Southern Rep New Play Bacchanal
January 14 – 31, 2010
Back by Popular Demand
SOUTHERN REP NEW PLAY BACCHANAL
Featuring Gulf Coast South writers
WORKSHOPS & READINGS
- The Thanatos Brass Band by Jim Fitzmorris
Jan 14th – 16th at 8pm, Jan 17th at 3pm
- Afterlife by Steve Yockey
January 21st – 23rd at 8pm, Jan 24th at 3pm
- The Thing About It – A New Musical
music & lyrics by Pete Sturman, concept & libretto by Brian Sands, additional music by Paul Cowgill
January 28th – 30th at 8pm, Jan 31st at 3pm
- Play Riots featuring Gulf Coast South writers
Jan 20th and 27th at 8pm
EVENTS
-
Doug Wright Speaks
Jan 19th at 7:30pm
- Alterna-Ending Play Slam
Jan 23rd at 11pm
- A Chat with Eric Overmyer
Jan 26th at 7:30pm
- Toga! Party!
Jan 29th at 10pm
Come gorge yourself on the new, the daring, the theatrical at SRT’s New Plays Festival. Experience the birth of new work. Revel in the voices of the South. Feast on workshops, readings and explorations featuring New Orleans’ own actors. Southern Rep presents our Southern 10-Minute Play Riots. The winner will be our curtain-raiser for THE PIANO TEACHER, the final show in our 2009/10 Season.
WORKSHOPS & READINGS
The Thanatos Brass Band by Jim Fitzmorris
Jan 14th – 16th at 8pm, Jan 17th at 3pm
Directed by Aimee Hayes
On the eve of a monumental funeral, Death and his wife Persephone return to New Orleans, where the rest of the Greek Pantheon have taken up residence disguised as some of the city’s elite. When mysterious forces threaten his plans, Death must wrestle with a contentious mother-in-law and scheming relatives to discover who’s plotting to destroy the city and whether the forces of Hades can stop it.
A professor of playwriting at Tulane University, Jim Fitzmorris has been instrumental in revitalizing The Shakespeare Festival at Tulane where he serves as Associate Artistic Director. His work as a performer, director, and writer continues to receive acclaim with plays such as The Heidemann Award finalist THE SONS OF MICKEY, this year’s Big Easy Award winner WHAT HAS THIS THING APPEARED AGAIN TONIGHT? And THE LAST MADAM, co-written with Carl Walker, which was a finalist for both The American Theatre Critics Award and The Sternberg Award.
Afterlife by Steve Yockey
Jan 21st – 23rd at 8pm, Jan 24th at 3pm
Directed by Aimee Hayes
A ghost story in the most literal sense, AFTERLIFE follows Connor and Danielle as they prepare their abandoned beachfront house for an impending storm. But when a great wave comes to their doorstep, they may not be able to escape from the haunting world of grief, death and everything after.
Steve Yockey is a roaming member of Out of Hand Theater. His projects with the company include HELP! and CARTOON. Actor’s Express Theatre in Atlanta, GA presented the world premiere of OCTOPUS in January 2008, followed in May/June by an extended run in San Francisco, co-produced by Encore Theatre Company and Magic Theatre. He is a regular fixture at Dad’s Garage Theatre Company including the short play cycle SLEEPY, a work commissioned to inaugurate the second stage “Top Shelf” series, and the adult-only SKIN – both directed by Kate Warner. Dad’s Garage and Berkeley’s Impact Theatre produced the co-world premiere of the new play LARGE ANIMAL GAMES this fall and WONDER opened at NYU’s Atlas Theatre last December, directed by Rachel Chavkin. OCTOPUS, CARTOON and SUBCULTURE (collected short plays) are available from Samuel French. Other plays include: BELLWETHER, HEAVIER THAN… and BLISS. He is a Phi Beta Kappa, summa cum laude graduate of the University of Georgia and holds an MFA in Dramatic Writing from NYU’s Tisch School of the Arts. Steve recently completed a Coca-Cola Artist Residency teaching dramatic structure at Emory University in Atlanta, GA and currently lives/works in San Francisco Bay Area as the National New Play Network’s playwright in residence at Marin Theatre Company.
The Thing About It – A New Musical
music & lyrics by Pete Sturman, concept & libretto by Brian Sands
additional music by Paul Cowgill
Jan 28th – 30th at 8pm, Jan 31st at 3pm
Directed by Holly-Anne Ruggiero
Featuring a Louisiana country-fried pop/rock score, THE THING ABOUT IT is a coming out tale about a man’s journey as he negotiates relationships and love, with an original sound that’ll have your toes tapping right along.
Photo by Graham
Studio One.Brian Sands has had works produced by Four Humors (LOVE AT THE LOUNGE), Artists Cooperative Theater (LANDSCAPE WITH FIGURE, ALL NIGHT SERVICE), Dillard University (LAGNIAPPE, A MUSICAL) and DramaRama (featured artist, 2005). His play TWO SECOND LIEUTENANTS IN THE RUSSIAN IMPERIAL ARMY was selected by Des McAnuff as a finalist in the Contemporary Arts Center’s playwriting contest. ROI C. NOGGIN, an adaptation of UBU ROI, was included in DramaRama 2008 and subsequently presented by Pavement Productions in Portland, OR. Brian is a member of the Dramatists Guild and has been the Literary Manager for Southern Rep since 2004.
Pete Sturman was born and raised in New Jersey. While pursuing his M.A. in English, he took up the guitar and began to develop his own offbeat songwriting style inspired by the likes of Leonard Cohen, Lou Reed, Bruce Springsteen and George Jones. He moved to New Orleans in 1992 and started singing at Checkpoint Charlie’s, where he met singer/pianist Paul Cowgill. They began performing together as the unambiguously gay music duo Pistol Pete & Popgun Paul. The two developed a loyal following and released two CDs under Mike West (Fine Red Wine, 1998 and Son of a Gun, 2000). The duos collaborations were brought to a stop after Hurricane Katrina when Pete moved to New York. Pete’s first solo release True Stories was also recorded by Mike West.
Paul Cowgill is a native West Virginian who moved to New Orleans in 1993 to become a blues musician. While busking on the streets of the French Quarter, he met Pete Sturman and they soon became musical partners. Now, the duo Pistol Pete & Popgun Paul have celebrated 16 years together! Paul currently resides in New Orleans where he was reborn and raised. He is also a co-curator of the Sidearm Gallery and a nursing student.
Play Riots featuring Gulf Coast South Writers
Jan 20th and 27th at 8pm
Winners Announced!
The finalists in our stage and radio play contests make a scene, 10 minutes at a time. Finalists and winners to be announced soon!
New Play Riot Press Release
STAGE RIOTS
- Winner - Rocks and Shadows by Shawn Hirabayashi
- Two Hundred Feet and Counting by Marco Antonio Ramirez
- The Craft of the Goddess by Ty Adams
RADIO RIOTS
- Winner - Rain Falls on Falstaff by Bradley Troll
- Mooning Lon Chaney by Ty Adams
PLAY RIOT PLAYWRIGHT BIOS:
Ty Adams began his playwriting career in New Orleans with The Camel Shepherds, his first play, winning the 1985 Grand Prize at the Contemporary Arts Center’s Festival of New Plays. He then moved to New York and studied with Cassandra Medley at the Ensemble Studio Theater. He later joined Circle Repertory Theater Company and developed his plays in Circle Rep’s Lab and at their writers’ retreats at Lanford Wilson’s home in Sag Harbor, NY. Ty’s New York productions include Baseball in Zanzibar at The Irish Arts Center; TOUCH at The New American Theatre; Gift of the Spice People and The Great Khan at The Director’s Company; Brainless Idiot at Alice’s Fourth Floor; How to Roast a Pepper at The West Bank Cafe; The Finger Hole at Manhattan Theatre Source; The Backward Man, Ice Fishing Prostitute and Morphs at Vital Theatre Company. Radio includes Save ME, a noir murder mystery broadcast for three years by NPR. Commissions include adapting the book Conecuh People by Wade Hall, to the stage. Ty’s screenplay The Falcon, was commissioned by French film director Raschid Kerdouche. Opera includes his play Mermaid’s Blood, adapted by the Japanese composer Michyo Tanaka. Ty has taught playwriting at Southampton College (NYSSSA Program) and for the Citizen Watch Institute, a non-profit organization helping deprived urban kids. He is presently on-hold with a film he wrote called Getting Lost, a Docu-Drama about a man’s struggle with cancer. He now lives in Woodstock, New York but considers himself a Tribal member of the Who Dat Nation.
Shawn B. Hirabayashi received the greater part of his training in dramatic writing from Milan Stitt at the Yale School of Drama (MFA Playwriting 1992). He has had 16 plays produced in New York City by Vital Theatre Company, Starfish Theatreworks, One Dream, Circle Rep Lab, Nada, Sundog Theatre, Atlantic Theatre Company Theatre School, Circle East, and Ripple Productions. He has had readings at various theatres including Circle Repertory Company, New York Theatre Workshop, and East West Players (L.A.). Shawn recently received the 2008 Wild Card Productions Playwright’s Commission in Memory of Frank Pisco. For two weeks in August 2002, Shawn was a resident playwright at New River Dramatists (then known as the Playwright Project – M.Z. Ribalow, Artistic Director). In 1997, he was the recipient of a Berrilla Kerr Award. The production by Vital Theatre Company of his play Funny was presented an award, Best of the 2002-2003 Season, by Off-Off Broadway Review. He received commissions from Starfish Theatreworks in 1999 and 2000. He was in the Circle Repertory Playwrights Project (1992-94) and participated in several Circle Repertory Writers’ Retreats (with Lanford Wilson and Paula Vogel among others). Shawn is a member of the Dramatists Guild, Starfish Theatreworks, and Circle East. He was the Literary Manager at Vital from September 2002 to August 2003, and an Artistic Associate until March 2005. He was a member playwright of Circle Repetory Lab. Along with his MFA, Shawn has a B.A. in English from the University of California at Davis (1987). He taught English in the Peace Corps in Morocco (1986-88). Born in New Paltz, New York, Shawn is French and Japanese-American and as a “foreign service brat” lived in Ecuador, Brazil, Ethiopia and Zaire (Congo) before he graduated high school. He has studied t’ai chi with Maggie Newman since 1993. He is a Leo, though that really means nothing to him.
Marco Antonio Ramirez has had plays produced at City Theatre, The Ensemble Theatre of Chattanooga, Florida Stage's 1st Stage New Works Festival, FringeNYC, The Juilliard School, The Kennedy Center, The Mad Cat Theatre Company, The Yellow Tree Theatre, and Actors Theatre of Louisville's Humana Festival of New American Plays, where he has twice received the Heideman Award for Best Ten-Minute Play (once in 2006 for I am not Batman, and again in 2009 for 3:59AM: a drag race for two actors). His collection of plays for young audiences titled Mermaids, Monsters, and the World Painted Purple was nominated for a Helen Hayes Award in 2008. Other honors include the Bryan Award for Drama from The Fellowship of Southern Writers, the Latino Playwriting Award from the Kennedy Center’s ACT Festival, and the Le Comte Du Nouy prize from Lincoln Center. A Miami native, he’s currently a Playwriting fellow at The Juilliard School.
Bradley Troll (Playwright, Rain Falls on Falstaff) is a playwright and teacher living in New Orleans, LA. Bradley holds a Bachelors in Mass Communication and a Master of Arts in English from McNeese State University and a Master of Fine Arts in Playwriting from the University of New Orleans. He has has short plays produced in Texas, Arkansas, and locally at Le Chat Noir and the University of New Orleans. In 2009, Bradley won the National Kennedy Center American College Theatre Festival National Critic's Institute Competition for theatre criticism. Bradley now co-runs Theatrebelowsealevel.com and teaches Gifted English in St. James Parish. Bradley is thrilled and honored to be working with Southern Rep.
EVENTS
Doug Wright Speaks
Jan 19th at 7:30pm
**Free and open to the public**
A lecture by the Tony Award and Pulitzer Prize winning playwright of I AM MY OWN WIFE and GREY GARDENS.
In 2006, Doug Wright received Tony and Drama Desk nominations for his book for the Broadway musical GREY GARDENS. In 2004, he was awarded the Pulitzer Prize, a Tony Award for Best Play, the Drama Desk Award, a GLAAD Media Award, an Outer Critics Circle Award, a Drama League Award, and a Lucille Lortel Award for his play I AM MY OWN WIFE. Earlier in his career, Mr. Wright won an Obie Award for outstanding achievement in playwriting and the Kesselring Award for Best New American Play for QUILLS. He went on to write the screenplay adaptation; the film was named Best Picture by the National Board of Review and nominated for three Academy Awards. His screenplay was nominated for a Golden Globe Award, and received the Paul Selvin Award from the Writer’s Guild of America. For director Rob Marshall, Doug penned the television special TONY BENNETT: AN AMERICAN CLASSIC, which received seven Emmy Awards. For career achievement, Mr. Wright was cited with an award from the American Academy of Arts and Letters and the Tolerance Prize from the KulturForum Europa. He is a member of the Dramatists Guild, the Writer’s Guild of America, East, the Screen Actor’s Guild and the Society of Stage Directors and Choreographers. Directing credits include KIKI AND HERB: PARDON OUR APPEARANCE in Washington DC, Philadelphia and London. Acting credits include the films LITTLE MANHATTAN and TWO LOVERS, and the television show LAW AND ORDER. Most recently, Doug wrote the Broadway libretto for Walt Disney’s THE LITTLE MERMAID. He lives in New York with his partner, singer/songwriter David Clement.
Alterna-Ending Play Slam
Jan 23rd at 11pm
**Free**
What if Willy Loman ended up in sunny Florida? Or Ophelia skipped a watery death and smacked some sense into Hamlet? Cheer on New Orleans’ best and brightest as they compete to see who will be the Alterna-Ending Champion.
A CHAT WITH ERIC OVERMYER
Jan 26th at 7:30pm
**Free and open to the public**
An open dialogue with the nationally-acclaimed playwright and TV producer/writer.
Eric Overmyer is a multitalented writer and producer, having written for the series THE WIRE, LAW AND ORDER, ST. ELSEWHERE, amongst others. Overmyer is the playwright of works such as ALKI, an adaptation of Ibsen’s PEER GYNT, DARK RAPTURE, NATIVE SPEECH, and ON THE VERGE. Overmyer is currently collaborating with David Simon on HBO’s TREME.
Toga! Party!
Jan 29th at 10pm, $5 at the door
You need an explanation? Togas available at the door for a nominal fee and ritual sacrifice to Bacchus. (We’re just kidding.)
“[Southern Rep became]…a major regional theater, and a place where new plays [are] the mainstay." — Associated Press
“The theater is the adventurous Southern Rep, which specializes in new plays” — The Times-Picayune
Family Rating: "R"
- Southern Rep NEW PLAY BACCHANAL Press Release
- Bacchanal New Play Riot Press Release
- Bacchanal New Play RIOT Submission Guidelines
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| BACCHANAL Pass | $25 your ticket to any and all BACCHANAL performances and events |
| Discount Pass | $20 with ID for students . seniors . military . theatre professionals |
| Workshop/Reading | $10 your ticket to any one workshop/reading |
Theatre Professional is defined as a member of AEA, SAG, AFTRA & IATSI. Additional $1-$2 per ticket service fees apply.
SOUTHERN REP CANNOT MAKE REFUNDS FOR ANY REASON. Subscribers may change their dates FREE OF CHARGE at any time before the date of the performance. Simply call the box office to reschedule - that's one of the beauties of being a subscriber. If you are a single ticket buyer and need to exchange a ticket, you may do so by paying a $5 per ticket exchange fee via the box office.
In deference to other audience members, late seating is at the discretion of the management. Thanks for being a part of Southern Rep!
