PRNYC, a modern day drama set in Manhattan PR Agency explores absurdity, power struggles, porous sexual boundaries, intense deadline pressure, conflicting messages, high stakes, obfuscation as a lifestyle, and brutal personalities that dominate the ecosystem of New York City PR agencies.

Peter Reilly works for the man known as The Beast, who reports to Simon Gurwitz, one of the most powerful men in New York. Simon has the ear of the Mayor, the Governor, Donald, Rupert, et al. What price will Peter Reilly pay to whisper in Simon’s ear and reflect the sheen of power to assuage his fears and lost identity? As Myron Mandelbaum  questions, will he “embrace The Beast or search for happiness over the rainbow?”

PRNYC is about the language we adopt to navigate difficult and highly pressurized situations in New York City professional offices. It may seem extreme to outsiders but to Peter Reilly it’s just another day in the office.

PRNYC was selected for a production in the 16^th Annual Port Townsend Playwrights Festival. It is presented at Key City Public Theatre as a one act, running approximately 40 minutes. It premieres February 9, 2012 and opens February 10 for a nine performance run, closing on February 26. It is on a bill with two other one act plays.

My hope is to try out the play on audiences unfamiliar with New York and PR, then expand the show into a full-length production, or combine it with another one act as part of the “Work America” series,  and seek a New York venue.

Background on PRNYC and the Port Townsend Playwright’s Festival: http://www.keycitypublictheatre.org/12_festival.htm | Playwriting Background:  http://markrosenyc.com/about-me/

From Mike Daisey

Hello All,

As a new year dawns, we are delighted to announce a national tour for our monologue, THE AGONY AND THE ECSTASY OF STEVE JOBS, which opens this week in the Bay Area at Berkeley Rep, and will go on to major engagements in both Washington DC and Seattle, running from now until late May.

This is a very special show for us. I don’t think Jean-Michele and I have ever worked as hard as we have bringing this piece to light, or have poured as much of ourselves into the work as we have into this story. This monologue is the apotheosis of years of journalism, travel, research, investigation, sweat, and tears…and I believe it tells an untold and deeply necessary story for our time.

(more…)

Friday, May 7, and Saturday, May 8th (7:30 PM, both days) are the final performances of the Wrecking Crew’s production of ‘Pterodactyls’ at Stone Soup in Seattle. This is a fine revival of Nicky Silver’s breakthrough play about the destruction of a Philadelphia family – the dinosaur in the living room.

Stone Soup Theatre Downstage
4029 Stone Way North
Seattle, WA 98103
(206) 633-1883

Directions to Downstage Theatre
Buy tickets here (Brown Paper Tickets)

“Nicky Silver’s absurdist 1993 tragicomedy deftly sketches the disintegration of Philadelphia’s Duncan family, an elite clan hobbled by extremely bad judgment, narcissism, and emotional deafness the way the dinosaurs were hobbled by a dust-filled atmosphere….Andrew Tribolini seems so effortlessly creepy you wonder whether he’s even going for creepy.” — Seattle Weekly, April 28, 2010 review

Ben Brantley, The New York Times, 10/21/1993, review of NY premiere of Pterodactyls.

“Bloody Bloody Andrew Jackson” is the most entertaining and most perceptive political theater of the season. Old Hickory, Rock Star President, Ben Brantley, NY Times, April 7, 2010. Extended through May 9 at the Public Theater, Lafayette Street.

The newly created Bleecker Street Theatre Company officially launched April 5 with a reading of Murray Schisgal’s Playtime, featuring Rosie Perez, Peter Reigert and Chip Zien.  A benefit Tuesday, April 13, features Murray Schisgal, Israel Horovitz, Mario Fratti, Donna de Matteo, Quincy Long and Stephen Adly Guirgis discussing “The Playwrights Journey.” Tickets are still available.

There is a full line-up of presentations of plays in development, including new work by C.S. Drury, Bill Quigley, and David Loughlin – mates from H.B. Studios playwriting with Donna de Matteo. Peter Zinn, another H-B playwriting mate, is doing a great thing here, and it looks like serious and accomplished actors, playwrights, directors, teachers and other new play developers (Guirgis, beyond writing great plays – thought of “Little Flower of East Orange” when I saw Michael Shannon blow them away in ‘The Runaways’ – is now the artistic director of the Public’s LAByrinth).  It’s great to see Peter push this and the healthy collaboration between the new Bleecker Street Theatre Company and H-B Playwrights. Playwriting is a dangerous profession and you need all the muscle you can muster to slog through.

Bleecker Street Theatre Company is the non-profit resident company housed at The Theatres at 45 Bleecker – a premier off-Broadway venue located in the NoHo neighborhood of New York City.

BSTC evolved out of The Theatres at 45 Bleecker’s production of Rumspringa, which opened in February of 2009 with a successful extended run. BSTC was formed later that year and now workshops other new plays through its popular Monday Night Play Development Series with the goal of fostering more world premieres onto the Off-Broadway stage. The company is especially interested in plays that are easily adapted for film and new media with the belief that the stage is an effective forum to present new stories to members of the NYC film industry who regularly attend BSTC productions. In addition to new works, BSTC also presents classics and previously produced plays that speak to a new generation of theatre goers.

BSTC PRODUCERS
Peter Zinn, Artistic Director
Louis Salamone, Executive Director
Elle Sunman, Managing Director

website: http://www.thebleecker.com | See Playbill interview with artistic director Peter Zinn

From The Loop Online, a great source for emerging playwrights:

This is James Venhaus, long-time Loop-er and playwright. I wanted to let you know about something really cool that is happening with one of my plays that might be of interest to you and/or your readers. The Overtime Theatre in San Antonio is currently in rehearsals for my full-length play, “The Happy Couple”. The cast and I created a blog to document the rehearsal process, including script changes that happen when rehearsing a new play. The blog has not only been a tremendous marketing tool, but having everyone involved “journal” about their experience has been very revealing and helpful to rehearsals. You can check out the blog at: http://jamesvenhaus.net/wordpress/

On top of all that, the San Antonio Express-News has run a story about our blog. (You know you are in pretty good shape, PR-wise, when the local paper runs a story about your show and a story about the blog about your show!) Check it out at http://www.mysanantonio.com/entertainment/stage/Blog_helps_process_of_staging_a_play.html I’m thinking doing something like this for future shows, especially productions where I am lucky enough to be involved in the entire rehearsal process. I thought other Loopers might find it interesting.

Visit The Loop Online at: http://thelooponline.ning.com

Northwest Playwrights Alliance in NYC - and you’re invited! WWU/Northwest Playwrights Alliance tour: Sat. March 20  @  3 pm Tickets: Donation at the door (or free if you’re willing to projectile laugh and/or cry)

Abingdon Theatre Arts Complex Dorothy Strelsin Theatre

just west of 8th Avenue

Join us for the first leg of the tour.  Next stops: England & Japan. Dr. Rich Brown directs an amazingly talented ensemble, featuring short plays by Eva Suter, Michael Wallace, Aaron Shay, Greg Hischak, Solomon Olmstead & Bryan Willis The plays: Tads, by Eva Suter.  An origin story that combines a brilliant use of dialogue and movement.

• Tads, dramatizes a conversation between the first amphibians to survive the treacherous journey out of the ocean to the beach.
• Johnny Elgam and the Newport Kid, by Aaron Shay.  A hilarious Old West Showdown between the meanest, trickiest, snarliest pokemon champs this side of Hawks Prairie.
• Scent of Man, by Solomon Olmstead.  The etiquette of growing a mustache – an idle conversation with life-changing consequences.
• The Square, by Michael Wallace – Schoolyard politics go a little too far in this playground competition…Funny, heartbreaking, and a little scary.
• Poor Shem, by Gregory Hischak – trouble in teh office when a co-worker has a fatal run-in with the Xerox machine.  Do we call a priest, a repairman…or just use the by-pass tray?
• The Lazy Beauty, by Bryan Willis — a classic fairy tale with an unexpected ending.  Be careful what you wish for….

CALL TO PLAYWRIGHTS FOR APPLICATIONS
Seattle Rep Summer Residency at Western Washington University
JUNE 20th-27th, 2010

Are you a playwright residing in the Pacific Northwest? Would you like to bring your work-in-progress to our inaugural Summer Residency at Western Washington University? For one week at WWU, Seattle Rep will host two full-length plays (two writers, two directors and ten actors) as well as a solo piece. Each play will be given several days of rehearsal time and a public presentation on Sunday, June 27th.

Seattle Rep and WWU provide transportation to and from Bellingham, room and board, and a modest stipend. Please send your proposal to :

Seattle Repertory Theatre
WWU Summer Residency
Attn: Braden Abraham
PO Box 90093
Seattle, WA 98109

Proposals should include:

* A brief description of your play
* Your goals for the residency
* Any schedule conflicts
* A copy of the script or writing sample
* Your contact information
*Please note we will be unable to return any proposal materials. *We will accept proposals until March 15th, 2010.

NPA ANTHOLOGY: NORTHNORTHWEST – CALL FOR SUBMISSIONS

The Northwest Playwrights Alliance is now accepting submissions for its 5th edition of “NorthNorthwest” an annual anthology of ten-minute plays. (NorthNorthwest is co-sponsored by NPA, Seattle Repertory Theatre and Western Washington University). This year’s theme: “The Way It Is.” No fee. Limit two scripts per playwright. Deadline for scripts: March 15, 2010. If selected, notification will be not later than June 15, 2010 NPA will not retain rights of any kind. Payment: international fame and complimentary copies. Please send your pdf. or Word e-submissmion to nnw.submissions@gmail.com. No snail mail submissions will be accepted. Questions? Please email nnw.submissions@gmail.com for further inquiries.

It’s been said that he’s equal parts Hemingway and Beckett but to me Pinter is Alfred Hitchcock. Re-reading The Birthday Party- discovering it for the first time, previous readings were like skimming – the suspense, tension, uncertainty – like a rug is about to be pulled out and someone is about to crumple down and fracture. It’s like a car accident, you’re horrified but mesmerized. It’s where every moment the stakes are incredibly high and one or two sentences in the whole play reveal, rather hint, only hint, at what the real action is, what the possible objective can be. I am scared for the people in the play – but who is the perpetrator, or is it a macabre accident, that these people are in the room. Chekhov, in a way, not in the language – but characters who are always at the boiling point or about to get there, and can be pushed over, a fractured structure that doesn’t follow climax/resolution formula. I used to think that Chekhov gave me permission to throw a bunch of characters in a room and let them run around complaining – that’s what it took to write comedic tragedy. This is not reality, it’s a heightened prismatic interpretation of a dream that you throw on a stage, yet an invisible, taut string holds it together and it vibrates through the play. Pinter is brilliant like Eugene O’Neill for me because I can read both as literature, I don’t need to see them to appreciate the drama here. The words, spare, repetitive, or blown out like wind sails in O’Neill’s case, carry a compelling narrative.

Pinter wrote The Birthday Party in 1957, his first (or second) play.

Does Harold Pinter’s private life shed light on his plays? – Jan 13, 2010, The Guardian

The following is from Harold Pinter, Writing for the Theatre (1962)

When we look into a mirror we think the image that confronts us is accurate. But move a millimetre and the image changes. We are actually looking at a never-ending range of reflections.

When true silence falls we are left with echo but are nearer nakedness. One way of looking at speech is to say that it is a constant stratagem to cover nakedness.

There can be no hard distinctions between what is real and what is unreal, nor between what is true and what is false. A thing is not necessarily either true or false; it can be both true and false.  ((Related: “There is nothing either good or bad, but thinking makes it so”. – (Hamlet, Act II, Scene II))

We have heard many times that tired, grimy phrase: ‘Failure of communication…’ and this phrase has been fixed to my work quite consistently. I believe the contrary. I think that we communicate only too well, in our silence, in what is unsaid, and that what takes place is a continual evasion, desperate rear-guard attempts to keep ourselves to ourselves. Communication is too alarming. To enter into someone else’s life is too frightening. To disclose the poverty within us is too fearsome a possibility.

Each play was, for me, ‘a different kind of failure.’ And that fact, I suppose, sent me on to write the next one. 

From The New York Times today:

…. close relationships between playwrights and theaters are increasingly rare these days, and developing more of them is one of the chief recommendations of a new study of the state of the American play that the nonprofit Theater Development Fund published in book form in late December. Yet several obstacles stand in the way, according to the study, which also looked at playwrights’ struggle to make a living and which has set off a debate in some theater circles. See Playwrights’ Nurturing Is the Focus of a Study, NYT, 01/14/2010