3Girls Theatre Company to Bring MOMENTS OF TRUTH to Royce Gallery This Fall

3Girls Theatre Company takes pleasure in announcing the world premiere of an original musical comedy: MOMENTS OF TRUTH, by 3GT resident playwright Patricia Milton (book) and Caroline Altman (music & lyrics). This world premiere production is directed by Louis Parnell, with music direction by Scrumbly Koldewyn, and runs Sept. 16 - Oct. 18, 2015 at Royce Gallery in San Francisco.

MOMENTS OF TRUTH features Original Music & Lyrics by Caroline Altman and Book by Patricia Milton. Directed by Louis Parnell, the production includes musical direction by Scrumbly Koldewyn

A floundering marriage. A scandalous interloper. A lie detector. What could go wrong?

Nan is a fine arts painter struggling to revive her confidence in herself, her art, and her marriage to art broker Gerald. Nan agrees to collaborate with her former art school roommate, Chloe, a scandal-ridden "shock art" photographer. They hope to rehabilitate their careers and land a prestigious prize and an exhibit in New York. Their project uses a lie detector to catch real-life models in their "moments of truth." As a love triangle threatens to develop under her roof, Nan considers ...should she bring the lie detector into her marriage?

The four person cast of MOMENTS OF TRUTH features: Bekka Fink (Nan Browne), Douglas B. Giorgis* (the Man), Tyler McKenna* (Gerald Browne) and Danielle Thys* (Chloe Lovino). (*Member Actor's Equity Association)

Technical credits include: Set Design: Jeff Wincek, Costumes: Abra Berman, Technical Direction: Brendan Lee, Props: Spiraleena Mason.

The show opens Sat. Sept. 19 (previews 9/16, 17, 18) and runs through Sun. Oct. 18, 2015. Performances are Thurs., Fri., & Sat. - 8:00 pm, and Sun Matinees - 2:00 pm. The show plays at the Royce Gallery, 2901 Mariposa St. (btw'n. Alabama & Harrison Sts.), SF 94110. Tickets: $30 Advance, $35 door, $20 previews (includes comp. refreshments); $75 opening night (with reception). Tickets available at 3girlstheatre.org/2015-moments-of-truth-by-milton-altman/.

MOMENTS OF TRUTH is the product of 3GT's core development program for Resident Playwrights.
It was first seen by audiences as a developmental reading at 3GT's 2013 New Works Festival at Tides Theater, then re-staged as a staged reading in the 2014 Salon Reading Series. After being selected as a "Play-off Finalist," it received a full staged reading during our 2014 New Works Festival at Thick House. After the Festival, the play was selected for full production by the Company in 2015. The play was initially developed in the Central Works Writers Workshop in Berkeley, CA. As a work-in-progress, it was a Finalist for the 2013 Women in Arts and Media Collaboration Award.

3Girls Theatre Company develops, produces and promotes new plays written by women playwrights. Fewer than 20% of new plays produced by the American mainstream theatre establishment in any year are written by women - an incredible statistic made even more so by the fact that this low percentage is roughly the same today as it was a century ago. In 2011, San Francisco playwrights Suze Allen,

AJ Baker and Lee Brady decided it was time to stop complaining about the lack of opportunities for women playwrights in American theater and take action. With fearless enthusiasm, the three Girls set about recruiting a company of amazing women who share their vision to "put women's work on stage where it belongs." Today, 3GT's Resident Playwrights collaborate with one another and the larger community to create and support extraordinary new work by women playwrights. 3GT's ongoing programs include: the annual New Works Festival, the Salon Reading Series, full productions of works developed by the company, and educational programs and outreach projects that invite script submissions and participation from the larger community.

ABOUT THE CREATIVE TEAM:

Caroline Altman (composer / lyricist) is a singer, actor, composer, director, educator, and Founding Artistic Director of Lyricabella Productions. Her award-winning musicals and TYA pieces include Whiskers! The Musical of the Velveteen Rabbit; Kiss the Frog; The Snow Queen: Splinters of Ice; Josephine and the Sheep of Dreams; and the operatic anti-bullying touring show, How Andy Found His Voice. Collaborative musicals include Not Without Our Women (with Patricia Milton and Andy Black) and Alice in Cyberland (with Tom Dolby.) Her performing career has taken her all over the U.S. and Europe. Local credits include featured roles with Theatreworks, 42nd Street Moon, Woodminster Summer Musicals, Oakland Opera Theater, Playhouse West, and CalShakes, and have garnered her a SF Bay Area Theater Critics Circle Award, and a Shellie Award for Contribution to the Performing Arts. Recently turned author, Caroline published her first book, Indy at the Opera: A Kitty Traviata, about a culturally curious and artistic cat. She is a member of Actors' Equity and Dramatists Guild. www.carolinealtman.com

Scrumbly Koldewyn (music director) is a musician, composer, conductor and performer, and was one of the founders of the beloved San Francisco drag group, the Cockettes. Long a mainstay of Bay Area showbiz, the Koldewyn's post-Cockettes career has included myriad appearances with his vocal groups the Distractions and the Jesters, work with a wide range of theaters - Rhinoceros, Berkeley Rep, New Conservatory, Angels of Light, the Aurora et al - and his popular cabaret duos with Cindy Goldfield, Leigh Crow and others.

Patricia Milton (playwright) is a playwright whose productions include: Reduction in Force, (Central Works, BardsTown Theatre), Believers (Wily West Productions, Lavanta Productions, Istanbul), Solving Sunflowers (East Mountain Center for Theatre) and The Only Virgin in Jubilee County (Hill Country Community Theatre). Reduction in Force won the 2011 Broadway World SF award for "Best Local Play." Her short plays Busybody and Stonehenge are published by Original Works Publishing (Busybody) and in Smith & Kraus's Best 10-Minute Plays for Three Actors 2014 (Stonehenge). Enemies: Foreign and Domestic premiered at Central Works in February 2015. In the Bay Area, her short plays have been seen at the Exploratorium and PianoFight, and in the SF Theater Festival, Woman's Will PlayFest, SF Fringe Festival, and Sheherezade. She was a 2013 finalist for the Titan Award as part of Theatre Bay Area's ATLAS program for playwrights, and is a member of Theatre Bay Area, City Light Source Writers Group, the Central Works Writers Workshop, Playwrights Center of SF, International Centre for Women Playwrights, and the Dramatists Guild. She is proud to be a Resident Playwright of 3Girls Theatre Company. patricia-milton.com

Louis Parnell has worked extensively as an actor and director with numerous companies in the Bay Area including American Conservatory Theatre, Campo Santo, CCT, Center Repertory, CentralWorks, The Magic, Marin Theatre Company, SF Playhouse, TheatreWorks, Thick Description and Traveling Jewish Theatre; as well as with many smaller nomadic companies. He most recently appeared as the narrator in the SF Playhouse production of Into The Woods. He is elated to be directing 3GT's world premiere production of Moment Of Truth in SF. Other recent acting work includes Freud in 3GT's production of The Couch, Manny in the 3GT world premiere of The Right Thing, Traveling Jewish Theatre's productions of Dead Mother and Death Of A Salesman. Louis works regularly at the SF Playhouse and has performed in their productions of Bell, Book & Candle, Cabaret, Coronado, Man Of La Mancha, The Fantasticks and One Flew Over The Cuckoo's Nest (to name a few). Other favorite acting performances include leading roles in Art, After The Fall, Angels In America, The Boys In The Band, It Had To Be You, Speed-The-Plow and Talley's Folly. Favorite directing gigs include American Buffalo, Deathtrap, Four Dogs And A Bone, Hurlyburly, Private Eyes, Reckless and Reunion. He has been honored with 11 BATCC nominations for acting or directing (4 wins) and 5 DramaLogue and Dean Goodman Choice Awards. He has also performed in numerous film, TV and commercial roles including Trauma, Nash Bridges, America's Most Wanted and the PBS documentary Ralph Ellison: An American Life (Sundance Film Festival 2006). He is on the Board of Directors of the SF Playhouse and 3Girls Theatre, was a founding member of Genesius Theatre Company and the Actors Theatre of SF, and is a proud member of SAG-AFTRA and AEA.

ABOUT THE CAST:

Bekka Fink (Nan) Bekka's recent opportunities to "play" in the Bay include: Cinderella's Stepmother/ Mother in Into The Woods, with SF Playhouse, Mrs. Peachum in The Threepenny Opera, at Shotgun Players, Veronique of The Mounties, with SF Mime Troupe, and the World Premier of Vienna Teng and Tanya Shaffer's The Fourth Messenger at Ashby Stage. She has also worked at Berkeley Repertory Theatre's Ground Floor, Theatreworks Silicon Valley, Brava, and A Travelling Jewish Theatre. In NYC, productions include Evil Stepsister in the Nat'l. Tour of Rodgers & Hammerstein's Cinderella, Johanna in Sweeney Todd, at The Hangar Theatre, and 6 years collaborating with Tom O'Horgan (B'way. Director of Hair and Jesus Christ Superstar), including a tour in Bangkok, Thailand, and Harry Partch's, Oedipus at The Metropolitan Museum of Art. Other NYC theatres include: Manhattan Theatre Club, NY Theatre Workshop, and the Village Gate. Film/TV credits include: For Here or to Go (2014 Cinequest Film Festival), Letters From Café Tosca (currently in production Indie feature), Cookie Wars (short film, 2013 SF Intl., LA, and Nashville Film Festivals), Worlds Astonishing News (Nippon TV- Japan), as well as a guest starring role on NBC-TV's, Trauma. Bekka is represented by the fabulous and nurturing JE Talent. www.rockstarorganizer.com

Douglas Giorgis* (The Man) is honored to be part of this production. He has worked from Off-Broadway to regional houses across the country. Selected company credits include - New York: Musicals Tonight!, La Mama, Retro Productions (company member), Abingdon Theatre Co., Boomerang Theatre Co. Regional: The Barnstormers (NH), Alliance Theatre (GA), Arizona Theatre Co.(AZ), San Jose Rep.(CA), Aurora Theatre (CA), Playwrights Foundation (CA). He is also a proud company member of Monday Night PlayGround here in the Bay Area. Film and Television: "After A Somewhat Prolonged Lapse of Memory" (pre-production), "On The Radioman" (series pilot), "Celebrity Ghost Stories", "Mysteries at the Museum." www.douglasgiorgis.com

Tyler McKenna* (Gerald Browne) Appeared most recently in Something for the Boys (Rocky Fulton) and Do I Hear a Waltz? (Renato De Rossi) at 42nd St. Moon, where he has performed previously in Oh, Kay! (Jimmy Winter) and The Best of Times - The Jerry Herman Salon. Other recent credits: Annie Get Your Gun (Frank Butler) as a Guest Artist with Napa Valley Conservatory Theater and A Little Princess (Captain Crewe) at Berkeley Playhouse. Other work includes productions with Symmetry Theatre Company, The Mountain Play, Marin Shakespeare Company, and American Conservatory Theater. Tyler is a graduate of the ACT MFA program.

Danielle Thys* (Chloe Lovino) is delighted to perform in another Patricia Milton play, having closed "Enemies, Foreign and Domestic" at Central Works earlier this year. Ms. Thys has performed on numerous Bay Area stages including The Magic, Marines Memorial, Marin Theater Co., Center Rep, San Jose Stage, Thick House, Cinnabar, Noh Space, The Exit, NCTC, and Stanford University. She plays Maive in The Rocket Family Chronicles, an offbeat sitcom available on Roku and recently featured in the Sprout Film Festival at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in NY. Her film "Open House" won Best Comedy in the National Film Challenge. She received critical acclaim at the Festival Fringe in Edinburgh, Scotland and also won "Best of" at the SF Fringe for her production of and performance in "Mary in the Hydrangea Bush" by Joe Besecker. Another SF Fringe "Best of" win came as a member of Crooked Family in Keith Haddock's, "Hell, The Musical", an original live rock homage to Sartre's "No Exit". Ms. Thys is an accomplished jazz, funk, blues and rock vocalist. She has appeared and recorded with Don Seaver, Terry Haggerty, Maurice Tani, Randy Craig, Emory Joseph, and many others, from the Sweetwater, to John Lee Hooker's Boom Boom Room to main stage at the House of Blues Las Vegas and beyond. She is a founding member of PlayGround and a member of Actors Equity.

* Appears courtesy of Actors' Equity Association, the Union of Professional Actors and Stage Managers.

Pictured: Danielle Thys* (Chloe), Tyler McKenna*(Gerald), Douglas Giorgis* (the Model), and Bekka Fink (Nan).In Moments of Truth - presented by 3Girls Theatre - Sept 16 - Oct. 18, 2015 - Photo by Jim Noreena.

To post a comment, you must register and login.