PAST PRODUCTIONS
Cast & creATIVE
Richard Nelson
Co-Translator, Director
Mr. Nelson’s plays include The Gabriels (Hungry, What Did You Expect?, and Women of a Certain Age) and The Apple Family plays (That Hopey Changey Thing, Sweet and Sad, Sorry, and Regular Singing), which were produced at The Public Theater in New York, toured internationally, and filmed for public television. His other plays include Illyria, Oblivion, Nikolai and the Others, Farewell to the Theatre, Conversations in Tusculum, Frank’s Home, How Shakespeare Won the West, Rodney’s Wife, Franny’s Way, Madame Melville, Goodnight Children Everywhere (Olivier Award for Play of the Year), The General from America, New England, Two Shakespearean Actors (Tony Award nomination for Best Play), Some Americans Abroad (Olivier nomination for Comedy of the Year), and others. His musicals include James Joyce’s The Dead with Shaun Davey (Tony Award for Best Book of a Musical) and My Life with Albertine and Private Confessions, both with Ricky Ian Gordon. His films include Hyde Park on Hudson (Focus Features), Ethan Frome (Miramax), and Sensibility and Sense (“American Playhouse”). With Larissa Volokhonsky and Richard Pevear, he has co-translated Ivan Turgenev’s A Month in the Country, Nikolai Gogol’s The Inspector, Mikhail Bulgakov’s Molière and Don Quixote, and Anton Chekhov’s The Seagull and The Cherry Orchard (all published by Theatre Communications Group). He is an honorary associate artist of the Royal Shakespeare Company and a recipient of the Arts and Letters Award in Literature from the American Academy of Arts and Letters and the PEN/Laura Pels “Master Playwright” Award.
Richard Pevear & Larissa Volokhonsky
Co-Translators
Mr. Pevear was born in Boston, grew up on Long Island, and attended Allegheny College (B.A., 1964) and University of Virginia (M.A., 1965). After a stint as a college teacher, he moved to the Maine coast and eventually to New York City, where he worked as a freelance writer, editor, and translator, as well as a cabinetmaker. He has published two collections of poetry, many essays and reviews, and 38 books translated from French, Italian, and Russian. Ms. Volokhonsky was born in Leningrad, attended Leningrad State University, and upon graduating joined a scientific team whose work took her to the east of Russia, to Kamchatka and Sakhalin Island. She immigrated to Israel in 1973 and to the United States in 1975, where she attended Yale Divinity School and St. Vladimir’s Orthodox Theological Seminary. Soon after settling in New York City, she was married to Mr. Pevear, and a few years later they moved to France with their two children. Together they have translated 30 books from Russian, including works by Leo Tolstoy, Mikhail Bulgakov, Nikolai Gogol, Anton Chekhov, Fyodor Dostoevsky, and Boris Pasternak. Their translation of Dostoevsky’s The Brothers Karamazov received the 1991 PEN/Laura Pels Translation Award, and their translation of Tolstoy’s Anna Karenina was awarded the same prize in 2002. In 2006 they were awarded the first Efim Etkind International Translation Prize by the European Graduate School of St. Petersburg.
CELESTE ARIAS (Eléna)'s select theatre credits include Katya in The Fairytale Lives of Russian Girls (Yale Repertory Theatre), Grotilde in Thunderbodies (Carlotta Festival of New Plays), and Masha in The Three Seagulls, or MASHAMASHAMASHA! (HERE Arts Center). Her recent film credits include Rebel in the Rye, Kate Can’t Swim, The Big Sick, and The Post. Her television credits include “Bull” and “The Good Wife.” She received an M.F.A. in Acting from Yale School of Drama.
Alice Cannon (Márya) Broadway: James Joyce’s: The Dead (Helen Hayes Award); Company (original cast). Off-Broadway: Significant Other at Roundabout Theater; I Remember Mama at Transport Group, General from America at Lucille Lortel and Alley Theater; Mr. Pim Passes By at Mint Theater. Regional: Queens for a Year at Hartford Stage; Road to Mecca, Best Actress Award, at Raleigh Stage; 4000 Miles at Hudson Stage Co., Angels in America at CT.. Repertory Theater. TV/film: “Difficult People”; “Full Frontal: Samantha Bee”; The Producers; Jewish Girls are Easy, Morris County: Elmer and Iris.
JON DEVRIES (Alexánder Serebryakóv) has appeared Off Broadway in The Whirligig, That Hopey Changey Thing, Sweet and Sad (Drama Desk, Obie Awards), Sorry, Regular Singing (Lucille Lortel Award nomination), As You Like It, The Wayside Motor Inn (Drama Desk Award), One Flea Spare, Hamlet, Agamemnon, Galileo, Goodnight Children Everywhere, The General from America, Sight Unseen, Richard II, Oedipus, and The Ballad of Soapy Smith. His Broadway credits include Devour the Snow, Execution of Justice, Major Barbara, Loose Ends, The Inspector General, and The Cherry Orchard. He appeared in the national tour of August: Osage County and the international tours of The Apple Family Plays and Forbidden Christmas, or The Doctor and the Patient with Mikhail Baryshnikov. Mr. DeVries’s film and television credits include Kill Your Darlings; American Gangster; The International; Evening; Che: Part One; The Baxter; Sarah, Plain and Tall; Skylark; “Law & Order”; “Law & Order: Criminal Intent”; ”Blue Bloods”; “Elementary”; “Boardwalk Empire”; “The Blacklist”; and others.
KATE KEARNEY-PATCH (Marína) was recently seen in The Brightness of Heaven and As It Is in Heaven, both at Cherry Lane Theatre. She has appeared in several Richard Nelson productions, including as Greta Conroy in James Joyce’s The Dead (American Conservatory Theater, Huntington Theatre Company, and The Kennedy Center), Hannah in The General from America (Lucille Lortel Theatre), and Anna in A Month in the Country (Williamstown Theatre Festival). Her recent theatre also includes Foster Mom (Premiere Stages). Ms. Kearney-Patch’s television credits include “How to Get Away with Murder” (pilot), “Momsters: When Moms Go Bad,” “Law & Order: Criminal Intent,” and “Hack.” She also just completed work on the short Divine Inspiration.
JESSE PENNINGTON (Mikhaíl Ástrov) was seen this fall in Macbeth directed by Robert O’Hara at Denver Center for the Performing Arts Theatre Company. His Off-Broadway credits include Bootycandy (Obie Award, Lucille Lortel Award nomination), Franny’s Way and Rodney’s Wife (Playwrights Horizons), The False Servant and Richard II (Classic Stage Company), The General from America (Theatre for a New Audience), A Place at the Table (MCC Theater), and The Winter’s Tale and The Taming of the Shrew (The Public Theater). Mr. Pennington’s regional credits include Major Barbara (Guthrie Theater), Maple and Vine (Humana Festival), Goodnight Children Everywhere (American Conservatory Theater), and James Joyce’s The Dead (Huntington Theatre Company), as well as productions at Geffen Playhouse, Alley Theatre, Williamstown Theatre Festival, New York Stage and Film, and People’s Light & Theatre Company. He was also seen in the European tour of Richard Nelson’s The Apple Family Plays in Berlin, Brighton, and Vienna. His film credits include American Gun and When Zachary Beaver Came to Town. Mr. Pennington received his M.F.A. from New York University’s Graduate Acting Program.
JAY O. SANDERS (Ványa) recently returned from a world tour of Richard Nelson’s trilogy The Gabriel Plays: Election Year in the Life of One Family out of The Public Theater, where he has been a regular presence for over 40 years with credits including Mr. Nelson’s The Apple Family Plays, David Hare’s Stuff Happens, the title role in Titus Andronicus, and a long list of appearances in Shakespeare in the Park. He has also performed across the country with Bryan Doerries’s Theater of War. A familiar face from film (JFK, The Day After Tomorrow, Tumbleweeds, Edge of Darkness, and Angels in the Outfield) and television (“Sneaky Pete,” “True Detective,” “Blindspot,” “Law & Order; Criminal Intent,” and “Roseanne”), Mr. Sanders’s voice can regularly be heard narrating PBS documentaries for “Nova,” “Nature,” “Wide Angle,” and “Secrets of the Dead.” His own play, Unexplored Interior, which explores the 1994 genocide in Rwanda, was the inaugural production of Washington, DC’s new Mosaic Theater Company.
YVONNE WOODS (Sónya Alexándrovna) last appeared at The Old Globe in Hay Fever. Her other theatre credits include Goodnight Children Everywhere (American Conservatory Theater), Franny’s Way (Playwrights Horizons), Miss Julie (Yale Repertory Theatre), Burn This (Shakespeare Santa Cruz), Life’s a Dream (Court Theatre), Left (New York Stage and Film), The General from America (Alley Theatre, Theatre for a New Audience), Les Liaisons Dangereuses (Huntington Theatre Company), Slag Heap (Cherry Lane Alternative), and Forbidden Christmas, or The Doctor and the Patient (Lincoln Center Festival, Spoleto Festival USA, The Kennedy Center, and others). She was also seen in the film Happy 40th. Ms. Woods trained at The Juilliard School.
GREGORY MOSHEr serves as Chair of the Hunter Theatre Department, and leads the Hunter Theater Project. He is the director and/or producer of over 200 plays at the Lincoln Center and Goodman Theatres (both of which he led), on Broadway, at the Royal National Theatre, and in the West End. Colleagues have included playwrights Samuel Beckett, Tennessee Williams, David Mamet, Richard Nelson, Spalding Gray, Wole Soyinka, Derek Walcott, Elaine May, John Guare, David Rabe, Emily Mann, and Edward Albee; directors including Peter Brook, Jerome Robbins, and Mike Nichols, and countless leading actors. Notable premiere productions include John Guare’s Six Degrees of Separation, John Leguizamo’s Freak, David Rabe’s Hurlyburly, Langston Hughes and Zora Neale Hurston’s Mulebone, the South African township musical Sarafina, and the premieres of over twenty plays by Mr. Mamet, including American Buffalo, Speed-the-Plow, Edmond, and Glengarry Glen Ross. He has collaborated with Mr. Nelson on nearly a dozen plays, including the Broadway production of James Joyce’s The Dead.
PRESS
This ‘Vanya’ is a teachable moment — for how to stage a classic play today
THE WASHINGTON POST | SEPTEMBER 20, 2018
Making 'Uncle Vanya' Real, Not Overwrought
TDF | SEPTEMBER 14, 2018
Jay O. Sanders, Roberta Maxwell, and Jon DeVries to Star in Uncle Vanya
THEATER MANIA | JUNE 26, 2018
Review: Listening to ‘Uncle Vanya’ With Virgin Ears
THE NEW YORK TIMES | SEPTEMBER 16, 2018
They Know Russian. I Know Plays. Would That Translate?
THE NEW YORK TIMES | SEPTEMBER 10, 2018
Hunter Theater Project Announces Richard Nelson's UNCLE VANYA
BROADWAY WORLD | JUNE 26, 2018
With fresh look at 'Uncle Vanya,' Old Globe bringing something new to the conversation
SAN DIEGO UNION TRIBUNE | FEBRUARY 7, 2018
PLAYBILL.COM
Go Inside Opening Night of Link Link Circus With Isabella Rossellini (and Her Dog Pan)
April 24th, 2019
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Link Link Circus, Isabella Rossellini’s new monologue play about the link between humans and animals via Darwin’s theory of evolution, opened at the Frederick Loewe Theatre at Hunter College April 22. The production, which also features Rossellini’s dog Pan, is scheduled to run through May 3. In Link Link Circus, Rossellini transform herself into Aristotle, Descartes, a medieval theologian, B.F. Skinner, Charles Darwin, and others, while Pan plays various animals, assisted by Andy Byers and Caleb Lane.
THEATERMANIA.COM
ISABELLA ROSSELLINI AND PAN CELEBRATE OPENING NIGHT OF LINK LINK CIRCUS
April 24th, 2019
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Link Link Circus, Isabella Rossellini's new off-Broadway show with her dog, Pan, officially opened at the Frederick Loewe Theatre at Hunter College. Presented by Hunter Theater Project, the show runs through May 3. Check out photos from the opening-night celebration below.
BROADWAYWORLD.COM
Link Link Circus STARRING ISABELLA ROSSELLINI CELEBRATES OPENING NIGHT
April 24th, 2019
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Hunter College president Jennifer J. Rabb announced today that Hunter Theater Project will present Golden Globe Award-winning actress-filmmaker Isabella Rossellini in her one-woman, one-dog theatrical evening, Link Link Circus. The production will play April 18 through May 3, 2019 for 14 performances only at the Frederick Loewe Theatre at Hunter College, East 68th Street between Park and Lexington Avenues. Tickets ($42, $15 for students with ID, with no service charge) are available starting Wednesday, March 20 at noon at www.huntertheaterproject.org.
HOLLYWOODREPORTER.COM
'Link Link Circus': Theater Review
April 21st, 2019
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If Isabella Rossellini had been my professor, I would have done much better in school. That's the main feeling I came away with after Link Link Circus, her latest theatrical foray into animal behavior, which is as entertaining as it is informative. The not quite one-woman show (more on that in a bit) is a follow-up to Green Porno, a theatrical adaptation of her series of Sundance Channel short films about the sex lives of animals.
NPR.ORG
'Link Link Circus' Explores Deep Connection Between Animals And Humans
April 20th, 2019
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NPR's Scott Simon asks actress Isabella Rossellini about her new one-woman, one-dog show, "Link Link Circus."
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WNYC.ORG
ISABELLA ROSSELLINI'S 'LINK LINK CIRCUS'
April 17th, 2019
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Isabella Rossellini joins us to talk about the new piece, which she conceived of and co-directed, “Link Link Circus,” with Hunter Theatre Project at the Baryshnikov Arts Center, and about studying for her masters in Animal Behavior and Conservation. The project stars Isabella and her dog, Pan.
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TWI-NY.COM
ISABELLA ROSSELLINI: LINK LINK CIRCUS
April 16th, 2019
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Everything that I study at school — that is very serious — I try to visualize and make it fun,” says Isabella Rossellini. The sixty-six-year-old daughter of neo-Realist Roberto Rossellini and Oscar-, Emmy-, and Tony-winning Swedish actress Ingrid Bergman is currently working on her master’s degree in animal behavior and conservation at Hunter College, where she will stage her unique one-woman, one-dog show Link Link Circus at the Frederick Loewe Theatre from April 18 to May 3 as part of Gregory Mosher’s Hunter Theater Project.
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THEATERMANIA.COM
ISABELLA ROSSELLINI REVEALS THE LINK LINK CIRCUS BETWEEN HUMANS AND ANIMALS
April 12th, 2019
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Audiences have loved Isabella Rossellini onscreen for decades, both as an actor (Blue Velvet, Death Becomes Her) and model (she was the face of Lancôme cosmetics from 1982 to 1996, and was re-signed in 2015). What her fans may not know, however, is that Rossellini is a passionate lover of animals. This interest is what spurred the creation of her lauded Sundance Channel series-turned-stage show Green Porno, which explores the mating rituals of various insects and animals, and also led her to Hunter College, where she's currently completing a graduate degree in animal behavior.
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LATIMES.COM
ANSWERING THE CALL OF THE WILD WITH ISABELLA ROSSELLINI AND HER 'LINK LINK CIRCUS'
January 25th, 2019
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Isabella Rossellini stops in her tracks, her eyes fixed on a California scrub jay. Its feathers are deep azure blue, its belly a soft gray-brown. Perched on a security guard’s finger, it sits near the historic Japanese house at the Huntington Library, Art Collections, and Botanical Gardens in San Marino.
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LAIST.COM
HOW ISABELLA ROSSELLINI WENT FROM MODEL/ACTRESS TO CHCKEN FARMER/ANIMAL BEHAVIORIST
January 24th, 2019
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Isabella Rossellini has a new show at the Broad Stage this weekend. She also recently published a book about chicken farming. That one's not what you'd expect from Hollywood royalty, the daughter of Oscar-winning actress Ingrid Bergman.
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CHICAGO.SUNTIMES.COM
LIFE IS A 'CIRCUS' THESE DAYS FOR ACTRESS ISABELLA ROSSELLINI
January 2nd, 2019
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It was no surprise that actress Isabella Rossellini went into the family business. After all she is the daughter of cinema royalty — Oscar-winner Ingrid Bergman (“Casablanca,” “Gaslight”) and Italian director Roberto Rossellini (“Open City”). But what is surprising is the career path she’s taken in recent years.
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On an autumn afternoon, in an empty lot outside the city, seven school girls meet up to perform a play. In an urban wasteland, the girls in their tartan school uniforms transform into witches, ghosts, and kings. They hurl headlong into the unchecked passions of Macbeth—in Shakespeare’s original text—as the line between real life and blood fantasy quickly blurs. Through prophecies and smartphones, blood and Beyonce, unexpected resonances emerge from Shakespeare’s dark nightmare of ambition gone awry, while at the same time, these young women discover what’s done cannot be undone.
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Mac Beth, which runs 90 minutes with no intermission, originally premiered in 2018 at Seattle Repertory Theatre. Red Bull Theater’s production played from May 7 through June 9, 2019 at the Lucille Lortel Theatre, where the run was extended by popular demand.
Mondays - Saturdays at 7:30pm
Matinees at 2pm on Thursdays and Saturdays
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This production is made possible by a generous grant from Susie Sainsbury and The Backstage Trust, and Anne H. Bass.
CAST & CREATIVE
Brittany Bradford (macbeth). Broadway: Bernhardt/Hamlet. Off Broadway: Fiasco’s Merrily We Roll Along. NYC/Regional credits: Fefu and Her Friends (Theatre for a New Audience); Guys and Dolls (The Muny); Flyin’ West (Westport Country Playhouse); Family Resemblance (Eugene O’Neill); The Profane and Taming of the Shrew (Chautauqua Theater Company); Midsummer Night’s Dream (Ten Thousand Things Theatre); Neighbors, Avenue Q, and Next to Normal (Mixed Blood Theatre); Ragtime and Stick Fly (Park Square Theatre). Training: Juilliard.
Camila Canó-Flaviá (macduff). Broadway: Network (Belasco Theater). Off-Broadway: Dance Nation (Playwrights Horizons; Drama Desk Award Winner for Outstanding Ensemble). Regional: The Coast Starlight (La Jolla Playhouse), My Jane (Chester Theater Company). TV: Lovecraft Country (HBO), Madam Secretary (CBS), Orange is the New Black (Netflix). Education: BFA from Mason Gross School of the Arts, Rutgers University.
Sharlene Cruz (witch 3 jan 6 - feb 3). Off-Broadway: Mac Beth (Red Bull Theater), The Climb (Cherry Lane Theater). Other credits include: Den of Thieves (Harlem Repertory Theater) and BLU (Aaron Davis Hall). Recent graduate of The City College of New York.
Dylan Gelula (witch 1). Film credits include First Girl I Loved (winner of the NEXT Audience Award at the Sundance Film Festival), Support the Girls, Her Smell, Flower, Under the Eiffel Tower, Horse Girl. TV: Xanthippe Voorhees on “Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt”, “Casual”, “Shameless”.
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Imani Jade Powers (witch 3, feb 4 - feb 22) Off-Broadway/NY: The Winter’s Tale (Pearl Theater); The Arabian Nights, The Winter’s Tale, and The Tempest (Hudson Valley Shakespeare Festival). London: Suddenly Last Summer, The House of Bernarda Alba, and Stuff Happens (RADA). TV/Film: "Wu-Tang: An American Saga" (Hulu), "Guarded", "Empire at Sea". Training: RADA. www.imanijadepowers.com
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Sophie Kelly-Hedrick (witch 2) is ecstatic to be returning to the third installment of Schmidt's Mac Beth, previously at Seattle Repertory Theatre (Witch 1) and Red Bull Theatre (Witch 2). Sophie is a current undergrad student at NYU Tisch, and was most recently seen in One for the Road (Playwrights Horizons Theatre School). Sophie hails from Mercer Island, Washington. sophiekelly-hedrick.com @sophiekellyhedrick
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juliette kenn de balinthazy(understudy macbeth, lady macbeth, macduff, banquo). recently graduated from Juilliard in May, 2019. Recent credits include Untitled Femme Maison at Door 10, is currently directing a multi-media piece entitled MOTHERBOARD, which opens at the premieres Beyond the Machine Festival in March. She originated the role of Cassandra in Louis Andriessen's Agamemnon at the New York Philharmonic conducted by Jaap Van Zweden. Other credits include Into the Woods, queens, Top Girls and Romeo and Juliet.
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Ismenia Mendes (Lady Macbeth). Credits include Marys Seacole (LCT3), Bernie and Mikey’s Trip to the Moon (59E59), The Liar (CSC), Troilus and Cressida, Much Ado About Nothing (The Public - Delacorte), Grand Concourse, Your Mother’s Copy of the Kama Sutra (Playwrights Horizons), The Wayside Motor Inn (Signature Theater), Family Furniture (The Flea), Baby Screams Miracle (Clubbed Thumb). TV/Film: Tali Grapes on “Orange is the New Black,” Anja Jacobs on “High Maintenance” (HBO) “The Devil You Know” (HBO pilot: Jenji Kohan/Gus Van Sant). She was a 2018 recipient of Red Bull Theater’s Matador Award for Excellence in Classical Theater. Training: Juilliard.
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Juliana Sass (understudy witch 1, 2, 3). Off-Broadway/NY: Julius Caesar (Theater for a New Audience), Little Murders (The Neon Coven). TV/Film: Sisterhood of Night, Radium Girls, “Alan Alda & The Actor Within You” (HBO). Education: BA in Comparative Literature from Harvard. julianasass.com
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Ayana Workman (banquo). Off-Broadway: The Price of Thomas Scott (Mint Theater) Romeo and Juliet, The Winter’s Tale (The Public Theater), Dos Worlds (Trinity Church), Macbeth (Masterfool Theater Company). Regional: Miss Bennet: Christmas at Pemberley (Cincinnati Playhouse in The Park), Romeo and Juliet (Shakespeare Theater Company). International: Julius Caesar at the Globe Theatre (London, England); Virtual Truth at Bunker Theatre (Ljubljana, Slovenia); and Guernica Continuum at SNG Maribor (Maribor, Slovenia). TV: “Person of Interest,” “Jessica Jones.” Ayana received her BFA from Mason Gross School of The Arts at Rutgers University.
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Erica Schmidt (director, adaptation). Directing credits include: Mac Beth (Seattle Rep, Red Bull Theater); Richard II with Robert Sean Leonard (The Old Globe); Cyrano and All the Fine Boys at The New Group (writer and director); Turgenev’s A Month In The Country (Classic Stage Company); Dennis Kelly’s Taking Care Of Baby (Manhattan Theatre Club); Jonas Hassen Khemiri’s I Call My Brothers and the Obie Award-winning Invasion! (both for The Play Company); Humor Abuse (co-creator/writer) – Lucille Lortel Award; (Manhattan Theatre Club, Philadelphia Theatre Company, American Conservatory Theatre, Seattle Rep and The Taper); Rent (Tokyo); Moliere’s Imaginary Invalid, Chekhov’s Uncle Vanya, Gilbert and Sullivan’s The Sorcerer and Copland’s The Tender Land (all at Bard Summer Scape); Carnival (The Paper Mill Playhouse); Quincy Long’s People Be Heard (Playwrights Horizons); Gary Mitchell’s Trust (The Play Company, Callaway Award nominee); As You Like It (The Public Theater/NYSF, chashama; New York International Fringe Festival Winner for Best Direction); Debbie Does Dallas (wrote the adaptation and directed Off-Broadway for The Araca Group); Spanish Girl (Second Stage). Princess Grace Award recipient 2001.
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Catherine Cornell (scenic designer). A selection of Catherine’s work includes: Seattle Repertory Theatre (Mac Beth, Buyer and Cellar); Heritage Theatre Festival (Harvey); University of Michigan (Cloud Nine); Seattle Public Theater (Dry Land, The Liar); Book-It Repertory Theatre (American Junkie, The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao, Tale for the Time Being, Slaughterhouse Five, Truth Like the Sun, and their Arts and Education Tour); ACTLab (Red Light Winter, 25 Saints, and Buzzer); Village Theatre KIDSTAGE (Les Miserables, Crazy For You); Strawberry Theatre Workshop (Frost/Nixon); NCTC (Bright Half Life). Her next design will be A Year of Magical Thinking with ACT Theatre.
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Jessica Pabst (costume designer). Broadway: Marvin’s Room, The Heidi Chronicles. Recent Off-Broadway: The Amateurs (Vineyard Theatre); Log Cabin, A Life, Rancho Viejo, The Qualms, Marjorie Prime, The Whale (Playwrights Horizons); The Cost of Living, The Ruins of Civilization, Taking Care of Baby, Murder Ballad (Manhattan Theatre Club); and Fortress of Solitude (The Public Theater). Jessica’s work has also been seen at Lincoln Center, Second Stage, Primary Stages, Atlantic Theatre Company, The New Group, and The Juilliard School. Regional: Actors Theatre of Louisville, Williamstown Theatre Festival, Long Wharf, Two River, Dallas Theatre Center, Children’s Theatre Company, and Center Theatre Group. 2013 Lucille Lortel Award. Drama Desk, Henry Hewes, IRNE award nominations.
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Jeff Croiter (Lighting Designer). Broadway: Falsettos; Bandstand; Holiday Inn; Something Rotten; Disaster; Penn & Teller; Newsies; Peter and the Starcatcher; Mothers and Sons; A Time to Kill; Jekyll & Hyde; The Pee-wee Herman Show; Next Fall; Kiki & Herb. Off-Broadway includes: The Other Josh Cohen; Daniel’s Husband; The True; Smokey Joe’s Café; Jerry Springer: The Opera; Tiny Beautiful Things; The Cost of Living; Sweet Charity; The Last Five Years; Almost Maine; Ordinary Days. Other credits include The Big Apple Circus; Penn & Teller (Vegas); Jennifer Muller/The Works. Received Tony, Hewes and Bass Awards and Drama Desk, Outer Critics Circle, Lortel, Ovation, Irne and AUDELCO nominations.
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Erin Bednarz (sound designer) is a performer, producer, dramaturg, DJ, and designer. Off Broadway: The Convent (Rattlestick Theater). National: American Repertory Theatre, Magic Theatre, Seattle Repertory Theatre, On The Boards, American Contemporary Theatre Seattle, and more. Design Residencies: University of Washington, Seattle University, Cornish College of the Arts. Erin recently became the first female Gregory Award recipient in outstanding sound design. Erin is co-founder of new play accelerator Umbrella Project, resident sound designer at Washington Ensemble Theatre, and incoming advanced sound design instructor at Cornish College of the Arts. Find out more here.
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Lorenzo Pisoni (movement coordinator). Broadway: Gary: A Sequel to Titus Andronicus, Beetlejuice, Frozen, Noises Off. Off Broadway: All the Fine Boys, Harlequin Studies. Other Credits: Pickle Family Circus, Cirque Du Soleil. As an actor, Lorenzo’s work on and off Broadway has been recognized with Drama Desk, Lucille Lortel, Obie, Outer Critics Circle awards.
ABOUT
HUNTER THEATER PROJECT (HTP) is a resource serving Hunter College and New York City. College-wide in scope, it links productions created by top-rank professional theater artists with the college’s teaching, learning, and research mission, giving vivid expression to subjects across the curriculum.
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Hunter College president Jennifer J. Raab announced today that Hunter Theater Project will present a strictly limited return engagement for Red Bull Theater’s critically acclaimed production of Mac Beth, adapted and directed by Erica Schmidt, from the play by William Shakespeare.
The production will play seven weeks only from Monday, January 6 through Saturday, February 22, 2020, with opening night on Tuesday, January 21 at the Frederick Loewe Theatre, East 68th Street, between Park and Lexington Avenues. Tickets ($49, $29 for guests under 30 years-old, $15 for students with ID, with no service charge)
a note from producer GREGORY MOSHER
The Hunter Theater Project, which launched with a production of Uncle Vanya, sprang in part from a graduate course I taught at Columbia in which we tried to figure out a better model – not to get too grand, we called it a gizmo - for connecting theater artists and what the theater visionary Peter Brook calls a “willing audience.” Fifty years earlier, a generation of young American producers had created a gizmo that we now refer to, generally, as the not-for-profit theater. It quickly became the norm; it’s hard to imagine an institutional theater without seasons, subscriptions, artistic/managing directors, and large administrative staffs. We thought it would be both fun and educational, even perhaps useful, to imagine a few new possible versions for the 21 century.
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In considering what might be attractive to artists and audiences of their generation, my students didn’t find these built-in features especially compelling. Given the variety of work available in most large or even large-ish American cities, there was less inclination to ask audiences to commit to five plays from one theater. We noted that commercial productions are assembled with relatively small teams, and so forth. Above all, my young colleagues felt ticket prices across the board have grown burdensome to not just young people but almost anyone who works in the theater, not to mention the generally less affluent.
The Hunter Theater Project is a modest effort to begin afresh, generating the simplest possible mechanism to support what happens when the audience and artists connect each evening. We’re going to do our best to see that the creators and facilitators are, in Hamlet’s words, well-bestowed, and trust them to do their best. As for audiences, we skipped both the “season” and a formal Membership program. Everyone is in effect a Member of the HTP.
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The theater has often advanced because it added things. Electric lights have a distinct advantage over candles. Sometimes, though, we need to try to get back to simpler forms: the daylit theaters of the Elizabethan age, Grotowski’s cauldron, and Brook’s empty space, to name just a few famous examples. These were – and still are in Brook’s case - theaters where talented actors and diverse audiences can collide and connect in a relatively intimate and unadorned space, everyone aware of each other, joined simply by being alive in tumultuous times.
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- Gregory Mosher