Golden Thread Productions to Present NEW THREADS 2022 Reading Series in August

Golden Thread Productions, the first American theatre company devoted to the Middle East, will return with New Threads 2022, its popular and free staged reading series. This year's line-up includes plays by playwright & professor Robert Myers; Egyptian-American playwright, director, dramaturg and teaching artist Nabra Nelson; Afghani-American speaker, writer & producer Humaira Ghilzai; professor, playwright & novelist Bridgette Dutta Portman; and Palestinian actor & writer Hend Ayoub. Bringing these important stories to life will be four esteemed directors: celebrated director, playwright & author Carey Perloff; 2020 recipient of the Theatre Bay Area Leadership Residency Aidaa Peerzada; prolific director and theatre maker Susannah Martin (Betty Shamieh's Make No Mistake); and Golden Thread's own Executive Artistic Director Sahar Assaf.

Each play brims with vivacity, humor and pathos as each unique and relatable character navigates the challenges of our world today, and in the imagined near future. Audiences will have an opportunity to ask questions and engage the playwrights and the creative team in conversation after each reading. The four staged readings will take place Tuesdays, August 9, 16, 23 and 30 in a tour of three different San Francisco theatre venues. All readings are at 7pm and FREE. For more information and to RSVP, please visit goldenthread.org.

The series launches on August 9 at Potrero Stage (1695 18th St., San Francisco, CA 94107) with A Thousand Strange Places: Anthony Shadid and the Middle East by Robert Myers, directed by Sahar Assaf, which dramatizes the life and career of Pulitzer Prize-winning Lebanese-American journalist Anthony Shadid during the tumultuous decade of 2002-2012. It received a workshop production at the MacMillan Center at Yale University, in conjunction with a panel of prominent journalists from "The New York Times," "The Washington Post," NPR, and elsewhere who knew and worked with Anthony Shadid. On August 16 at Brava Theater Studio (2781 24th St., San Francisco, CA 94110) is What to Expect When You're Simulating Expecting by Nabra Nelson, directed by Susannah Martin, an intense comedy that peers into the new normal of the year 2080 with taboos, restrictions and climate disasters that still don't dampen the desire for family, home and security. August 23 at Z Below (470 Florida St., San Francisco, CA 94110) brings Pilgrimage by Humaira Ghilzai and Bridgette Dutta Portman, directed by Aidaa Peerzada, in which five Muslim American women embark on an Umrah, a minor pilgrimage to Mecca. Will the journey bring them together, or will secrets, rivalries and old wounds tear them apart? The series concludes on August 30 at Z Below with HOME? by Hend Ayoub, directed by Carey Perloff. Presented in collaboration with Z Space and San Francisco Playhouse, HOME? is an autobiographical solo show about a young woman's journey to retrieve and imagine a sense of home.

"We are so excited to bring back New Threads this year in person and to be sharing such riveting plays from and about the Middle East with our Bay Area audiences," says Sahar Assaf, Golden Thread's Executive Artistic Director. She adds, "The common thread running between the plays this year is the theme of journey. Some of our diverse characters are on truth-finding missions, some are on home-searching journeys, and some are on family-building quests. We will travel with them between the past, present and future and from Seattle to Egypt, from San Francisco to Mecca, from Oklahoma to Baghdad, and many other places in between. Our audiences are in for heartwarming, exhilarating, and revelatory theatre evenings and conversations at the various local Bay Area theatres the program is touring this year."

New Threads is made possible partially by a generous grant from the Doris Duke Charitable Foundation and the William and Flora Hewlett Foundation. Golden Thread thanks San Francisco Playhouse and Z Space for supporting the reading of HOME? by Hend Ayoub.

Golden Thread Productions, founded in 1996, is the first American theatre company devoted to the Middle East. We produce passionate and provocative plays from or about the Middle East that celebrate the multiplicity of its perspectives and identities. We are a developmental catalyst and vibrant artistic home to artists at various stages of their career. We bring the Middle East to the American stage, creating treasured cultural experiences for audiences of all ages and backgrounds. goldenthread.org

NEW THREADS 2022 LINE-UP
Note that readings take place at three different San Francisco venues.

Tuesday, August 9, at 7pm

Potrero Stage, 1695 18th St., San Francisco, CA 94107
A THOUSAND STRANGE PLACES: ANTHONY SHADID AND THE MIDDLE EAST
by Robert Myers
directed by Sahar Assaf
Pulitzer Prize-winning, Lebanese-American journalist Anthony Shadid is wounded in Palestine, awaits the American invasion of Iraq in Baghdad, covers the Israeli invasion of Lebanon in 2006, the fall of Mubarak in Tahrir Square, and is kidnapped in Libya while reporting on the civil war there. He re-defined the role of a reporter and was one of the only correspondents who covered the lives of people from the Arab world from every walk of life.

Tuesday, August 16, at 7pm

Brava Theater Studio, 2781 24th St., San Francisco, CA 94110
WHAT TO EXPECT WHEN YOU'RE SIMULATING EXPECTING
by Nabra Nelson
directed by Susannah Martin
In the year 2080, the new normal involves taboos on pregnancy, car ownership, red meat, and suburban homes. It involves travel restrictions, a mixed-race majority, ongoing climate disasters, and constant uncertainty. But other than that, everything is the old normal. Except for Hoda's experimental pregnancy. As Hoda gets ever-closer to her dream life, things don't seem to be going as planned. An intense yet comedic experience, this near-futuristic play simulates the unexpected.

Tuesday, August 23, at 7pm

Z Below, 470 Florida St., San Francisco, CA 94110
PILGRIMAGE
by Humaira Ghilzai and Bridgette Dutta Portman
directed by Aidaa Peerzada
Five Muslim American women embark on a pilgrimage to Mecca. Noor is an Afghan American immigrant with a secret. Her tech CEO daughter Maryam is struggling with legal woes, while Noor's nieces, the estranged sisters Sosan and Nadia, work to mend their fractured relationship. Meanwhile, Fatima, a Black Muslim convert, hopes to find her biological mother. Will the journey bring them together, or will secrets, rivalries, and old wounds tear them apart?

Tuesday, August 30, at 7pm

Z Below, 470 Florida St., San Francisco, CA 94110
HOME?
by Hend Ayoub
directed by Carey Perloff
Presented in collaboration with Z Space and San Francisco Playhouse
Through a panoply of vivid characters-from a five-year-old who just wants to join the neighborhood's Purim party to a casting director in Egypt who can't forget where she comes from, to her dying mother who longs for her to find a place in the world-Hend shares a deeply personal and true story about her search for the place that many of us take for granted: Home.

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