by The Happiest Medium on May 28, 2012
Benefiting: Grand Central Neighborhood Social Services Corporation (GCNSSC)
Produced by Waving Cat Productions
Written by Hope Weiner
Directed by Molly Ballerstein
“America is undergoing a facelift, and anything that is regarded as ugly or undesirable is being put out to pasture. Internal migration has reached its highest levels as the displaced roam the highway seeking their own utopia.”
Show Times:
- Fri 6/1/12 – 5:00pm
- Sun 6/3/12 – 6:00pm
- Tues 6/5/12 – 5:00pm
- Sat 6/9/12 – 1:30pm
- Wed 6/20/12 – 10:00pm
- Sat 6/23/12 – 8:00pm
Answers by Molly Ballerstein
(Director)
Karen Tortora-Lee’s Question
How did you come up with the title for your show?
Molly: The title is based off the main character (Smacker) and her experiences of living on the highway.
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by The Happiest Medium on May 28, 2012
Benefiting: United Nations Environment Programme
Written and Performed by Gustavo Pace
Directed by Lou Liberatore
“Struggling against his father’s wishes to become a lawyer, a young man journeys from Rio to NYC to fulfill his own dreams to become a clown.”
Show Times:
- Tues 6/5/12 – 6:00pm
- Fri 6/8/12 – 8:30pm
- Sun 6/10/12 – 4:00pm
- Sun 6/17/12 – 3:00pm
Gustavo Pace (Writer/Performer)
[Editor's Note: Gustavo - who is Brazilian - invited me to Americanize his answers, but I thought they were charming as is. I'm sure you'll agree.]
Karen Tortora-Lee’s Question
How did you come up with the title for your show?
Gustavo: Naked Brazilian have different meanings like for example the sexy naked in the car that I experienced, also to get the soul naked and some other meanings that you need to see the show to understand. If I am going to be naked? That you need to come to check what happen. This is what I can tell about the show: Dad says, be a lawyer I say, be a clown What’s a boy to do? (father doesn’t always know best).
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by The Happiest Medium on May 27, 2012
Benefiting: WIN [Women in Need]
Produced by LifeDream Productions
Written by Amy Gray Piper
Directed by Melissa Skirboll
“Ruth thought she buried her past, but in a series of conversations with her long-dead mother, she struggles to hold onto her illusions before being forced to remember the truth. We watch as her fragile hold on sanity slips away as she falls into the madness that gripped her mother.”
Show Times:
- Sat 6/2/12 – 8:00pm
- Mon 6/4/12 – 9:30pm
- Thur 6/7/12 – 6:00pm
- Wed 6/13/12 – 4:00pm
- Tues 6/19/12 – 6:30pm
- Sat 6/23/12 – 11:00am
Answers by Melissa Skirboll
(Producer/Director)
Karen Tortora-Lee’s Question
How did you come up with the title for your show?
Melissa: For this question, I defer to Amy Gray Piper, the playwright. She said, “Dark closets, under the bed…these are the spaces from our childhood where the monsters live. The closet in this play is what physically connect the past and present and where Ruth’s fears still live.”
When I approached Amy about submitting this piece to the festival, she thought about changing the title. We batted around a few ideas but never came up with anything better. I think it’s perfect; both succinct and full of meaning. And as a director I love being able to play with the closet as portal into the past, into the subconscious, into memory and madness. By using the closet as the central metaphor, Amy gave the actors and director a huge creative gift.
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by The Happiest Medium on May 27, 2012
Benefiting: Girls, Inc.
Produced by Easter Punny Productions
Written & Performed by Alicia Barnatchez and Erin Leigh Schmoyer
Directed by Leah Bonvissuto
“Elizabeth and Elizabeth are historical re-enactors, on a low-rent version of Plimoth Plantation. When it goes the way of the buffalo, they must learn how to marry their Pilgrim lives to modern times. Their answer? Reality TV. So, update your smallpox vaccine, hop aboard this multi-media Mayflower, and prepare to get colonized…again!”
Show Times:
- Sat 6/2/12 – 5:00pm
- Thur 6/7/12 – 7:00pm
- Fri 6/15/12 – 8:30pm
- Sat 6/16/12 – 3:00pm
- Tue 6/19/12 – 8pm
Answers by Alicia Barnatchez & Erin Leigh Schmoyer (writers/performers/producers)
Karen Tortora-Lee’s Question
How did you come up with the title for your show?
Alicia & Erin Leigh: The title came from our protagonists both being names Elizabeths, (as was true of many a Pilgrim lady settler).
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by The Happiest Medium on May 27, 2012
Benefiting: The Arc
Produced by Mark Jason Williams and Gabrielle Fox
“Acts of Love make us laugh, smile, swoon, cry, feel insecure, and drive us crazy. This evening of short plays uncovers the humor, kindness and raw emotions we share with one another while finding romance in the office, revisiting the one that got away, exploring the afterlife, dealing with a disability, and beyond.”
Show Times:
- Thur 5/31/12 – 6:00pm
- Sun 6/3/12 – 4:00pm
- Wed 6/6/12 – 7:00pm
- Fri 6/8/12 – 4:30pm
- Thur 6/14/12 – 9:30pm
- Fri 6/22/12 – 8:00pm
Mark Jason Williams (Playwright)
Karen Tortora-Lee’s Question
How did you come up with the title for your show?
Mark: Gabrielle Fox, playwright of three shows in the evening, came up with the idea. We’re doing an evening of five short plays, all of which explore the drama and humor of love and personal relationships, particularly how people rely on empathy, kindness and support to get through a difficult situation, so the title seemed like a natural fit.
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by The Happiest Medium on May 26, 2012
Isabelle Goodman as Cara, Gloria Rosen as Bubby, Andrew Rothkin as Jonny and Rosie Cosch as Debra in Bubby’s Shadow (Photographer: Paul Dorfman)
Bubby’s Shadow
Benefiting: Jewish Social Services Hospice & Visiting Nurse Service of New York Hospice and Palliative Care
Produced by White Rabbit Theatre
Written by Andrew Rothkin
Directed by Greg Cicchino
An unexpected knock and Jonny’s home again… to his sister, his niece, and the past he left behind. Join the Cohens as their Bubby guides them on a journey, traversing darkness, finding light… After all, Bubby’s not one to let a little snag like death stop her from fixing her family.”
Show Times:
- Sun 6/3/12 – 12:00pm
- Tue 6/5/12 – 4:00pm
- Sat 6/9/12 – 4:30pm
- Fri 6/15/12 – 6:00pm
- Sun 6/17/12 – 11:00am
- Tues 6/19/12 – 8:30pm
- Wed 6/20/12 – 6:00pm
- Sat 6/23/12 – 7:00pm
Answers by Andrew Rothkin
(Playwright/Producer/Actor)
Karen Tortora-Lee’s Question
How did you come up with the title for your show?
Andrew: Coming up with a title for one of my pieces, whether it is a poem, short story, one-act or full-length play, always comes at different times. Sometimes it is the first thing I come up with; sometimes it is the last thing I come up with; or it can occur any time during the process.
My initial working title for the piece (which I had forgotten until now) was simply Nanny, what my siblings, my cousins and I all called our wonderful, dear grandmother.
The inspiration eventually hit, and I devised Bubby’s Shadow, Bubby’s Light. I liked it then – and like that now… but virtually everyone I talked to thought the title was too much. Indeed, I just as easily could have called it Bubby’s Light, as the play is as much about light as it is about darkness, as much about illumination as it is about mystery…. In the end, I opted for the title that would intrigue me most if I were an unbiased theatregoer.
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by The Happiest Medium on May 26, 2012
Benefiting: Frank Silvera Writers Workshop
Produced by Twinbiz
Written by Yvette X (aka Yvette Heyliger)
Against all odds and emboldened by the 1960′s Black Arts Movement, Yvette X comes to terms with her politically-incorrect ancestry and stakes a claim as a dramatist in the American Theatre.
Show Times:
- Tue 6/5/12 – 6:00pm
- Fri 6/8/12 – 8:30pm
- Sun 6/10/12 – 4:00pm
- Sun 6/17/12 – 3:00pm
Answers by Yvette Heyliger (Playwright)
Karen Tortora-Lee’s Question
How did you come up with the title for your show?
Yvette: The title of my show came from a line in the play which says, “…I feel compelled to create a safe, inclusive space that builds a bridge to Baraka and the other writers of the Black Arts Movement; writers who were the forerunners of multiculturalism and whose legacy to the melting pot was to tell their own stories, their own way, and to get those stories to the masses “by any means necessary.”
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by The Happiest Medium on May 26, 2012
Benefiting: Planned Parenthood
Produced by G-Money Productions
Written by Duncan Pflaster
Directed by Glory Kadigan
“In Ancient Greece, a woman spurned in love finds a deserted island and sets herself up as the Empress Salacia, decreeing that there shall be no love allowed in her domain, only sex. She gathers some sybaritic acolytes and all is frolicsome mindless fun until Salacia’s ex-lover Agis comes to the island in disguise, to attempt to win her back.”
Show Times:
- Mon 6/4/12 – 7:30pm
- Wed 6/6/12 – 9:30pm
- Sat 6/9/12 – 5:30pm
- Tues 6/12/12 – 4:00pm
- Wed 6/13/12 – 9:00pm
- Sun 6/17/12 – 9:00pm
- Mon 6/18/12 – 4:30pm
- Fri 6/22/12 – 9:30pm
Answers by Duncan Pflaster (Playwright)
Karen Tortora-Lee’s Question
How did you come up with the title for your show?
Duncan: Well, the play is about a woman who gives up on love and devotes herself to sex; she sets herself up as Empress of an island devoted to sybaritic pleasures. Unlike my other play, that was always the title from the genesis of the project. I only found out later that “The Empress of Sex” was also a title for Mae West, which I think is awfully appropriate.
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by The Happiest Medium on May 23, 2012
Benefiting: Pride For Youth & The Long Island Crisis Center
Produced by Off Sides Entertainment & Marketing, Inc.
Co-Produced by Ann Bass & The Lantern Theatre Co.
Music/Lyrics by William Finn
Book by James Lapine & William Finn
“Marvin wants it all: a loving ex-wife, an adoring son, and a handsome lover- all living together in harmony. Unfortunately, we don’t always get what we want. Add one psychiatrist and a couple of lesbians from next door, shake, and serve alongside a nation turning a blind eye to a spreading plague…”
Show Times:
- Wed 5/30/12 – 8:00pm
- Sat 6/2/12 – 8:30pm
- Sun 6/3/12 – 2:30pm
- Wed 6/6/12 – 6:00pm
- Mon 6/11/12 – 8:30pm
- Fri 6/15/12 – 5:00pm
Answers by Chris Leidenfrost-Wilson
(Co-producer, Assistant Director, Actor)
Karen Tortora-Lee’s Question
How did you come up with the title for your show?
Chris: Well, I think it has something to do with the “falseness” we put on to exist in a world that constantly turns against us– the way we hide or alter ourselves and live our lives to make us seem the way we want to be perceived – like a singer using their falsetto… That’s my interpretation. If you want the real answer, you’ll have to ask William Finn or James Lapine!
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by The Happiest Medium on May 23, 2012
Deuteranomaly
Benefiting: Adam R. Spector Foundation
Produced by Mind the Gap Theatre
Directed by Paula D’Alessandris
“When the Greenbergs discover that their young son, David, suffers from Deuteranomaly (red-green colorblindness), the couple’s opposing views on love and limitation come to light. Twenty years later, a grown-up David struggles with this legacy in his relationship with Cassandra, a talented painter whose work he can never truly see.”
Show Times:
- Fri 6/1/12 – 5:30pm
- Sat 6/2/12 – 10:00pm
- Thur 6/7/12 – 4:00pm
- Mon 6/11/12 – 6:00pm
- Sun 6/17/12 – 1:00pm
- Fri 6/22/12 – 4:30pm
Answers by Jessica Fleitman (Playwright)
Karen Tortora-Lee’s Question
How did you come up with the title for your show?
Jessica: Deuteranomaly came from a prompt in a playwriting class, in which the first line of the play had to be a statement of scientific fact. Mine was the following (SPOILER ALERT for the first line in the play!): “One in seven men suffers from some form of color blindness.” I began researching forms of color blindness, and stumbled upon “Deuteranomaly,” which is the term for the inability to differentiate between red and green. I liked the word because it managed to simultaneously sound vaguely biblical and slightly off (which is a good way to describe the entire play, now that I think about it).
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