Theater Alliance Announces Upcoming Readings; BLOOD KNOT 5/15

We're mixing old and new for an exciting week of readings with our monthly Duke Ellington School showcase right in the middle! For advance tickets to the readings, click here. Pay What You Can tickets will be available at the door (Theater Alliance readings only. For Ellington tickets, please click on separate link below).

All readings are at the H Street Playhouse, 1365 H Street, NE. Come early or stay late and grab a bite or a drink at one of the many hip new eateries on H Street!

Sunday May 15
Blood Knot by Athol Fugard
Directed by Mark Hairston
with Ricardo Frederick Evans and Mark Hairston

A parable of two brothers, one white-skinned, one black, sharing a hovel in the slums of Port Elizabeth, South Africa. When what started out as a harmless game suddenly becomes all too real, the brothers are forced to piece together the fragments of their shared past, confront their individual identities, and finally speak the unspoken. Blood Knot is an examination of the bond between brothers amidst the "separate-ness" of apartheid South Africa.

Monday May 16
No Rules Theatre Company
Stonewater Rhapsody by Doug Wright
Directed by Tyler Budde

Set on the front porch and in the living room of a conservative Texas home, the play tells the story of two teenagers whose sexual awakening has been severely hampered by the fundamentalist fervor that runs like power lines through the Bible Belt. A comic first scene, set on the porch of Whitney's home, details his attempts to seduce the puritanical Carlyle after he's just been elected president of the Youth Ministry at the Church picnic. Carlyle coyly refuses his advances, citing everything from teen pregnancy to hellfire and damnation as reasons to abstain. In a dramatic second scene, Carlyle seeks Whitney's help after she has been the victim of a sexual assault. Rather than face the grim reality of her experience, Carlyle transforms the attack from an act of violence to a vision of glory, in which the bodies of her assailants become the angels torn from the Sistine Chapel ceiling, and the alcohol they forced upon her becomes the blood of Christ. As Carlyle's delusions grow, Whitney must convince her of the unfortunate truth. Together they struggle to wed their simplistic religious doctrine with the often painful complexity of the real world.

Tuesday May 17
Duke Ellington School R Street Speaks on H Street
Click here for tickets to this event only

Wednesday May 18
The New Negro by Thembi Duncan
Directed by BranDon White

Summer, 1926: A country schoolteacher inherits a Harlem boarding house from her worldly, sophisticated aunt and arrives on the doorstep eager to take the big city by storm. Instead, she finds herself caught in a whirlwind of enthralling characters and events that teach her more about herself than she ever imagined. Experience one of the oft-ignored stories of lesbians, gays, and everything in between, during the period that came to be known as the Harlem Renaissance.

Thursday May 19
Theater Alliance
'Night Mother by Marsha Norman
Directed by Stephawn Stephens
with Adele Robey and Fatima Quander

Recently revived on Broadway, this one-act play features two characters: Jessie Cates and her mother, Thelma, with whom she lives. The play opens with Jessie asking her mother where a particular gun is kept. She finds it with Thelma's help. As she cleans the gun, she quietly announces she's going to kill herself at the end of the evening. Jessie's announcement sets off a fierce struggle between mother and daughter, with Thelma using every strategy she can conceive of to talk Jessie out of her plan. Thelma becomes so desperate, she even resorts to telling Jessie the truth about a number of issues that have affected her life.

Friday May 20
Grain of Sand Theatre
Two new plays by Carl Long
Thomas Jefferson and George Mason Draft the Declaration of Independence
directed by Sara Bickler

Thomas Jefferson has taken on the task of writing the Declaration of Independence, but has writer's block. He visits his friend and mentor, who is not nearly as helpful as Jefferson would like.

and
The Fairy Tale
Directed by Christine Lange

A prince falls in love with a damsel in distress. They try for happily-ever-after, but a witch, a fairy, and some cops stand in the way.

 

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