Arena Stage Sets Full Cast of Ayad Akhtar's DISGRACED

Arena Stage announces casting for the final production of the 2015/16 season, Ayad Akhtar's Pulitzer Prize-winning drama Disgraced. Director Timothy Douglas (Arena's King Hedley II) tackles this emotionally-charged play by Akhtar, author of the novel "American Dervish" and currently the most produced playwright in the United States. Hailed as "emotionally shattering, a smart and provocative work of unusual daring that should be seen by anyone who cares about serious theater" by Newsday, Disgraced runs April 22-May 29, 2016 in the Kreeger Theater.

Disgraced introduces Amir, a Pakistani-American lawyer living the American dream-an Upper East Side apartment, Italian suits, a beautiful wife and the promise of becoming partner at the law firm. When a friendly dinner party conversation rockets out of control, the internal battle between culture and identity threatens to raze all that he's worked so hard to achieve.

Arena Stage favorite and D.C.-area native Nehal Joshi, who won audiences over for his performances in Oklahoma!, The Music Man and Mother Courage and Her Children, tackles the role of Amir. Joe Isenberg (Woolly Mammoth's We Are Proud to Present..., Arena's A Time to Kill) returns to Arena Stage as Isaac. Making their Arena Stage debuts are D.C. powerhouse performer Felicia Curry, seen in numerous productions across the region, as Jory; California-based actress Ivy Vahanian (Broadway's Coram Boy) as Emily; and Samip Raval as Abe, reprising a role he played at PlayMakers Repertory Company this past fall.

"Ayad Akhtar is a dream of a person-smart, kind, quick, humble and driven," says Artistic Director Molly Smith. "Disgraced tackles current issues around cultural identity head-on. It's an intelligent play that challenges the audience. No one will feel comfortable in this play, and ideally that is what spurs us to deeper understanding. Having Timothy Douglas as director ensures this will be a thought-provoking and superb production."

"Ayad Aktar has composed an exacting tale for our turbulent times," shares Director Timothy Douglas. "His script demands that I bring forth the lyricism of a clarifying order from the chaos of cultural misunderstanding that is the woven fabric of this remarkable play, while being ever vigilant in spotlighting genuine insight into the complexity of perception in what it is to be Muslim and American. With Arena Stage favorite Nehal Joshi in the role of Amir and the formidable Ivy Vahanian as his fiercely committed and compelled wife Emily, along with a cast of some of D.C.'s finest talent, Arena's Disgraced will propel the unbridled power of truth and the incendiary nature of misperception toward an explosive reckoning."

Ayad Akhtar (Playwright) was born in New York City and raised in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. He is a novelist and author of "American Dervish," published in over 20 languages worldwide and named a 2012 Best Book of the Year by Kirkus Reviews, Toronto's Globe and Mail, Shelf Awareness and O, The Oprah Magazine. His play Disgraced won the 2013 Pulitzer Prize for Drama, ran on Broadway at the Lyceum Theatre and is currently the most produced play in the country. In addition to Disgraced, his plays The Who & The What and The Invisible Hand received Off-Broadway runs and are currently being produced at theaters across the country. Ayad was listed as the most produced playwright for the 2015/16 season by American Theatre. As a screenwriter, he was nominated for an Independent Spirit Award for Best Screenplay for The War Within. He has been the recipient of fellowships from MacDowell, Djerassi, the Sundance Institute, Ucross and Yaddo, where he currently serves as a board director. He is also a board trustee at PEN/America.

Timothy Douglas (Director) previously directed King Hedley II at Arena Stage. D.C.-area credits include Father Comes Home from the Wars (Parts 1, 2 & 3), Two Trains Running, The Trip to Bountiful, Permanent Collection and A Lesson Before Dying (Round House Theatre); Dontrell, Who Kissed the Sea (2016 Helen Hayes Award nomination for Outstanding Director) and Insurrection: Holding History (Theater Alliance); The Last Orbit of Billy Mars (Woolly Mammoth); and Much Ado About Nothing (Folger Theatre). Additional credits include The Lake Effect (Silk Road Rising), Off-Broadway's Bronte: A Portrait of Charlotte and the world premiere of August Wilson's Radio Golf (Yale Repertory Theatre). Timothy is an associate artist at Cincinnati Playhouse in the Park and has directed more than 100 projects for American Conservatory Theater, Guthrie Theater, Berkeley Repertory Theatre, Center Theatre Group, South Coast Repertory, Steppenwolf Theatre Company, PlayMakers Repertory Company, Berkshire Theatre Festival, Milwaukee Repertory Theater, New Zealand's Downstage Theatre and Norway's National Theatre. He has served on the faculties of the University of Southern California, University of North Carolina, Emerson College, ACT and New Zealand Drama School.

Cast Biographies (in alphabetical order)
Felicia Curry (Jory) makes her Arena Stage debut. Area credits include OLIVÉRio, Chasing George Washington and Beehive (Kennedy Center); A Christmas Carol, The 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee and Civil War (Ford's Theatre); This (Round House Theatre); Home (Rep Stage); Laugh and Bloody Bloody Andrew Jackson (Studio Theatre); LES MISERABLES (Signature Theatre); Imagination Stage; Adventure Theatre MTC; MetroStage; Olney Theatre Center; and Toby's Dinner Theatre. Regional credits include Vanya and Sonia and Masha and Spike and The Mountaintop (Gulfshore Playhouse), Sister Act (Riverside Center) and The Color Purple (Virginia Repertory Theatre). New York credits include We Three Lizas (Joe's Pub) and The Brontes (NYMF). Felicia has received four Helen Hayes Award nominations, most recently for playing Nancy in Oliver! (Adventure Theatre). She is a graduate of the University of Maryland, College Park.

Joe Isenberg (Isaac) returns to Arena Stage following his performance in A Time to Kill. Additional D.C. credits include The Force of Destiny and Show Boat (Washington National Opera); Marie Antoinette and We Are Proud to Present... (Woolly Mammoth); Young Robin Hood (Round House Theatre); Suicide, Incorporated (No Rules Theatre Company); The Lieutenant of Inishmore and Crave (Signature Theatre); and Macbeth (Folger Theatre). TV credits include Netflix's House of Cards and PBS's Enemy of the Reich: The Noor Inayat Khan Story. Joe's choreography has been seen at numerous D.C. theaters, as well as at Florida Stage, Actors Theatre of Louisville and the Metropolitan Opera. He is the recipient of the 2013 Helen Hayes Award for Outstanding Choreography and has received several award nominations.

Nehal Joshi (Amir)'s Arena Stage credits include Mother Courage and Her Children, The Music Man, Oklahoma! and Señor Discretion Himself. D.C. credits include Man of La Mancha (Shakespeare Theatre Company), Recent Tragic Events (Woolly Mammoth), Mister Roberts (Kennedy Center) and Venus (Olney Theatre Center). Broadway credits include LES MISERABLES (original revival cast) and The Threepenny Opera (Roundabout Theatre Company). Off-Broadway credits include Falling for Eve, Working and Who's Your Baghdaddy? Regional credits include LES MISERABLES and Arsenic and Old Lace (Dallas Theater Center), Peter and the Starcatcher (Actors Theatre of Louisville), Working (The Old Globe/Asolo Repertory Theatre) and Disney's The Jungle Book (Goodman Theatre/Huntington Theatre Company). Film/TV credits include The Wire, Blackout and Submissions Only. Video game credits include "World of Warcraft: Cataclysm." Nehal received a 2013 Drama Desk Award. Twitter: @nehalpjoshi.

Samip Raval (Abe) hails from Charlotte, North Carolina and makes his Arena Stage debut. Regional credits include Shakespeare Theatre Company, Oregon Shakespeare Festival, PlayMakers Repertory Company and Georgia Shakespeare Festival. Workshop/residency credits with the Kennedy Center, Lincoln Center and Eugene O'Neill Theater Center. His short film The Faucet, which he wrote and directed, screened at the Oxford Film Festival and Toronto Short Film Festival. He has devised theater with artists in Kenya and India and works as a teaching artist with ASTEP in South Florida and New York. He is the recipient of the William R. Kenan Fellowship and attended the University of North Carolina School of the Arts.

Ivy Vahanian (Emily) is ecstatic to make her Arena Stage debut working with Timothy Douglas on this particular play. Many years ago, Ivy worked in D.C. with PJ Paparelli at Washington Stage Guild. Broadway and Off-Broadway highlights include Coram Boy, directed by Melly Still; Sundance Institute Theatre Lab in Residence at the Public Theater with Robert O'Hara; and Toys in the Attic, directed by Austin Pendleton. Regionally, Ivy has worked with Timothy twice before in All My Sons (Actors Theatre of Louisville) and A Line in the Sand (Washington Stage Company). She is now based in Santa Barbara, where she runs an award-winning theater company, The Producing Unit, with Peter Frisch. Ivy is also a proud mother to three amazing boys.

The creative team for Disgraced includes Set Designer Tony Cisek, Costume Designer Toni-Leslie James, Lighting Designer Michael Gilliam, Original Music & Sound Designer Fitz Patton, Fight Director Cliff Williams III, Stage Manager Amber Dickerson and Assistant Stage Manager Kristen Mary Harris.

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