Spotlight On...Danny Mitarotondo

Name: Danny Mitarotondo

Hometown: Bridgewater, New Jersey

Education: BA, Gallatin at NYU; MFA, Playwriting at Columbia University

Favorite Credits: All of them.

Why theater?: Theater is the only thing in the universe that makes me feel like I am making my own universe in a universe larger than myself. It’s balanced; it’s generous. It’s gorgeous.

Tell us about Sun and Room: Sun and Room is about three college students hanging out on a Friday night, from sundown to sunup. The goal of being present and with each other takes the characters and audience on a journey through layers of connection, vulnerability, pain, and triumph.

What inspired you to write Sun and Room?: I was teaching playwriting at Fort Lewis College in Durango, Colorado – a small liberal arts school on top of a mountain in Southwest Colorado. The department commissioned me to write a play for its students. As a professor I saw students doing Durang, Kauffman and Hart, Chekhov – work that was good for them to play with, but in performance, looked almost comical because they were too young. Not by their own fault: those plays weren’t written for their age group – there aren’t many plays written for their age group. I realized that the contemporary plays about early 20s students are old now – they were written in the 90s. And anything new seems to treat college students like they are struggling through an abyss of social problems: abortions, drug overdoses, drunk driving – like college students need morality plays instead of honest, realistic plays with gravitas. Am I so conditioned to think that theater is white 40s and 50s adults Virginia Woolf-ing it up in a room that I’d forgotten to write for my own tribe?  So I wrote for my own tribe. Together with Dr. Ginny Davis (who directed the Fort Lewis College production of Sun and Room), I auditioned thirty students and chose three: Leah Brewer, Matthew Socci and Zoë Pike. I interviewed these actors and studied their voices. I wanted to write dialogue that sounded accurate to their speech, the speech of early 20s adults. I wanted to study how iPhones change our language. I wanted to write around physical behavior – unfinished sentences, overlapping and competitive text. I was inspired by Edward Hopper’s paintings and so I tried to write with the way he treats perspective, subject, light, and shadow. I started to experiment using a playwriting technique called the Score, which I created with Shannon Fillion. In the Score text is written horizontally, like sheet music. The Score allowed me to orchestrate the onstage relationships with precision – create dialogue that overlaps and competes. I was fortunate to work with the actors in the room as I was writing, and so I was able to write around their behavior in tandem with the choices of my director. Guided by the tenants that the play was about the present, not the past; that the play’s design was inspired by the realism of Edward Hopper, which is not totally realism; and that characters should at all times sound like Leah, Matt and Zoë, not me – together, my team and I slowly built the story of Sun and Room: a play about three college students hanging out on a Friday night. Last year, Sun and Room had a production at Fort Lewis College and then another production in LA at the Region VIII Kennedy Center American College Theater Festival.Now, our story and team are in New York City. Under Shannon Fillion’s direction, we have crafted a specific and fully realized version of my original impulse in collaboration with the Colorado actors, designers, and crewwho created it with me. I couldn’t be more excited. We have something very special.

What kind of theater speaks to you? What or who inspires you as an artist?: At the moment, I am drawn to theater that keeps me in the moment – whatever style. I believe that is my job: to give people the permission to be in the moment; to give an audience the choice to let go and be carried into a new experience, with care. I’ve only seen two plays in my life that have carried me into the moment: David Cromer’s production of Our Town and Anya Saffir’s production of The Happy Journey to Trenton and Camden.

If you could work with anyone you’ve yet to work with, who would it be?: David Cromer. I saw his production of Our Town five times. I think I went into debt because of that production. Thornton Wilder might be my favorite playwright and Cromer’s production blew me away. David, if you are reading this … come see Sun and Room.

What show have you recommended to your friends?: Aside from the two plays mentioned above, I’ve only recommended Circle Mirror Transformation. I saw Circle in previews and was shocked and delighted. The audience could feel that Annie Baker was a writer to be excited about. It was an amazing show.

Who would play you in a movie about yourself and what would it be called?: Hopefully someone attractive in "Hopefully Someone Attractive". It’s a romantic comedy.

If you could go back in time and see any play or musical you missed, what would it be?: The original production of Edward Bond’s Saved.

What’s your biggest guilty pleasure?: Sitcoms.

If you weren’t working in theater, you would be _____?: Writing sitcoms. Or working in a cemetery.

What’s up next?: I wrote the libretto for an opera, with music by Rachel DeVore Fogarty, directed by my dear friend and collaborator Mo Zhou. It is an adaptation of Maupassant’s The Necklace. Also, Shannon Fillion and I will start working toward Brontosaurus Haircut Productions’ 2016 production of my play Manmade Mistakes.  This is going to be a good, good year.

Spotlight On...Kimberly Faye Greenberg

Name: Kimberly Faye Greenberg

Hometown: Born in Long Beach... But I think it's now NYC as I lived here 16 years.. Isn't it at "10" that it becomes hometown??

Education: BA in Drama from University of CA Irvine

Select Credits: First and Only actress to play leading roles in 2 Off-Broadway musicals at the same time; Sylvia in Danny and Sylvia: The Danny Kaye Musical (which ran 3 years) and Fanny Brice in the solo show "One Night With Fanny Brice". That foray as Fanny opened a lot of doors for me. I now play Fanny in The Broadway bound musical Ghostlight which has had numerous Broadway investor readings etc...and of course in my own solo touring show Fabulous Fanny coming to 54 Below. I now have two successful albums as Fanny too! And, of course, I've worked a ton across the board in tv, film, theatre etc in many other lead/supporting roles.

Why theater?: Oh goodness. I've been doing it since I was in 4th grade. I went to this theatre arts camp and I was hooked. It’s like a drug. Once you're hooked... That's it. There is nothing else.

Tell us about Fabulous Fanny: The Songs and Stories of Fanny Brice: I like to call my show a “Cabaret with a twist” ..I channel Fanny basically the entire show (There is a twist in the end and I won’t give that away here…you have to come see the show.) Anyhow I play her in full costume, hair, make-up etc. and, as Ms. Brice, I sing/talk about her life. There is a story arc. I don’t in any way consider it a Wikipedia of facts. It is much more intimate and focuses more so on her the loves of her life (she was married 3 times) and her fun/interesting anecdotes. That combined with her famous, and not so famous songs, that, for the most part were inspired by the happenings in her life, create what is an evening where Fanny Brice fans and those that may not even know who she is can get to know this legend who, in actuality, has inspired so many future comedians (Lucille Ball, Gracie Allen etc), singers like Barbra Streisand (who also sings many of Fanny Brice's standards), the genre of musical theatre/American theatre history and such story arcs/mentions on todays hit television shows like Boardwalk Empire, Glee and so much more!

What inspired you to create Fabulous Fanny: The Songs and Stories of Fanny Brice?: Well, its funny how the universe conspires to keep bringing Fanny Brice back into my life. I wasn’t actually looking to create another solo show, having just done one Off-Broadway, but several venues who saw me in that Off- Broadway show wanted more and they commissioned me to write a new show! And here we are! Needless to say the show was a success at those venues and i’ve kept touring it ever since!

What kind of theater speaks to you? What or who inspires you as an artist?: Really smart musicals/plays that make you think and that gives the actor something to sink their teeth into. But I also love big spectacle musicals, the more traditional the better, that just put a huge grin on your face... My theme is getting repetitive...but Fanny Brice! She has inspired me and practically my entire acting career. She was so confident, proud of who she was and what she did, she was so full of chutzpah and took so many risks! Just incorporating those traits into my life has brought me so much inspiration, which has led to me taking huge leaps of faith in all areas of my career as an artist.

Any roles you’re dying to play?: Besides the obvious of Fanny in Funny Girl... Reno in Anything Goes, Fantine or Mdm T in Les Mis, Aldonza in La Mancha, Mama Rose in Gypsy...all the big, bold brassy women...they are my favorite! Of course I love creating roles too... I tend to do so much more of that lately in both plays and musicals. Listen I just want to keep working... Give me a role and I will play it.

What’s your favorite showtune?: That's easy... "Don't Rain on My Parade"... That never gets old.

If you could work with anyone you’ve yet to work with, who would it be?: Patti Lupone!!! I love her and all she does and everything she stand for. She did this interview once in Time Out magazine that I have had hanging on my fridge for years... In it it says (and I’m paraphrasing here) how she never gave up making big bold choices and being true to who she is as an artist regardless of whether or not that means going against the grain. I just love and appreciate that. I so dream of play her daughter!! We would make a good team..Any casting/ producers reading this?

Who would play you in a movie about yourself and what would it be called?: Oh goodness... I have no clue... I think we would have to do an open call and give an unknown a chance. I’m all about rooting for the underdog…And, I think I’m totally stumped on a title as well…lets leave that to the writer who is being paid big bucks to make my story nice and overly dramatic. ha ha ha.

What show have you recommended to your friends?: On The Town! I loved it!

What’s your biggest guilty pleasure?: Penny & nickel monopoly slot machines in Atlantic City

What’s up next?: Well, my Fabulous Fanny show will be at 54 Below on February 12th at 7pm! Its such a great, intimate venue and the atmosphere is so perfect for a 1920s/30's era show about Fanny Brice! Come see it! And, after that I’m thrilled to be singing in a tribute concert for Maury Yeston (who will be in attendance) called “Bookseller in the Rain” at the Metropolitan Room with my friend, and Ghostlight creative, Tim Realbuto and a bevy of other amazing Broadway folk.

Spotlight On...Anthony Sneed

Name: Anthony Sneed

Hometown: Toms River, NJ

Education: Toms River East, SAE

Select Credits: "Chasing Banksy" (2015), "After The Fall" (2013), "Bad Biology" (2008)

Why theater?: The way the energy of the performer mixes with the room and affects the audience is not only magical, but is something I think about constantly. With film, you can fine tweak those elements till you get a desired result but with theater there are elements out of your control, it’s scary and I’m really drawn to that. I once had a confused family member walk across the front of the stage looking for the bathroom and fortunately it was improv so we dealt with it and it worked wonderfully.

Who do you play in The Buffalo?: I play my 14 year old self.

Tell us about The Buffalo: The Buffalo is based on real events from the time I was in 8th grade. I moved around a ton as a kid and had a hard time fitting in, so when I finally came back to a school district I was familiar with, I made these big strides for acceptance. It’s quite self deprecating, but that’s what brings out a good portion of the humor, from me wearing Fubu & sewing these huge JNCO’s with my Mom to ultimately bringing a gun to school to impress the guys. Mind you, this was one year before Columbine so I was lucky there, but I ultimately get sent to live with my uncle in Missouri who was a part of this born again Christian community called Heartland. Trying to fit in there was just overwhelming, I was working milking cows in their dairy next to these born again criminals, gangbangers and sex offenders, it was a trip! Then I’d go to school and the kids there were just white washed, had no opinions other than what they were told. It was years later I came across this article in People Magazine about how Heartland was a cult and the more research I did, I found New York Times articles and forums littered with stories of kids being abused and tortured in the pursuit of God. It scared me how when I was in it, I didn’t realize it. I’m telling you, Google “Heartland”, find some threads and you’ll come across the best non-fiction you’ve ever read.

What is it like being a part of The Buffalo?: Being a one man show, I was surprised how it’s brought people together. My cousin Chris has been a super big help with getting me off book. I did a workshop run at The Pit in November and was just overwhelmed with the turnout. Peter Michael Marino, who runs Solocom, came backstage before the show and was like “Dude, you sold out the main stage at the PIT, for a solo show!” My friend Liz had to sit in the aisle. My close friends and everybody from the UCB & Magnet communities have been super supportive and I’m very grateful for that. I worked briefly with my director Armando Merlo for the first run, but this time around has been extensive and exhaustive for both parties. Armando, for those that don’t know, won the 2012 Solo NYC Fringe for his show “Salamander Starts Over”, so I really trust him when he speaks. My acting teacher, JoAnna Beckson, pulled me aside during class and was like, “you should really consider working with Armando, you two would really hit it off”. She couldn’t have been more right. We both grew up in New Jersey, have similar sense of humors, and when I suggest a Wu-Tang reference as a joke, he not only gets it, but recognizes whether the audience will get it and that’s important. This is only the beginning for The Buffalo, I have plans to take this around the world.

What kind of theater speaks to you? What or who inspires you as an artist?: I don’t care what kind, I just care if I have to take a few minutes to sit in my seat after the lights come up. I also enjoy leaving a theater being like, “What the fuck was that?!”. Then thinking about it for a few days and realizing it resonated with me more than I expected. I have subscriptions to Playwrights, Signature & Labyrinth, and try to catch shows at New Group and Wooster as much as I can. I love when I leave a Playwrights show and they give you that little Q&A that Tim Sanford does with the playwright. Those things are gold for someone like me. I work in a variety of mediums: performance, writing, conceptual & visual art, music, comedy and I find that I’m constantly getting turned on by the world around me. I’ve been told that I “notice the strangest things”. I tend to watch film in that way. Film has probably had the greatest cultural impact on my as an artist. My lifes goal is to have the entire Criterion Collection and right now I’m pretty close. Forget film school, spend a few grand and buy Criterions and just study the stories of the world and the works of the great auteurs. Everything else will fall into place.

Any roles you’re dying to play?: Stanley in Streetcar. Joe Bonaparte in Golden Boy. My dad was a golden gloves boxer and I’d love to bring my sense of strength and vulnerability to this. Josh in Cherokee. Lisa D’Amour wrote a brilliant, intriguing play and being that my family is Cherokee and lives on that very reservation she wrote about, it’s been a life goal to land that role. I got close the first go round if there’s another I’m all in.

What’s your favorite showtune?: Not going to lie, I’m not a big show tunes guy, but my collaborator & director Frank Henenlotter showed me the original Sweeney Todd with Angela Lansbury and pretty much everything in that was fantastic.

If you could work with anyone you’ve yet to work with, who would it be?: Anne Kaufman, Lisa D’Amour, Kirk Lynn, Annie Baker

If you could go back in time and see any play or musical you missed, what would it be?: The Streetcar where Alec Baldwin couldn’t get through the door, so instead of breaking the door like Stanley would, he apparently walked down off the stage and hopped around the set piece. Hilariously awkward to even think about right? That door being locked is like a Meisner wet dream.

What show have you recommended to your friends?: Your Mother’s Copy of the Kama Sutra

What’s your biggest guilty pleasure?: I have a lot of pleasures but nothing I feel guilty about.

What’s up next?: I’m planning on making The Buffalo as big as it can be. I have a 16mm feature film I did with Frank Henenlotter in New Orleans and Brooklyn called “Chasing Banksy” coming out this year. I’m producing a documentary on comic book artist Mike Diana, the only artist in the history of the USA to be tried and convicted of obscenity.

Spotlight On...Lee Sunday Evans

photo courtesy of Julie Guinta

Name: Lee Sunday Evans

Hometown: Denver, CO

Education: Boston University, School for International Training

Favorite Credits: The Play About My Dad by Boo Killebrew, The Deepest Play Ever by Geoffrey Decas, The Caucasian Chalk Circle with HS students at PPAS

Why theater?: I'm endlessly fascinated by the public event of it - about the communication between a play and an audience, between the performers on stage and the audience that's watching them. I'm fascinated by what you can and can't control about it - and what you do and don't want to control about it. We're so media saturated these days, that I'm hooked on the idea that we can create a public space where we're NOT telling people what to think or crafting images and narratives designed to manipulate people. That seems of vital importance to me - and increasingly difficult because our expectations that we 'get' something or can 'identify' with a play seem to be so heavily shaped by our experience with heavily manufactured media - marketing, movies, commercials, music videos etc.

Tell us about A Beautiful Day in November on the Banks of the Greatest of the Great Lakes: Great Lakes is a contemporary family drama. Its a play about a sprawling family making Thanksgiving dinner where there are no props or representational scenic elements, and all the action is described by two sports announcers looking down on the event. Aesthetically, the play is a rejection of naturalism because it requires that you figure out some way to stage it without any representational set or props.

What made you want to direct Great Lakes?: The language. I'm absolutely crazy about Kate's playful, detailed, staccato, muscular language. Its so smart and so outrageously funny AND, its also very, very emotional. I love that her language is emotional and not at all sentimental. The mode of story-telling that the language in this play sets up is so exciting to work on as a director - the text tells you everything you need to know about the action and a fair amount about what people are feeling as well. So, as a director, I was freed from having to represent any quotidian behavior on-stage - no one had to walk across the room to pick up the "real-life" hot pads or napkin rings. Instead, I got to reveal the characters and tell the story by creating a staging vocabulary that works in concert with the text but is not literal in any way. The challenge of telling the story in this play was extremely appealing to me - any time I started to recreate any literal behavior on-stage the play felt dead, flat because that behavior was already being described so why should we need to see it? So then the challenge for me as a director becomes - what do you put on stage while the text is being said? The play pushed me to this fundamental question about what to put on stage to tell the story. It required me to start with this big blank canvas that I found very exhilarating. In the end, I can see that I was honing in on how the text and the staging would create a composite and in that composite was the story. The audience put the text and staging together - they had to inherently be active in that way. That's very exciting to me.

What kind of theater speaks to you? What or who inspires you as an artist?: I'm very inspired by experiments with form. Writers who are making formal and structural choices in their work to illuminate or deepen the content in some way. I think that every era creates new forms to suit and challenge the prevalent conventions of that time. I think Kate created the form of narrated sports-action family drama for this play, because she wanted to make a familiar event (Thanksgiving with the family) into something just strange enough that you can see it fresh for yourself in some way. And, as an artist, I think she's responding to the 20th century naturalistic conventions that can feel a bit tired these days - we've seen so many plays in living rooms and kitchens where people are pretending to act normally, like they would in every day life, even though its a room full of carefully chosen representational things. When those plays were written - people didn't watch tons of TV where 'real-life' was being portrayed in great detail. Now - I think the bravest theater artists are defiantly carving out new space for theater that doesn't try to compete with the naturalism and representation of TV and Film. We have to invent and explore new, inherently theatrical forms of story-telling.

If you could work with anyone you’ve yet to work with, who would it be?: I'd absolutely love to watch Ariane Mnouchkine build a new production from day one through closing night. I'd be an actor with a bit part, a props person, anything.

What show have you recommended to your friends?: Daniel Fish's recent production A (radically condensed and expanded) Supposedly Fun Thing I'll Never Do Again - after David Foster Wallace

Who would play you in a movie about yourself and what would it be called?:  No comment!

If you could go back in time and see any play or musical you missed, what would it be?: As many of the early performances of Godot as I could - at the big fancy theaters where it was panned and people stormed out, and the famous performance of it in a prison where all the inmates completely understood it. And I'd LOVE to have seen one of Brecht's original productions of Mother Courage or Good Person in Berlin, to see how he approached his own work and how people responded to it in the time, place, and context where it was originally created.

What’s your biggest guilty pleasure?: Seeing sci-fi, action movies at a big expensive theater on 42nd street where you're steeped in the horror of Times Square mania seeing Hollywood films made with gazillions of dollars that supposedly reflect the values and fears and narratives of mainstream culture.

If you weren’t working in theater, you would be _____?: In my dreams, I'd be an economist. Working for someone like Thomas Piketty or Esther Duflo.

What’s up next?: A residency at Baryshnikov Arts Center, and working on a commission from New Victory Theater, then headed up to MacDowell to work on a contemporary adaptation of Shaw's Major Barbara.

Review: Who Needs Rationale?

Sometimes the lives we lead are not exactly what we want. So in order to make them what we want, we pursue other ventures that get us there. In Ross Howard’s No One Loves Us Here, a bevy of characters pursue new ambitions that may or may not involve the lives of those around them.
Rationale and reason are out the window in this bizarre dark comedy. Established like a trashy soap, No One Loves Us Here tackles death, infidelity, and a whole slew of drama-filled topics when a mysterious young man turns the Beaumont's world upside down. Washington, a nineteen year old who works in a video store, a virtually non existent work place, knocks on the door of a well-to-do couple and manages to convince them to allow him to reside in their guest house. What follows is a quick succession of scheming and smack talk that results in the unthinkable. Ross Howard's script is a well-planned idea that is executed in an unfortunate way. The characters that he depicts are larger than life but they often fall short in their execution. Director Jerry Heymann seemed to miss the brand of comedy Howard was going for, thus makes the production a bit messy on the whole. The situation that Howard places his characters in is quite funny and over-the-top. But without an equal heightened approach, the drama comes across as drama and not the comedy that it truly wants to be. The rationale of these seemingly complete strangers allowing another stranger live with them is incomprehensible but without this bit of plot I suppose this play couldn’t further.

photo courtesy of Hunter Canning

Though Heymann’s direction seemed to confuse the actors’ approach, Jessica Kitchens’ seemed to be the only one who tackled the heightened hilarity. Her boozy housewife was desperate for attention and by the end of Act II, her deadpan delivery proved that this could have been an even stronger show if her costars matched her. April Kidwell, a top-notch comedian, scraped the surface of bold. Kidwell’s Amber was a wonderful “other woman” but it seemed as if she was being asked to hold back. Anthony Michael Irizarry as Washington had such rich potential but also seemed to be lacking. What he did present was pretty noble.
Director Heymann missed the mark to bring this production to its full potential. From a design standpoint, Heymann’s team brushed the surface of possibility. Set designer Brian Dudkiewicz created a generic American living room, bland carpet, decor and all. For a couple that was supposedly of a high monetary class, the room did not reflect it. Despite that, poorly constructed walls with noticeable seams drew attention away from the action. Costume designer Samantha Lind gave the characters little personality. Had Heymann’s vision been clearer, perhaps this colorful play would have been reflected in the overall production design.
While some may love this play, there was just something off in No One Loves Us Here. Howard’s script had substance but Heymann’s direction didn’t quite match it. In the hands of another eye, perhaps the nuances of comedy would have been perfected, but as it stands now, New Light Theater Project’s production was just not up to par.

Review: A Storyteller's Delight

Secrets, secrets are no fun, unless you share with everyone! Every family has some skeletons. Some dark past that stays hidden away until someone gets curious. Set tucked away in the titular state, Brian Watkins’ astoundingly mighty Wyoming brings a formally shattered family together on a day of thanks as a healed wound is ripped open once again. Produced by the hit machine Lesser America, Wyoming is a gripping saga of family and the power of keeping truths away.
Played in the mid 1990s, Brian Watkins’ Wyoming shares the story of the reemergence of a long departed brother who mysteriously returns to town, forcing a family to question a life-defining instance that happened over twenty years earlier. Broken into two distinct parts, the first part of the play is filled with exposition, told through smart theatrical devices. The second part is an action packed dinner where an innocent party game leads to truths being revealed. From a structural standpoint, Wyoming utilizes some pretty standard devices, but the way Watkins boosts them is smart and fresh. From flashbacks to a monologue, the array of storytelling is perfect for this mystery play. Brian Watkins is a wordsmith. His marvelous storytelling talents are on full display as he keeps you glued to the edge of your seats, waiting with bated breath for the ultimate reveal. The moment the word game at dinner begins, each sentence that the family creates leads to such a fantastic reveal.

photo courtesy of Hunter Canning

To bring Wyoming to life, Lesser America has assembled a cast filled with company favorites along with seasoned pros. As April, the curious sister and daughter who hopes to unite the family, Sarah Sokolovic is simply stunning. Sokolovic has an innate ability to blend humor into her performance, all while remaining firm and grounded. Sokolovic is truly the glue that keeps the family and play together. Daniel Abeles and Nate Miller as Tom and Grant respectively have a natural connection as performers that made playing brothers easy. Their tag team act blended well with Sokolovic’s April. Carter Hudson does a great job as the smokey Hank in the flashback scenes. His chemistry with Laura Ramadei’s Maggie is exquisite. While Laura Ramadei does beautiful work as young Maggie, there is a small layer missing as she transitions to play the matriarch. The age dynamic between mother and daughter was lacking. She does transform and finds some beautiful moments in the dinner scene, there was more to be desired.
Watkins’ script is near flawless and Danya Taymor’s direction was equally brilliant. The rollercoaster of momentum was expertly maintained by Taymor. She found the moments when the story needed to take time and when it needed to keep moving. Taymor’s staging throughout was spot on. In the first part, keeping Edward T. Morris’ rundown world stationary allowed Taymor to blend into each scene and memory with ease. By mixing present with past, Masha Tsmiring’s lighting design allowed for some beautiful stage pictures. The soundtrack that Robin Pecknold and Neal Morgan composed fit beautifully into Watkins’ world. It was subtle and served the play well.
Wyoming is one of those simple plays that hits you. It mixes an array of emotions that allow to feel as if you are part of the family. Brian Watkins knows how to tell a story. And with a top notch team surrounding in, his story is even stronger. Wyoming may be the best thing from Lesser America yet.

Review: A Truly Beautiful Day

If you ever thought your family’s holiday gatherings were nuts, wait until you see the folks of Kate Benson’s wildly flawless A Beautiful Day in November on the Banks of the Greatest of the Great Lakes. A typical Thanksgiving goes haywire as relatives unite on a day of thanks as history recurs in the present.
Presented like a high speed sporting event, including wickedly spot on play by play, A Beautiful Day in November on the Banks of the Greatest of the Great Lakes follows an average American family’s Thanksgiving from preparation to completion. Rather than offer a stereotypical family drama, playwright Kate Benson does the extraordinary and turns the family drama on its head, finding ingenuity in a high concept piece. Her characters lack ordinary names. The cast is a wonderfully diverse ensemble. There are no props or furniture. All of this allows Benson’s piece to be universal and accessible. Benson’s script on paper is merely a blueprint for possibility. Director Lee Sunday Evans lifts Benson’s words and breathes such life into it on stage. Evans takes great precision in her direction. She has taken great care and dedication as she guided her ensemble to victory. Evans has a Wes Anderson-like specificity that was vibrant, energetic, and stunning to watch. The theatrical vocabulary that Evans created was crisp and inventive. The brilliance that Evans adds to Benson’s wide-open script is nothing short of daring. Her attention to detail adds a wonderful layer to an already solid production.

photo courtesy of Heather Phelps-Lipton

Benson’s cornucopia of personalities that make up the family is a wonder to watch. The blend of generations is dynamic. As the host with the most, Brooke Ishibashi as Cheesecake gave a solid and grounded performance. Her array of personality shined depending on who she was interacting with. Her camaraderie with her sisters Cherry Pie and Trifle, played by the equally wonderful Alicia Simms and Nina Hellman respectively, was pure delight. Mia Katigbak as matriarch SnapDragon is true and comical in her physicality. Kristine Haruna Lee as the hazardous Gumbo brings an extraordinary sharpness to her character. Her sense of vulnerability shines through as her family gets down on her, but the moment she becomes the hero, her strength is astonishing and real. While the majority of the cast had a lot of physical work to explore, it was the pair of color commentators that seemed to have the most fun and hardest job. Hubert Point-DuJour and Ben Williams as the color commentators have a sensational report with one another. While you may not have been watching the dynamic duo at all time, their presence was alive, all thanks to their silky smooth vocals.
With a blank canvas to create Benson’s world, the design team brought an authentic and cohesive design. Sara C. Walsh’s 70s inspired set with wood galore was just what this athletic play needed. At first glance, the tape on the floor of the stage looked arbitrary, but with close attention, each color and shape defined specific movement by the company. Costume designer Kathleen Doyle did a solid job defining the generation gap between characters and allowing each individual to have their own personality through costume. If ever there is proof of the importance of sound design, it’s in this play. Brandon Wolcott’s brilliant design captured the spirit of the piece by incorporating stadium buzzers as replacements for various everyday items like doorbells and oven timers.
While the end is bound to pose an abundance of questions, the lead up is quite brilliant. A Beautiful Day in November on the Banks of the Greatest of the Great Lakes is a defining piece that proves theater doesn’t need to always fall into that cookie cutter mold to be great. Kate Benson has written a great play but it’s the top notch directing by Lee Sunday Evans that makes this play a celebration.

Spotlight On...Brian Watkins

Name: Brian Watkins

Hometown: Parker, CO

Education: DePaul and Northern Colorado

Why theater?: It's live and completely unlike any other art form. The flesh and blood aspect of it never gets old. And it's very hard to get right.

Tell us about Wyoming: It's a play about a family that's trying to avoid the past. Their estranged and silent brother is spotted at a hometown diner twenty years after a confounding childhood crime and his return uncovers some buried memories and unspoken bounties, hatching a quite eventful Thanksgiving. It's a ensemble piece that explores the places and people we come from and the fragile power that memory holds over family. We have an excellent team all around with a cast that will knock your socks off. The play is heavily reliant upon music as a tool for understanding Time, so we've enlisted original music to be composed by Robin Pecknold and Neal Morgan, who have done some beautiful work. Robin is my cousin, and so it was a joy to collaborate with him on this, as his sound is an absolutely a perfect fit for the world/tone of the play. Add some great designers and the stellar work of the producers at Lesser America and I think we've made a great night of theatre.

What inspired you to write Wyoming?: I'm interested in the elusiveness of memory and the stakes that it holds in our relationship to family history. This is directly affected by the land our family occupies, and I wanted to write something that contrasted the permanence of that land with the temporality of its inhabitants. We all have a connection to the past, and I find it's typically more mysterious than concretely fathomable. This is the flint that sparks the dramatic action in Wyoming (I hope).

What kind of theater speaks to you? What or who inspires you as an artist?: Theatre that is muscular and unexpected and stories filled with characters whose choices are oddly defined by environment. I love plays that see the stage as a kind of altar for Americans shaped by the history of the land they live on, or moonstruck by the culture and heritage they keep. It's always shifting but one thing that's remained constant is a continual fascination with where people are from (i.e. Place). For me, Place is the gathering agent yet totem of individuality that shapes society. In it's best form I think this expresses a distinctly American conflict, that is, characters driven by instincts that are at once territorial and transient. Some of my favorite artists that do this are Bruce Nauman, Flannery O'Connor, Cormac McCarthy, Sam Shepard, Faulkner.

If you could work with anyone you’ve yet to work with, who would it be?: Tough question, as the people I'm working with right now at Lesser America are some pretty great folks. People that can do more with less are the best kind of artists in my eyes.

What show have you recommended to your friends?: More recently, Scenes From a Marriage at NYTW and Father Comes Home From The War at the Public. Jez Butterworth's The River was pretty damn good too. I'll see anything he writes.

Who would play you in a movie about yourself and what would it be called?: Jim Varney, "Ernest Goes to Camp"

If you could go back in time and see any play or musical you missed, what would it be?: I would have loved to see the original production of Long Days Journey Into Night

What’s your biggest guilty pleasure?: Barbecue/beer.

If you weren’t working in theater, you would be _____?: Probably writing in some other capacity.

What’s up next?: Wyoming plays with Lesser America until the end of the month so come see it while you can. Then I'm headed off to Colorado for a reading of the play with Local Theatre in Boulder as part of their Lab series.

Spotlight On...Corey Tazmania

Name: Corey Tazmania

Hometown: Brooklyn, New York

Education: Antioch College, Fiorello H. LaGuardia High School of Music & Art and Performing Arts

Select Credits: The Parable Conference (Next Wave Festival, BAM); On the Future of Art (Guggenheim); Pericles and Oliver Twist (STNJ); Jericho (NJREP); The Housewives of Mannheim (59E59).

Why theater?: Theatre is an art form that requires collaboration- of ideas, craft, and expression. Because it is a shared event throughout its entire process, I feel connected to and actively engaged in something much larger than myself (esprit de corps).

Who do you play in Villainous Company?: Claire Ashburn

Tell us about Villainous Company: This play is like a puzzle. All three of its characters reveal certain truths. Each of them (and us) have to figure out where these pieces fit to make sense of the real and whole story being told.

What is it like being a part of Villainous Company?: Super fun! I think we're pretty lucky to have a group of people who are playful, thoughtful, clever, wicked good at their craft and bring homemade snacks...

What kind of theater speaks to you? What or who inspires you as an artist?: Wow, I have to say I am inspired by all of the performing arts and the artists, artisans and technicians who make it happen. There is something so beautiful and scary and reflective in the ephemeral quality of live art.

Any roles you’re dying to play?: Martha (Who's Afraid Of Virginia Woolf?); Medea (Medea); Frankie (Frankie And Johnny At The Clare De Lune); Pilot (Grounded); Portia (Merchant of Venice).

What’s your favorite showtune?: "My Friends" from Sweeney Todd.

If you could work with anyone you’ve yet to work with, who would it be?: Director Ken Rus Schmoll.

Who would play you in a movie about yourself and what would it be called?: Natalie Wood, "The Foolish Grin (Working Title)"

If you could go back in time and see any play or musical you missed, what would it be?: Ellen Terry in Macbeth, Ruth Gordon in A Doll's House

What show have you recommended to your friends?: Under the Radar Festival

What’s your biggest guilty pleasure?: Chinese food in bed.

What’s up next?: In February, I'll be working on an installation for Camel Collective at REDCAT and then return to NJREP for Richard Strand's new play, The Realization of Emily Linder.

Spotlight On...Julia Campanelli

Name: Julia Campanelli

Hometown: I’ve lived in NYC long enough to call it my hometown. I think I was born here in a previous life.

Education: University of Maryland (theatre) and The New School University, NYC (film)

Select Credits: Sleep No More (Punchdrunk NY); Cornbury: The Queens’ Governor (Theatre Askew); The Seagull (East River Park Amphitheatre); And It Spins Twice by Alex Roblan, Benefit of A Doubt with Carol Kane, The Comings And Goings Of Average People with Mackenzie Phillips, directing the site-specific Macbeth on LES for Shelter Theatre Group.

Why theater?: It’s the only place being a drama queen isn’t frowned on. I think. I may be wrong.

Who do you play in Villainous Company?: Joanna Clay, the fastest cat in the jungle.

Tell us about Villainous Company: 3 female sociopaths in a game of intrigue and a war of wills.

What is it like being a part of Villainous Company?: Wonderful! The company is great. It’s a great, tricksy script, and director is delightful. My cast mates are so good it’s intimidating. I really had to up my game to play with them.

What kind of theater speaks to you? What or who inspires you as an artist?: Theatre about strong, independent, intelligent women speaks to me, which is why I was drawn Villainous Company. Playwrights like Sarah Ruhl and Moira Buffini inspire me because they write these types of characters. Ann Hamburger’s En Garde Arts did some site-specific productions directed by Tina Landau and Ann Bogart that blew my mind. Literally, my head left my body. It was messy, but worth it.

Any roles you’re dying to play?: Mr. Macbeth, Hecuba, Tamora, Lady Bracknell (let’s take it back from the men). Juliet, or any ingénue. I was never an ingénue. Too tall.

What’s your favorite showtune?: I’m not a musical theatre person, but I do like A Little Night Music, and West Side Story, because of the stories they’re based on, and of course the music is so brilliant.

If you could work with anyone you’ve yet to work with, who would it be?: I would love to have worked with Mike Nichols. He inspired me to become a director.

Who would play you in a movie about yourself and what would it be called?: I am developing a screenplay about myself. In high school I broke the gender barrier in sports in the United States. The role I would play would be writer and director. I’m stuck on the title, though. I’m open to suggestions.

If you could go back in time and see any play or musical you missed, what would it be?: Wow. So many. I would love to have seen an original Globe production in Shakespeare’s time. Moliere in his last performance, dying on stage (that’s how I want to go). John Wilkes Booth at his last performance. (talk about theatre as politics!) Sarah Bernhardt in anything, Laurette Taylor in The Glass Menagerie, Charles Ludlam and Everett Quinton in Camille. The original production of The Trojan Women; (Imagine Euripides’ notes to actors -  “I love what you’re bringing to the role, but it’s a comedy!”)

What show have you recommended to your friends?: Villainous Company, Curious Incident of the Dog In the Night Time, Tamburlaine Parts I & II.

What’s your biggest guilty pleasure?: Seeing 2 plays or 3 films in a day.

What’s up next?: In 2015 I’m directing three concert staged readings for my theatre company, Shelter Theatre Group: a gender-reversed Romeo and Juliet, on the same weekend VC opens (multi-tasking!), an all-male version of The Maids, and a gender-mixed version of Hamlet. After VC closes I go into pre-production on a short film I wrote and will direct and act in, based on one of Shakespeare’s most famous sonnets, called “116”. I have a horror film project with director Jeremiah Kipp in development that we hope to shoot this year. And I have another film I’m developing based on Jocasta and her relationship with Oedipus, placed in modern day New York City. Again, I’m stuck on the title. Do you think ‘Motherf**ker’ is too literal? Spoiler alert, definitely.

Spotlight On...Terri Mateer

Name: Terri Mateer

Hometown: Brattleboro, Vermont

Education: BS Interior Design

Favorite Credits: Doing A Kind Shot at FringeNYC. What an experience!

Why theater?: Because there are actual real, live people there.

Tell us about A Kind Shot: It's a solo show that chronicles my life as a basketball player, designer, coach, stripper…. It's uplifting and thought provoking and some have said that the pace of my delivery makes them feel like they are watching a basketball game. I used to play pro ball in France and I played thru college so the story uses basketball as a metaphor. And just when you think, "Oh my God..! This is getting heavy." I slip in some humor.

What inspired you to write A Kind Shot?: After my first solo show, I wanted to take what I had learned and tell a story with a "truer angle" of my life. So, I Googled "how to do a solo show" and found Marty Moran's show All the Rage and later saw The Tricky Part. I liked how he told his life story with a thru line and how it was on the edge with humor and smarts. After performing "a kind shot", people write me emails saying how they can now talk about stuff (like sexual abuse) that they had never talked about with their  loved ones. Many people have said that the show inspires them to get out there, play, let it rip. It's the feedback from people that inspires me, that keeps me going.

What kind of theater speaks to you? What or who inspires you as an artist?: I like the "straight" plays. But then I really like the weird outrageous ones too. Anytime there are humans on a stage crushing the lights out, I'm game, all in, give me more. I mean, I love Stomp! And I could fall in love with a solo artist, who is simply on stage and pouring out their heart and soul. What inspires me are those laughs, those moments of sizzle, the mistakes that you as a performer can turn into gold on the stage… the opportunity to share yourself live! To see what is gonna happen tonight…knowing that you are seeing a show for the first time! Every time is the first time.

If you could work with anyone you’ve yet to work with, who would it be?: Jeff Goldblum, Jodie Foster, Steve Buscemi, TILDA SWINTON!!!

What show have you recommended to your friends?: Random Acts by Renata Hinrichs, both of Marty's shows, and any of Mike Birbiglia's shows -- he's got one now called Thank God for Jokes.

Who would play you in a movie about yourself and what would it be called?: A female coach who is falling apart, she coaches a team, say from a small town and the kids are living like below the poverty level and thru coaching, the kids get into colleges, she heals, a community is created.  The movie would have to be called "Coach". And star Sigourney Weaver or Mariel Hemingway or Kate Winslet.

If you could go back in time and see any play or musical you missed, what would it be?: Burn This.  It was my mom' favorite play she always talked about it. I played Anna in some scene studies. Plus, I love John Malkovich too. And I miss my mom, so it would be cool to see what she liked.

What’s your biggest guilty pleasure?: Eating.

If you weren’t working in theater, you would be _______?: I'd be a mess….but I'd be working in architectural design services or finding a way to create my landscaping biz into a full time gig.

What’s up next?: Raising money. You got any?

Spotlight On...Kyoung H. Park

Name: Kyoung H. Park

Hometown: Santiago, Chile

Education: MFA in Playwriting, Columbia University

Favorite Credits: disOriented and the upcoming premiere of TALA

Why theater?: I stumbled into playwriting as an accident and after many years, it just became something I did. Sometimes, it’s pure discipline, because I don’t understand why I keep doing it, except that I’m miserable when I don’t, and unless I keep writing, I feel like something inside me is never let out. I wish there was another way to explain where it comes from, but it comes from a real need, and once a play is written, it just seems logical that I would find a way to make the play happen. The process is long and protracted. It feels like you’re pregnant for four years, and you just carry this thing—this play—and find the ways to make your words human, by finding actors who’ll embody your words; then, you create a home for them, by finding designers who can make this “play-world” you’ve written come to life; and then, you figure out why you’re putting all of this together, and for whom, and how you’ll make it happen, so you can find an audience.

Tell us about TALA: TALA tells two stories—the first is a semi-autobiographical narrative about my immigration story as a gay, Korean-Chilean playwright (performed by Daniel K. Isaac)—and the second story is the story of Pepe and Lupe, two lovers inspired by Chilean poets Gabriela Mistral and Pablo Neruda (performed by Flor De Liz Perez and Rafael Benoit). We collage these two stories together and thread them into a whole with original music by Svetlana Maras, choreography by Yin Yue, illuminated props by Jason Krugman, live video by John Knowles, in a theatrical production with set design by Marie Yokoyama, lights by Chuan-Chi Chan, sound by Lawrence Schober (and Chris Barlow) and costumes by Elizabeth Barrett Groth. The overall effect is seriously playful, challenging, and beautiful—everyone involved is an active collaborator and doing really fascinating work.

What inspired you to write TALA?: I started writing TALA four years ago because I was trying to find a way to immigrate to the United States. Obviously, you can’t immigrate to a country by writing a play, but I wrote the play as a way to expressively work through what I had to figure out legally, as an immigrant. When I was finding my way through the immigration system, the play did well, but when I lost my way, the show stopped. I got my Greencard this May and we received our artistic residency at the University Settlement a few weeks later. Soon after that, we scheduled the premiere of TALA and I’m quite excited that we’re doing it in this historic, NYC landmark that has served immigrant communities for over 130 years. I’m very thankful Alison Fleminger and Lisa Clair (Curator and Co-Curator of the Performance Project @ University Settlement) have invited us to tell this story in their space—it’s a heavenly match.

What kind of theater speaks to you? What or who inspires you as an artist?: I am inspired by the theater made downtown—although “downtown,” “experimental,” or “performance art” doesn’t really capture the nature of this work. I am inspired by theater that challenges conventions, manipulates forms and techniques, and I respond very well to work that is personal and made by individuals—when you feel like someone is really reaching out to you to tell you something. I don’t go to the theater to be entertained, I like going to the theater to listen, to think, and to be asked to think about things in a different way. That really inspires me.

If you could work with anyone you’ve yet to work with, who would it be?: I feel like I’ve worked with everyone I wanted to work with as I prepared myself to make this show. Previous to my studies at Columbia, I was an exchange fellow in Augusto Boal’s Center for the Theater of the Oppressed in Rio de Janeiro and learned how to create work based on collaboration and improvisation. I searched for ways to make this happen with my own writing, and I interned with Young Jean Lee’s Theater Company for two years, before jumping on the Mabou Mines’ band-wagon to work with my mentor, Lee Breuer, for another two years. Last year, I was a fellow with Target Margin Theater’s inaugural Institute for Collaborative Theater-Making and found ways to process and distill all of these practical experiences into a method I can call my own, and now I’m more interested in making my own work. I have more than five plays in different stages of development, waiting for me to make them happen, so if anything, I’d like to work with theater companies that can help me keep making my work, or tour my work to support the making of future projects. Now that I am not restricted by my immigration status, there’s this door that’s been opened and I’m just trying to stay centered as the ideas flow out.

What show have you recommended to your friends?: Since it’s January and festival season, I am recommending multiple shows to my friends. I’m excited about The Assembly’s That Poor Dream at The Tank, Temporary Distortion’s My Voice Has an Echo In It at the COIL Festival, Bora Yoon’s Sunken Cathedral at HERE’s Prototype Festival, Cynthia Hopkins’ A Living Documentary at American Realness, Lucy Alibar’s Throw Me on the Burnpile and Light Me Up at Under the Radar, and La MaMa’s SQUIRTS!, curated by Dan Fishback. I’m sure I’m not the only one excited that all 10 seasons of “Friends” are now available on Netflix, but if you’re a theater person and not going out to the theater every night this month, you are really missing out on some of the best theater in the city. It’s just that plain and simple.

Who would play you in a movie about yourself and what would it be called?: I am in love with this question because I’ve already written this movie. It’s called "SEOUL BABY" and it’s a gay drama set in Korea. Daniel K. Isaac would play me, as he’s already done so in disOriented, an immigrant family drama with Korean fan dancing, and will be doing again, in TALA. Daniel K. Isaac is my muse and we have a really wonderful, collaborative partnership. We challenge each other to grow artistically with each project that we work on, and I hope we get to keep working together in the future. He’s a generous artist and phenomenal actor, and the way we’ve managed to keep collaborating over the past few years truly excites me.

If you could go back in time and see any play or musical you missed,what would it be?: I really wish I had seen more productions of Sarah Kane, Martin Crimp and Caryl Churchill, more work by Richard Foreman, and I always missed Dimitris Papaioannou when his work was somewhere in the States. I have a feeling that I would appreciate their work even more if I had had a more direct, visceral experience with them, so I’d go back in time to see their works.

What’s your biggest guilty pleasure?: I am obsessed with "Project Runway". I think there’s something really satisfying about watching all these people make clothes and “put on a show” in sixty minutes and see the [very reduced and edited] creative process that makes that happen. By the end of each episode, it makes me feel a sense of creative completion, which is nice, because my process is so glacial. It takes so much time. Theater is probably one of the slowest and most complicated ways of expressing yourself creatively, but the collaborative practice and social nature of theater is my ultimate guilty pleasure—it’s like an addiction. I am hooked on people.

If you weren’t working in theater, you would be _____?: I would probably find ways to work in film or TV, because you can reach more people through these other media. But to be honest, I already work outside the theater to support the work I do artistically, so in some ideal future, in which artists are more sensibly compensated for their work, I would probably love being a full-time artist.

What’s up next?: I have readings and workshops lined-up for the Spring following the premiere of TALA, on-going discussions about a TV show, and I’m looking forward to spending lots of time writing grants so we can produce our next show!