NVA has a lot to celebrate in Season 9.
 
Summer Comedy Festival

Time Flies

By David Ives

Directed by Joshua Everett Johnson

Featuring Ensemble Members Adam Brick, Joshua Everett Johnson, Tim Parker, Wendy Waddell & Rachael VanWormer

July 30 - August 16; Press Opening August 1, 2009 at 8 PM

Take a wild and hilarious ride through a variety of settings and situations having to deal with some of life's most metaphysical questions. David Ives' "Time Flies" is a crazy, weird and funny set of short plays which present a unique vision on the subject of life, death and the time in between. The urgency of two lovers is explored from an insect’s point of view, a man declares that he is a famous French painter, and two Polish woman provide a funeral lunch with no food. Listed by New York Magazine as one of the "100 Smartest New Yorkers," David Ives is a master of combining parody, witty dialogue and theatricality to create gut-wrenching laughter.

Running Off-Nights with Time Flies:

Prom Night/Sure Thing

By Emily Reit/David Ives

Directed by Ruff Yeager

Featuring Ruff Yeager, Karson St. John, Joseph Baker & Kristie Kahlweiss

August 2, 4, 5, 9, 11, 12; Press Opening August 2, 2009 at 7 PM

Written by an extremely talented local teen, Prom Night introduces us to some absurdly over-protective parents who go to drastic measures to thwart their daughter's plans for her Prom Night in a production originally produced by Playwrights Project in San Diego.

Sure Thing is a classic of contemporary comedy: Two people meet in a cafe and find their way through a conversational minefield as an offstage bell interrupts their false starts, gaffes, and faux pas on the way to falling in love.

Things We Want

By Jonathan Marc Sherman

Directed by Lisa Berger*

Featuring NVA Ensemble Members Adam Brick, Joshua Everett Johnson, Tim Parker & Rachael VanWormer

Regional Premiere

September 17 - October 11; Press Opening September 19, 2009 at 8 PM

Things We Want is young, hip, exciting and a great match for the men in NVA’s Ensemble.  Three adult brothers are living together once again in their childhood apartment, struggling to define themselves while pursuing their desires and dreams.  A darkly comic look at the illusions we have about what makes us happy – and what is within our power to change.

Picasso at the Lapin Agile

By Steve Martin

Directed by Dana Case

Featuring NVA Ensemble Members Adam Brick, Sandra Ellis-Troy,  Kristianne Kurner & Tim Parker with Greg Wittman

November 12 - December 6; Press Opening November 14, 2009 at 8 PM

In a legendary bar in 1904 Paris, a chance encounter between the young Einstein and Picasso sets sparks and stars flying. What does the world look like to a genius on the verge of transforming it? Their views on sex, fame and the future collide amidst an eccentric constellation of characters. Steve Martin – yes, that Steve Martin - brilliantly tackles these questions and more in his award-winning comedy, where philosophy and humor are seamlessly woven together in this surreal encounter of two great minds.

Winner of the Outer Critics Circle Award for Best Off Broadway Play

Holiday Event

The Santaland Diaries

By David Sedaris

Directed by Kristianne Kurner

Featuring Ensemble Member Daren Scott*

Dec 10 - 23; Press Opening December 12, 2009 at 8 PM

Written by the great American humarist David Sedaris, The Santaland Diaries follows one out of work actor who decides to become a Macy’s elf to pay the holiday bills.

The Man Who

By Peter Brook & Marie-Hélène Estienne

Directed by Kristianne Kurner

Featuring Ensemble Members Ron Choularton*, Sandra Ellis-Troy &  Manny Fernandes with Walter Murray

Regional Premiere

February 4 - 28; Press Opening February 6, 2010 at 8 PM

The Man Who is inspired by, but is in no way a conventional stage adaptation of, "The Man Who Mistook His Wife for a Hat," Oliver Sacks' best-selling collection of case histories about the neurologically impaired. Performed by a superb ensemble of four actors and one musician, this series of fables is an adventurous journey through the mind, as well as a demonstration of a very rare kind of dedicated theater craft.

The Heidi Chronicles

By Wendy Wasserstein

Directed by Ensemble Member Amanda Sitton

Featuring NVA Ensemble Members Kristianne Kurner & Amanda Morrow with Cris O’Bryon

Modern American Classic/Tony & Pulitzer Award Winning

April 1 - 25; Press Opening April 3, 2010 at 8 PM

Art historian and "humanist" Heidi Holland tries to keep her bearings in the social currents of the 1960s, '70 and '80s. Winner of the 1989 Pulitzer Prize, the Tony Award and the New York Drama Critics Circle Award, NVA brings Heidi back twenty years later to illuminate what has changed and what has stayed the same.  Featuring Executive Artistic Director Kristianne Kurner in the title role, this hilarious and touching play will stay with audiences long after they have gone home.

Summer and Smoke

By Tennessee Williams

Directed by Kristianne Kurner

Featuring NVA Ensemble Members Dana Case, Joshua Everett Johnson & Jack Missett with JoAnne Glover

American Classic

May 27 – June 20; Press Opening May 29, 2010 at 8 PM

A haunting and poetic drama, Summer and Smoke tells the story of Alma (JoAnne Glover), a minister’s daughter, and John (Joshua Everett Johnson), the hedonistic doctor next door.  In her search for spirituality and lasting love, she is confronted with his need for sensual fulfillment.  Their turbulent relationship becomes an emotional battle of wills that alters each of them irrevocably.  Riveting and intense, this sultry production transports you to the oppressive and sweltering summer of Mississippi to experience the unrelenting power of desire.

*Appearing courtesy of Actors Equity Association, the Union of professional actors and stage managers.

New Village Arts Theatre was founded in April 2001 by graduates of New York's Actors Studio Drama School.  NVA is now in its eighth season of producing award-winning, critically acclaimed theatre in North County San Diego.  Thanks to the support of the City of Carlsbad and many generous individuals and companies, New Village Arts opened their new theatrical space in the heart of Carlsbad Village in June of 2007.  

NVA's debut in November 2001, Brilliant Traces, was staged in the Granary – a converted chicken coop in Carlsbad's Magee Park – and received Critic's Choice from the San Diego Union-Tribune.  Pat Launer (then of KPBS) named New Village Arts "The Most Exciting New Theatre" in San Diego in January 2002.   New Village Arts found a temporary professional home in the Studio Space at Jazzercise, Inc.  In the five years that NVA produced at Jazzercise, they were awarded numerous major awards, for such productions as A Lie of the Mind, Orphans, The Waverly Gallery, The Playboy of the Western World and Nocturne.  New Village Arts became known for intense, thrilling, ensemble driven productions and is the most highly-awarded theatre company in North San Diego. 

New Village Arts presents theatre fueled by the power and passion of the artist and shares with its audience an uncompromising appetite for the human experience.

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