The UC San Diego Department Of Theatre And Dance Presents THE JEFFERSON MIDDLE SCHOOL MONTHLY

The UC San Diego Department of Theatre and Dance presents The Jefferson Middle School Monthly, written by Mara Nelson-Greenberg and directed by Carla Harting, as part of the 2019 Wagner New Play Festival.

About the play: There's something amiss at Jefferson Middle School. Women are going missing, Cora may be turning into a doll, and MJ has tubes growing out of his belly button. The editors of the school paper are going to get to the bottom of all of it. A coming of age comedy that dives into the dark underbelly of life in 21st century America, THE JEFFERSON MIDDLE SCHOOL MONTHLY explores what it means to become an adult in a world where the adults have messed everything up.

The preview for The Jefferson Middle School Monthy will be May 6 at 7:30 PM. The Jefferson Middle School Monthy will runs May 10, 14, 15, and 16 at 7:30pm, and May 18 at 7:00 PM. Performances are at the Theodore and Adele Shank Theatre in the Joan and Irwin Jacobs Theatre District on UC San Diego's campus: 2910 La Jolla Village Drive, La Jolla, CA. For information about parking, please see the website.

Tickets are $20 for regular performances. Subscriptions and group rates are available. Student tickets are $10 for regular performances. Faculty, staff, alumni and senior citizens discounts available as well. Tickets can be purchased online or by calling the box office at (858) 534-4574.

The cast features David Price (Mr. Whitney), Xavier Clark (Alex), Anthony Adu (MJ), Assata Hefner (Dana), Arianna Mahallati (Sasha), Jalani Blankenship (Cora), Siobhan O'Reilly (Alisha), and Hayden Emerson (Mr. Stover).

The creative team includes Carla Harting (Director), Nicholas Ponting (Scenic Designer/Assistant Director), Samantha Englander (Costume Designer), Mextly Almeda (Lighting Designer), Stephen Jensen (Sound Designer), Jim Short (Dramaturg), Jacob Halpern Weitzman (Production Stage Manager), Alex Luong (Asst. Stage Manager), Abigail Sinson (Production Assistant), and Amelia Llamas (Production Assistant).

The 2019 Wagner New Play Festival at UC San Diego features world premiere productions written by our talented MFA playwrights, and directed, acted, stage-managed and designed by our nationally-acclaimed MFA companies. The plays produced in the Wagner New Plays Festival represent some of the most original and groundbreaking new voices in American theatre. The plays in this year's festival are Monster by Ava Geyer, The Gradient by Steph Del Rosso, The Jefferson Middle School Monthly by Mara Nelson-Greenberg, Shame Spiral by Ali Viterbi, Duchess! Duchess! Duchess! by Vivian Barnes, and a staged reading of Incendiary by Dave Harris.

About the playwright:
Mara Nelson-Greenberg is a second-year MFA Playwriting student who grew up in Brooklyn, NY. Her work has been developed at Clubbed Thumb, Playwrights Horizons, Ensemble Studio Theatre, Theater Intime, and WildWind Performance Lab, among others. Her short plays have been produced by Little Theater at Dixon Place, Ensemble Studio Theater, TinyRhino, Yes Noise, Communal Spaces, #serials at The Flea and Hansel and Gretel Pocket Utopia. She is a member of EST/Youngblood, a New Georges Affiliated Artist, and an alum of Clubbed Thumb's Early Career Writers Group.

About the director:
Carla Harting is an actor who has worked extensively in New York and all over the country. Carla has collaborated with Sarah Ruhl on several of her new plays, including the premiere of Dead Man's Cell Phone at Playwrights Horizons, Eurydice at Yale Rep and Second Stage Theatre, as well as Passion Play at Arena Stage. New York theatre credits include Dreams of the Washer King (Playwrights Realm), Kid-Simple (Summer Play Festival), Valparaiso (Rude Mechanicals), Jimmy Carter Was a Democrat (Clubbed Thumb, Performance Space 122, The Kitchen), Freakshow and Late: A Cowboy Song (Clubbed Thumb), Be Aggressive (Soho Repertory Theater) and Straight Up & with a Twist (New Georges). Her regional work includes Goldie, Max & Milk (Florida Stage), Legacy of Light, A Delicate Balance, and Passion Play (Arena Stage), The Lady from Dubuque(Seattle Repertory Theatre)), The Scene, After Ashley, Kid-Simple, Aloha, Say the Pretty Girls, and The Blue Room (various Humana Festivals at ATL), Night and Day (The Wilma Theater), What the Butler Saw (South Coast Repertory), Uncle Vanya, Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf?, The Imaginary Invalid, and Zoot Suit (San Diego Repertory Theatre), A Midsummer Night's Dream (La Jolla Playhouse), Our Country's Good (Signature Theatre Company, DC) and The Bright and Bold Design (The Studio Theatre, DC). In San Diego, Carla's recent work includes Outside Mullingar (San Diego Rep), Betrayal (North Coast Rep), Fool For Love (Cygnet), and August: Osage County (The Old Globe) for which the cast received a Craig Noel Award for Best Ensemble. Carla's film and television credits include Never Forever with Vera Farmiga, "Law & Order" and "Law & Order: Criminal Intent." Carla received her BA from the College of William & Mary and an MFA in Acting from UC San Diego.

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