2009 Power Plays Festival Cast & Crew July 5- August 2, 2009 at Actors Express
Essential “Food for Fish” opens audience comments Playwright Steve Yockey “…strongly suggest that folks in Atlanta check out the whimsically dark, touching and intoxicatingly performed production of Adam Szymkowicz’s “Food for Fish” at Essential Theatre.” Bobbie is a lonely young man living in New York, trying to write about three sisters who long to escape the city and return to their childhood home of New Jersey or is he really just an imaginary character in the mind of Sylvia, the youngest sister? Middle sister Alice is hopelessly in love with the husband of her older sister, and so she goes out on dates with a different man every night, working in her lab by day to isolate the human gene that makes us fall in love so she can control it! Oldest sister Barbara (played by a man) and her husband (played by a woman) cant figure out how men and women are supposed to relate to each other. This is the kind of play we love to do at the Essential funny and beautiful and just about impossible to describe. The New York Times did it best, calling it Fabulously weird and weirdly fabulous. “Ice Glen” opens next with poetry, drama and romance ICE GLEN by Joan Ackermann. Regional Premiere.
Directed by Ellen McQueen
Featuring: Jo Howarth, Dina Shadwell, Jayson Smith, Spencer G. Stephens, Jim Starbh and Ann Wilson.
Sarah Harding lives in an isolated country cottage, surrounded by a warm circle of quietly eccentric friends. She may be Americas greatest poet, but no ones ever seen her work which is just the way she wants it. But now an editor has arrived from Boston, wanting to publish her poems and bring her the fame and fortune she has never sought. With unforgettable characters, this wonderfully funny romantic drama — about the frozen places in our hearts coming back to life again — is like the best Emma Thompson movie you never saw. Beautifully written. Talkin Broadway. A lovely play. CurtainUp Come support our guest poetry readers as they share a brief selection before selected performances.
- Flora Maria Garcia, Executive Director MACC July 10 8pm
- Jeff Watkins, Artistic Director, Shakespeare Tavern, July 12 7pm
- Bob Farley, Artistic Director, Georgia Ensemble July 20th 8pm
- Georgia Poetry Society July 25th begins at 7pm
- Charles Green, Fulton County Arts Council/Sunrise Bank. July 26th 7pm
- Phillip Depoy, Clayton State, Drama Dept. Chair, July 31 8pm.
Fundraising Raffle
$10 per ticket; $75 for ten tickets
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Two tickets Actor’s Express Atlanta Premiere of Grey Gardens, the hit Broadway musical based on the acclaimed film that documents the lives of Jacqueline Kennedy-Onassis’ flamboyantly eccentric aunt Edith Bouvier Beale and her daughter “Little Edie.” Mother and daughter cling to each other through hysteria, happiness and heartbreak as the beautiful home around them falls into ruin. Indulge in the lush music, mysterious glamour and “The Revolutionary Costume for Today” inside the dilapidated, 28-room mansion called Grey Gardens.
Second Place: Two Festival Passes for 2010 Essential Theatre Festival
Essential Festival Coming Attractions
Opening July 15 will be JIM CROW AND THE RHYTHM DARLINGS by Vynnie Meli. World Premiere.
Directed by Betty Hart
Featuring: Rachel Bodenstein, Enisha Brewster, Daniel Burnley, DeAndrea Crawford, Nadir Mateen, Delesa Sims
Its World War Two, and with so many men going off to serve, the previously all-male world of jazz is opening up to women for the first time. The International Rhythm Darlings are an all-female African-American band touring the Deep South, which would be a tough situation in the best of times but now theyve got a last-minute replacement in the group, a white Jewish woman, and integrated bands arent allowed to play together on stage. Not in the South, not anywhere.
Inspired by the real-life experiences of musicians from that era, Vynnie Melis play takes a fascinating look at some extraordinary women who make their way past fear and hatred to find the common threads that bind them together. Winner of the 2009 Essential Theatre Playwriting Award competition, the only prize exclusively dedicated to the work of Georgia playwrights. The Essential Theatre is proud to have developed this play (along with Working Title Playwrights and Jewish Theatre of the South) and to be bringing it to the stage for the first time.