Works by Neil LaBute, Marian Fontana & More Featured in SUMMER SHORTS 2013

Throughline Artists (J.J. Kandel, Executive Producer; John McCormack, Producing Artistic Director) will present SUMMER SHORTS 2013, their seventh annual festival of new American short plays from established and emerging writers, at 59E59 Theaters (59 East 59th Street). Performances will begin Friday July 19th, and continue through Saturday August 31st only.

Featured will be six world premieres from some of the theater's finest established and emerging artists, including Marian Fontana (Falling Short, directed by Alexander Dinelaris), Lucas Hnath (About A Woman Named Sarah, director TBA), Tina Howe (Breaking The Spell, directed by Birgitta Victorson, with music performed by Evan Shinners), Neil LaBute (Good Luck [In Farsi], which he will direct), Paul Weitz (Change, directed by Billy Hopkins), and Alan Zweibel (Pine Cone Moment, directed by Fred Berner). George Xenos will provide scenic design, with costume design by Sandra Alexandre (series A) and Tamara Menear (series B), lighting design by Greg MacPherson, and sound design by Marios Aristopoulos.

Summer Shorts returns for another summer of new American one-acts featuring original plays by the country's top playwrights. Representing some of today's best writing, directing and acting talents, Summer Shorts celebrates theater, summer and the short form. The festival's two separate series offer a diverse range of voices, styles, and subject matter. Summer Shorts 2013 offers six world premiere one-act plays, presented as two separate evenings. The two series will run in rotating repertory. The New York Times called Summer Shorts "shamelessly cleaver and deeply satisfying!"

Throughline Artists (J.J. Kandel, Executive Producer; John McCormack, Producing Artistic Director) is committed to preserving the traditions of the theater for the next generation by providing opportunities for established professionals to work with and pass on knowledge to emerging artists.

59E59 Theaters (Elysabeth Kleinhans, Artistic Director; Peter Tear, Executive Producer) is the Drama Desk Award-winning theater complex located on 59th Street between Park and Madison Avenues in Manhattan. Owned and operated by the Elysabeth Kleinhans Theatrical Foundation, a not-for-profit foundation, 59E59 Theaters brings new, innovative and invigorating work to East Side audiences. 59E59 Theaters presents Off-Broadway productions by not-for-profit companies from across the United States and around the world, including an annual festival of new British theater called Brits Off Broadway and a preview of shows going to the Edinburgh Festival Fringe called East to Edinburgh.

Performances will be Tuesday through Thursday evening at 7:15 pm, Friday & Saturday evenings at 8:15pm, Saturday matinees at 2:15 pm and Sundays at 3:15 pm and 7:15 pm. Tickets are $25 each (59E59 Members $17.50). Tickets can be purchased from the Box Office (Monday 12-6pm, Tuesday - Thursday 12-7:30pm, Friday & Saturday 12-8:30pm, Sunday 12-7:15pm), by phone through Ticket Central at 212-279-4200 or online at www.ticketcentral.com. Service fees apply to phone and web purchases.

Looking for A PAIR OF SHORTS? See both Series A & B for only $40 (plus applicable service fees). Good for performances through August 14th only. Hurry - tickets must be purchased by August 4th!

For more information, please visit www.summershortsfestival.com or www.throughlineartists.org

SERIES A

GOOD LUCK (IN FARSI)

Is a comic look at two actresses vying for the same role on a television show. They sit in a casting office waiting their respective turns, while looking for ways to psych each other out before their auditions. A funny look at the small, bitter rivalries we all share in life.

Neil LaBute received his Master of Fine Arts degree in dramatic writing from New York University and was the recipient of a literary fellowship to study at The Royal Court Theatre, London, and also attended The Sundance Institute's Playwrights Lab. His films include: In The Company Of Men; Your Friends and Neighbors; Nurse Betty; Possession; The Shape Of Things (a film adaptation of his play by the same title); The Wicker Man; Lakeview Terrace; Death At A Funeral and the upcoming Some Velvet Morning. LaBute's plays include Filthy Talk for Troubled Times; bash: latter-day plays; The Shape Of Things; The Mercy Seat; The Distance From Here; Autobahn; Fat Pig; Some Girl(s); This Is How It Goes; In A Dark Dark House; Wrecks; reasons to be pretty; The Break of Noon; In a Forest, Dark and Deep, Lovely Head; Reasons to be Happy. LaBute has also adapted Dracula, Woyzeck and Miss Julie for the stage. Seconds of Pleasure, a collection of his short fiction, was published by Grove Atlantic.

BREAKING THE SPELL

An evil spell... a beautiful princess... a worried king... his lovesick fool... and the most talented musicians in the land collide in the retelling of Sleeping Beauty.

Tina Howe. This is Miss Howe's third collaboration with the merry fellows at "Summer Shorts." Some of her other plays include Museum, The Art of Dining, Birth and After Birth, Painting Churches, Coastal Disturbances and Pride's Crossing. These works can be read in Coastal Disturbances, Four Plays by Tina Howe and Birth and After Birth: A Marriage Cycle, published by TCG. She's won all the usual prizes, suffered the usual humiliations and has been Playwright-in-Residence of the Rita and Burton Goldberg MFA in Playwriting at Hunter College since 2010. Miss Howe is proud to have served on the Council the Dramatists Guild since 1990.

American musician EVAN SHINNERS travels the world performing Bach from pool halls to Carnegie Hall. He has delighted audiences with his stories, songs, and unique renditions of the music of Johann Sebastian Bach. A 2010 Juilliard School graduate, Mr. Shinners was recently featured on NBC TV and National Public Radio performing an all-electric Bach Show at Webster Hall. In December he was invited to the White House, playing Bach in front of 19,000 people including the First Family for the national Christmas Tree Lighting. His first recording ('@bach') caught the ears of many: "I know this is a lot of weight to put on a young man's shoulders, but Evan reminds me of a young Glenn Gould" (Bill McGlaughlin); "It's tremendously sloppy, it's excitingly insane! But by god there is nothing quite like it" (David Dubal); "A bona fide Bach-star" (Time Out). His second album, ("evan plays seven"), is also a full length youtube film, and won the Grand Prize at Bachtoberfest 2012, earning him the title: Mr. Bachtober. A poet and a tummler, Mr. Shinners publishes his own writings annually and hosts an eclectic party of New York based musicians every month in Spanish Harlem.

ABOUT A WOMEN NAMED SARAH

A woman named Sarah goes to Arizona to interview for a job, a job working for a man named John. John's wife, Cindy, also interviews Sarah, and Sarah wants this job so much that she does something that hurts the feelings of her husband, Todd. This is a play about a woman named Sarah--yeah, you know the one.

LUCAS HNATH's plays include Red Speedo (Studio Theatre), A Public Reading of an Unproduced Screenplay About the Death of Walt Disney (Soho Rep), nightnight (2013 Humana Festival), Isaac's Eye (Ensemble Studio Theatre), Death Tax (2012 Humana Festival, Royal Court Theatre), and The Courtship of Anna Nicole Smith (Actors Theatre of Louisville). Lucas has been a resident playwright at New Dramatists since 2011. He is a proud member of Ensemble Studio Theatre and has enjoyed residencies with The Royal Court Theatre and 24Seven Lab. He is a winner of the 2012 Whitfield Cook Award for Isaac's Eye, 2013 Steinberg/ATCA New Play Award Citation for Death Tax, and a two-time winner of the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation Grant for screenwriting. He is also a recipient of commissions from the EST/Sloan Project, Actors Theatre of Louisville, and New York University's Graduate Acting Program. Lucas received both his BFA and MFA from NYU's Department of Dramatic Writing and is a lecturer in New York University's Expository Writing Program.

SERIES B

PINE CONE MOMENT

Two elderly people who want to be together must first deal with the voices of their departed spouses before they can move forward with their relationship.

Alan Zweibel. An original "Saturday Night Live" writer who The New York Times says has "earned a place in the pantheon of American pop culture," Alan Zweibel has won multiple Emmy, Writers Guild of America, and TV Critics Awards for his work in television which also includes "It's Garry Shandling's Show," "Monk," and "Curb Your Enthusiasm." Alan's many theatrical contributions include the Tony Award winning play 700 Sundays which he collaborated on with Billy Crystal, Martin Short's Broadway hit Fame Becomes Me, and the off-Broadway plays Happy (Summer Shorts 2010), Comic Dialogue, Between Cars, andBunny Bunny - Gilda Radner: A Sort of Romantic Comedy which he adapted from his best-selling book. Alan has written the 2006 Thurber Prize winning novel The Other Shulman, the popular children's book Our Tree Named Steve, a collection of short stories (Clothing Optional), and the novel Lunatics that he co-wrote with Dave Barry. Alan's humor has also appeared in The New Yorker, Esquire, Atlantic Monthly, The New York Times Op-Ed page, Huffington Post and MAD Magazine. The co-writer of the screenplays for Dragnet, North, and The Story of Us, Alan recently received an honorary PhD. from the State University of NY; in 2010 the Writers Guild of America East gave him a Lifetime Achievement Award. Alan is currently working with Billy Crystal on the feature film of 700 Sundays; is an executive producer on Showtime's documentary series "Inside Comedy" starring David Steinberg; just finished writing a Broadway show for Lisa Lampanelli, and the film rights to Lunatics was recently purchased by Universal Studios with Steve Carell attached.

CHANGE

Three old college friends get reacquainted in Change by Paul Weitz.

Paul Weitz published plays include Lonely I'm Not, Trust, Show People, and Privilege (2nd Stage) as well as Roulette (EST at the John Houseman). Movies written and directed include American Pie, About a Boy (Academy Award nomination), In Good Company, American Dreamz, Being Flynn and Admission. Weitz acted in the film Chuck and Buck.

FALLING SHORT

Frustrated with her writing career and her ongoing search for love on the internet, Lee finds herself revealing more than she planned on a date with a quirky actor. Sharing their mutual loneliness,Falling Short reveals the moving, awkward and sometimes hilarious attempts at human connection.

MARIAN FONTANA's plays and one-woman shows have appeared at Playwrights Horizons, the Vineyard Theater, Variety Arts and more. Her one-woman show A Woman and her Bassoon premiered at Playwrights Horizons Summerfest. She recently performed stand-up comedy at Gotham, the Metropolitan Room and other venues. Her articles have appeared in The New Yorker, Vanity Fair, Salon.com, The Guardian and more. Her memoir, A Widows Walk, published by Simon and Schuster, was named as one of the Top Ten Great Reads of 2005 by People Magazine and the Washington Post's Book Raves. A Widows Walk was on the New York Times best-selling biography list. Her essays have appeared in the anthologies Money Changes Everything and The Time of My Life (Random House) and most recently in the Apocalypse for Sock Monkey Press. She has been featured on This American Life, CNN, Good Morning America and All Things Considered. She recently completed her second memoir that was optioned by CBS. She founded the 9-11 Families Association that opened Tribute NYC, a memorial museum and served as Board President until 2007. She is currently on the board of the New York Writers Coalition, a not-for-profit that offers free creative writing classes to some of the most underserved populations in our city including LGBT teens, the recently incarcerated, the blind, Cancer patients, War Veterans and more.

Photo Credit: Walter McBride / WM Photos