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On Thursday, January 22nd I was fortunate enough to have a round table reading of my play "Henry and the Hippocampus" at Lark Play Development Center.
Lark PDC is an organization singularly devoted to supporting playwrights and new plays. They truly are a gift to the world of theater.
To learn more about this organization and to see how you can support them, click here.
I am one of 18 playwrights who have written short plays each about different zip codes in the Greater Los Angeles Area. My play, title "Curiosity Rover," takes on the zip code for Skid Row in Downtown Los Angeles.
These plays are presented on the Antaeus main stage over four nights, with my play being presented on Saturday, February 7th and Monday, February 9th.
Each year the Loyola Marymount CSJ Center for Reconciliation and Justice honor members of the LMU community with the "Hidden Hero" award. Part of the award ceremony is a presentation of dramatized narratives for each award recipient. This year I was asked to interview and awardee and create a dramatized narrative based on his life and experiences.
This is a fascinating experience not simply as a playwright working in a new form, but as a human learning about the contributions to society made by a person I would never have met otherwise. The awardee I was assigned to write about, Cesare P. R. Romano, has been working to free refugees who should not be incarcerated around the world. He is a remarkable person and most definitely worthy of the award he is going to receive on October 25th.
I look forward to the public learning more about Cesare's experiences and am proud to be part of this ceremony.
Chalk Repertory Theatre is dedicated to producing classical and contemporary plays in unconventional spaces.
THIS OCTOBER, Chalk Rep is teaming up with a brand-new building in Downtown LA to bring back our most popular theatrical event! We've invited fifteen Los Angeles playwrights to write 10-minute plays to draw inspiration from the new high-rise at 8th & Hope, and create work to be performed site-specifically in the building.
Audience members will be led through the building to experience new theatrical works in both public and private spaces, culminating in a rooftop party. And with a new slate of plays each weekend, you can experience it all three times.
I will be part of Week #2 October 16, 17 & 18 (see full schedule below).
All tickets $20. Advance purchase is highly recommended, as audience numbers are limited.
Buy your tickets now by clicking this link.
WEEK ONE - October 9, 10 and 11 at 8PM
New plays by: Alex Lewin, Jennifer Maisel, Lina Patel and Janine Salinas
WEEK TWO - October 16,17 and 18 at 8PM
New plays by: Zakiyyah Alexander, Carla Ching, David Myers, Brian James Polak, and Speed Weed
WEEK THREE - October 23, 24 and 25 at 8PM
New plays by: Boni Alvarez, Rachel Axler, Lisa Kenner Grissom, Regan Linton, and Madhuri Shekar
The Road Theatre’s annual Summer Playwrights Festival is an 8-day fundraising event and celebration that takes place each summer in late July, and this year we will mount 38 staged readings of new plays. The festival is growing larger each year with participating playwrights from around the country and around the world. The readings are followed by talk-backs with the playwrights, directors and casts and receptions featuring refreshments and live music.
This year the festival expands to include our performance spaces at both the Road on Lankershim and our newer space at the Road on Magnolia, which is located inside the NoHo Senior Arts Colony, a one-of-a-kind housing community geared toward actors, writers, painters, musicians and other artists.
This year, for the first time, the festival celebrates an even mix of male and female playwrights.
WAR PROFITS will be presented Thursday, July 31st at 8pm at The Road on Lankershim
5108 Lankershim Boulevard, North Hollywood, CA 91601
The reading will be directed by Taylor Nichols and features Ana Pasti, Steve Madar, Michael Antosy and Shante DeLoach.
On May 16th, I earned my MFA in Dramatic Writing from the USC School of Dramatic Arts. Days after graduation, I began rehearsals for the presentation of my thesis play "Henry and the Hippocampus." Actors Arye Gross, Tessa Auberjonois, and Rob Nagle were led by director, Elina de Santos in two public presentations Wednesday, May 28th and Saturday, May 31st.
"Henry and the Hippocampus" was recently selected as the winner of the Jean Kennedy Smith playwriting award. Supported by VSA, the International Organization on Arts and Disability, The Jean Kennedy Smith Playwriting Award, named after the founder of VSA, is offered for the outstanding student-written script that explores the human experience of living with a disability.
The playwright is invited to attend The Kennedy Center American College Theater Festival in April, 2014.
VSA is an international nonprofit organization founded in 1974 by Ambassador Jean Kennedy Smith. VSA is creating a society where people with disabilities can learn through, participate in, and enjoy the arts. Nearly 5 million people with disabilities participate in VSA programs every year through a network of affiliates in 42 states and 51 countries worldwide.
At the Kennedy Center American College Theater Festival "War Profits" was awarded the John Cauble Award for One-Act plays. The play, along with three other finalists, was presented in a reading at the KCACTF in April with "War Profits" announced as the winner at the end of the festival.
This award is named in honor of Dr. John Cauble, Professor Emeritus of UCLA, who provided guidance and support for the establishment of the Michael Kanin Award Program. His continued participation in the recognition of student playwrights through the former “Playwriting Awards Development Committee” is a cornerstone within the Michael Kanin Awards Program.
"Pass Go, a Monopoly Play" is included in the anthology The Best Ten Minute Plays of 2013, published by Smith & Kraus. The book is available now at Amazon.com.
I recently started to do research on a project involving prisons and as part of that research I witnessed a presentation of The Actors Gang Prison Project at a prison in Norco, CA. It was a mind-blowing experience to watch a group of 14 incarcerated men wearing makeup and masks presenting their most honest selves through Commedia dell'arte stock characters. These are men who have lived and are living through experiences I can't even fathom. They are scary looking, tattooed from knuckles to necks, criminals. There's no questioning that, but what I saw today was a revelation. There was so much humanity in that prison. I feel too raw and the experience is too fresh for me to even put together the proper words to describe what I witnessed, but I can say today's presentation opened my eyes to what our prison system could be doing for many of the men and women incarcerated. The men I met today are all going to be released some day and most of our prisons have no programs to help rehabilitate them. The Actors' Gang is doing just that. The men who performed today seemed to be transformed by the experience which included 8 weeks of working together with the Actors' Gang facilitators and culminating in today's presentation. I have to admit I was pretty nervous as I walked through a prison yard to get to the room where the presentation was taking place. And this prison yard was straight out of every movie I've seen. The men were milling around, chatting, playing handball. Some of them were looking at me as I walked through the yard. All I could think about was how in the movies they all have shivs in their pocket and would want to stab me for walking across their path. Well, I didn't get a shiv in the kidney. Instead what I got was some polite help by a couple guys who pointed me in the correct direction. Another guy opened a door for me and gave me a fist-bump. Their performance lasted about two hours and ended with the men serenading us with the Rolling Stones song "You Can't Always Get What You Want." When the song was over I had the opportunity to speak with about a half dozen of the guys. Each and every one of them held out their hands to shake mine, looked me in the eye and said "Thank you for coming here today." I gladly shook their hands in return and thanked them for showing me what looked like some really difficult work. The brief conversations which were mostly about how long they've been in prison (12-20 years for those I met) and how much longer they had (between 2 days and 2 years) but most of them didn't talk about what they did, nor did I ask. One guy briefly mentioned how hard the past 18 years has been for him, and how he's moved from prison to prison, but it wasn't until he got to Norco that he felt like he could live on the outside again. He said "I can't look back any more. I have 21 months left, but I gotta focus on right now." His name was Eugene. He had a nice smile. As I was walking out, Mike, another inmate, said "That was hard, man." I didn't know what to say. I self-consciously responded "but you got through it." As I left the building and walked back through the crowded prison yard, I wasn't so scared. It's not that this place is a vacation and everything is peaches and cream, but I understand this part of our world a little bit better.
Click here to help support the work The Actors' Gang is doing.