Akie Kotabe to Lead UK Premier Reading Of Oren Safdie's COLOR BLIND

Akie Kotabe, star of Emmy Winning series Man in the High Castle, joins Tunji Lucas, Stanley J Browne, Alana Maria, Naomi McDonald and Mac McDonald - best known for his role as Captain Hollister in Red Dwarf - in a reading of Oren Safdie's latest play Color Blind at the Potemkin Theatre.

Award winning playwright Oren Safdie - son of the internationally renowned Israeli / Canadian architect Moshe Safdie - brings his latest work to London at the end of September.

The staged reading of Color Blind will be presented as part of a festival of arts, performance and cinema created in partnership with the Architecture Foundation. It will be directed by Sean Power.

Colour Blind is inspired by the construction of the National Museum of African American History and Culture in Washington DC. In the play Oren Safdie imagines a fictional jury assembled to choose the winning architectural design for the building while delivering a sharp satire of the racial politics informing the jury members' decision.

Oren Safdie, initially studied architecture before discovering playwriting as part of his Master's studies at Columbia University:

Oren Safdie said:

"Playwriting is like sculpture. You start with a block of stone-an idea-and chisel it down to its essence. Architecture is about building up, adding bit by bit until you are finished. Architecture isn't as revealing as playwriting, which is much more personal. For me, playwriting is where you work things out."

Oren Safdie has written 14 plays that have been performed across North America and brought him wide recognition. He is also the the recipient of numerous awards and fellowships including the Canada Council for the Arts, the Conseil des arts et des lettres du Québec, the Graham Foundation for Advanced Studies in the Fine Arts, the John Golden Fund and the Société de développement des entreprises culturelles.

Color Blind will be presented as part of a Summer season of events at the Potemkin Theatre - the Winner of the 2019 Antepavilion Architecture Prize 2019 and created by Maich Swift Architects. The Potemkin Theatre is a bold, geometric structure is attached to the top of a Haggerston warehouse. Its fantastic canal-side location allows audiences to witness performance happening either from the roof itself, or by looking across the waterway.

The Potemkin Theatre brings together opera, family-friendly theatre, new writing for the stage, expert architectural talks and an innovative two-day symposium, the programme makes the very most of its waterside location and encourages audiences to enjoy the remaining late-summer evenings.

Other events in the season will include:

• Family circus performance Look Up! from Hikapee (21 Sep, 11.30am & 2.00pm)
• Steve Tompkins and David Jubb in Conversation from the Architecture Foundation (26 Sep, 7.00pm)
• Rooftop cinema festival celebrating the city in film, including The Great Beauty and Wings of Desire

The Potemkin Theatre programme is supported by a grant from Arts Council England and is delivered in partnership with Dezeen.

The Potemkin Theatre and Antepavilion are supported by the Architecture Foundation and Shiva Ltd.

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