Justin Sayre's LOVE'S REFRAIN to Premiere at La Mama, 4/1-10

La MaMa Experimental Theatre Club will present the world premiere of LOVE'S REFRAIN, a new solo play by Justin Sayre from April 1-3 and 8-10. Tracing the lives of stars from nebula to supernova, Sayre extracts a fresh definition for love in his latest performance piece. Wedding personal stories with the science and poetry of astronomy, LOVE'S REFRAIN is romanticism for the modern age. The piece is directed by acclaimed visual artist Matthu Placek with costume design by Dusty Childers and a musical score by David John Sokolowski.

LOVE'S REFRAIN combines the science behind the birth and death of stars with personal memories from Sayre's past that informed his understanding of love. Set on a bare stage, the piece details Sayre's own sense of romanticism as it waxes and wanes in the modern period and concludes with the dimming of space as one by one the stars go out and leave us. The piece is devised along six sections, each dealing a different stage of development in the stars, all underscored with manipulated and morphed sounds from the romantic music we have been sending out to the known universe for a century. The play also uses source material from Shakespeare to Keats and Shelley.

"Love has been a subject that has obsessed me and confused me for the entirety of my life," reflects Justin. "Love's Refrain is my attempt at understanding. Using the science behind the lives of star, I trace the experiences that have built up my definition of love. The mistakes, the foibles, the moments, over too soon, which like the passing of a comet dazzled past me and were gone. What a perfect metaphor for a star."

LOVE'S REFRAIN will be performed at The Club at LaMaMa (74a East 4th Street, 3rd Floor) on for two weekends April 1 to 3 and April 8 to 10 on Fridays and Saturdays at 10:00 PM and Sundays at 6:00 PM. Tickets are $18 and $13 for students and seniors. The box office is open Monday through Sunday from 12:00 Noon to 6:00 PM. For tickets, please call (646) 430-5374 or visit www.LaMama.org.

JUSTIN SAYRE (Writer and performer) has been described by Michael Musto in The Village Voice as "Oscar Wilde meets Whoopi Goldberg," and was recently named one of LA's 16 Most Talented LGBT Comics by Frontiers Magazine. Sayre is best known as the creator and host of the downtown hit The Meeting*, now in its 7th season at Joe's Pub. The Meeting* was named among the Top Nightclub shows of 2013 by Time Out New York and Sayre received a 2012 Bistro Award for "Comedy Artistry." The Meeting* has also spawned the Annual Night of Thousand Judys, which benefits the Ali Forney Center for homeless LGBT youth. He currently works as a staff writer on the CBS sitcom "2 Broke Girls" and has appeared opposite Lisa Kudrow on HBO's "The Comeback." His first young adult novel, Husky, was published by Penguin Books in 2015 and a sequel will hit stands in September 2016. His works for the theatre include: The Boy Sonata, presented at Hot! Queer Theatre Festival and The Wild Project; Rite of Water for Queer Pop-Up Museum; Justin Sayre Is Alive and Well...Writing at Ars Nova, which was called one of the "Top 10 Events on the New York Stage" by the New York Daily News; and The Click of the Lock which was a finalist for the Eugene O'Neill Festival and was last presented at The Players Club with Zachary Booth and Justin Vivian Bond. As Edge New York said: "Comedian, raconteur, performing artist, gay rights activist and sexual outlaw: I'm not sure Justin Sayre is classifiable. The veteran performer is on his way to becoming a Downtown Manhattan institution along the lines of Charles Ludlum or Charles Busch." www.JustinSayre.com

MATTHU PLACEK (Director) has collaborated with notable contemporary artists such as Marina Abramovic, Julian Schnabel, Terence Koh, Jonah Bokaer, Vanessa Beecroft, Richard Prince, Brice Marden, Cindy Sherman, James Ivory, and Yoko Ono. His individual and collaborative work has been exhibited at The Museum of Modern Art in New York, The Kitchen, Deitch Projects, Mary Boone Gallery, Galleria Lia Rumma, the Sundance Film Festival's "New Frontier," the Toronto International Film Festival, the Stockholm International Film Festival, the National Young Arts Foundation and the National Monument Fort Jay at Governors Island. Placek has been awarded grants from the National Young Arts Foundation and the Rockefeller Brothers Fund. He has been in residence at The Pocantico Center at the Rockefeller estate and Marfa, Texas. He is supported by NYFA's Artspire program. www.MatthuPlacek.com