Independent Shakespeare Co.'s New Works Reading Series Continues with IAMBIC LAB

Independent Shakespeare Co. (ISC), presenters of the Griffith Park Free Shakespeare Festival and recipients of the 2015 Los Angeles Drama Critics Circle Margaret Harford Award for sustained excellence in theater, announce the debut of a new works reading series, iambic lab, presented Friday, February 12 and Saturday, February 13 at 7:30pm and Sunday, February 14 at 2pm at Independent Studio in the Atwater Crossing Arts + Innovation Complex, 3191 Casitas Ave., #168 in Atwater Village.

Ranging from original translations of classical plays to entirely new works on classical themes or using classical forms, iambic lab gives voice to three playwrights writing in divergent styles. The new works are THE HUNCHBACK OF SEVILLE by Charise Castro Smith, C.3.3.: THE REDEMPTION OF OSCAR WILDE adapted by Scott Carter, and a new translation and adaptation by André Martin of LOVE'S BLUFF by Georges Feydeau. All seating is free.

Comments Independent Shakespeare Co.'s Artistic Director, Melissa Chalsma, "Interacting with new voices in the theater is crucial for a healthy artistic ecosystem. We are especially interested in meeting and promoting writers who are using history and historical forms as their inspiration for beginning original theatrical conversations. It's invigorating to work on new plays! And of course, Shakespeare was once an 'emerging playwright' as well! Making room for new voices is what allows the present to become the glorious past."

The Hunchback of Seville

by Charise Castro Smith

Friday, February 12 at 7:30

Locked in a tower, the too-smart-for-the-1500's, Maxima Terriblé Segunda (renowned cartographer and adopted sister of Queen Isabella of Spain), is faced with a dilemma: how to save her lover, obey the dying Queen and countenance her spoiled niece, the Infanta Juana. The play is at turns bitingly satirical and absurdly funny. Told with a sharp, sassy verve, these three intelligent women clash over their differing convictions on colonialism, greed, religion and loyalty.

CHARISE CASTRO SMITH is a playwright, television writer and actor from Miami, currently residing in Los Angeles. Playwriting credits include: Feathers and Teeth (Goodman Theater/ Developed at Atlantic Theater Company), Estrella Cruz [The Junkyard Queen] (Ars Nova/ Yale Cabaret/ Halycon Theatre), The Hunchback of Seville (Washington Ensemble Theater/ Trinity Reperetory Theatre), Washeteria (Soho Rep) and Boomcracklefly (Miracle Theater). She is currently under commission by South Coast Rep and Trinity Reperetory Theatre, and is developing a new drama series at ABC. Select acting credits include Antony and Cleopatra (Royal Shakespeare Company/ Public Theater), An Enemy of the People (Baltimore Center Stage) and The Good Wife (CBS). Charise is the recipient of a Van Lier Fellowship at New Dramatists, and is an alumna of Ars Nova's Playgroup and New George's The Jam. MFA: Yale School of Drama, BA: Brown University.

C.3.3.: The Redemption of Oscar Wilde, from the writings in and of prison of Oscar Wilde

Adapted by Scott Carter

Saturday, February 13 at 7:30, followed by a talkback with Scott Carter

In January 1897, two years after Wilde entered prison following a conviction of gross indecency, he began a letter addressed to his love, Alfred Lord Douglas, whom he blamed for his ruin.

Wilde was allowed one page of paper at a time and, when that paper was filled up, it was confiscated by the prison guards. He was then given a new sheet. He could not again refer to the already written pages. The result was an 80-page, 50,000 word text -- returned to Wilde when he was released from Reading Gaol in May 1897. Wilde's literary executor, Robert Ross published a highly redacted version of the text in 1905 (following Wilde's death in 1900). The full edition was not published until 1962. It is called "De Profundis" -- literally, "from the depths." And that is centerpiece of this play: hearing a fallen giant reconstruct his soul, page by blood-inked page

SCOTT CARTER has been Executive Producer/Writer for "Real Time with Bill Maher" since it debuted on HBO in 2003. He produced the first 1,100 episodes of "Politically Incorrect With Bill Maher" from its 1993 Comedy Central debut to its 1997 move to ABC. While at "P.I.", Carter received eight Emmy nominations and three consecutive CableAce Awards for Best Talk Series. In 1997, Variety named him one of the "50 Creatives to Watch." In 2007, he was a co-recipient of the Producer's Guild of America's Johnny Carson Award for "Real Time." A former stand up comedian, Carter wrote "The Gospel According to Thomas Jefferson, Charles Dickens and Count Leo Tolstoy: Discord" that had two readings at Independent Shakespeare Co. before being produced at the Noho Arts Center followed by a production at The Geffen Playhouse. He has written and performed two full-length monologues, "Heavy Breathing" and "Suspension Bridge," at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival, The Aspen Comedy Arts Festival, The Kilkenny (Ireland) Murphy's Cats Laugh Festival, the Cleveland Performance Festival, Dixon Place, Primary Stages, Manhattan Punchline, etc. He is former Producing Director and a founding member of The Invisible Theatre, now in its 42nd season in Tucson, Arizona.

Love's Bluff a sex farce in 4 acts

by Georges Feydeau

Translated and adapted by André Martin

Sunday, February 14 at 2:00 pm

Keeping with the spirit of Vaudeville, this new adaptation of Georges Feydeau's French farce (by ISC company member André Martin) takes a modern and absurdist look at marriage, love, and...sex. An unfaithful wife, her short-tempered husband, her overzealous lover, his young naive wife, a drunken neighbor and, in typical Feydeau fashion, a young man with a speech impediment. Torn between erotic desires and social etiquette, it's a game of chance, high-stakes, and door-slamming exits and entrances. Is love all risk? Is love all luck? Either you're all in or you fold because as everyone knows you can't stop until the ace is in the hole. André Martin hopes to highlight the comedic strengths of ISC's acting company giving audiences a raucous night of theatre.

ANDRÉ MARTIN created and played the lead role in his adaptation of Edmond Rostand's Cyrano, produced at Independent Studio in 2013 which played to sold-out audiences. André was last seen on stage with ISC in 2015 as Mercutio in Romeo & Juliet and Dogberry in Much Ado About Nothing at the Griffith Park Free Shakespeare Festival 2015. Other ISC roles include the title role in Pericles, Macduff in Macbeth and Tony Lumpkin in She Stoops To Conquer, Don Armado in Love's Labour's Lost, Lysander in A Midsummer Night's Dream, the Clown in The Winter's Tale, Antipholus of Ephesus in The Comedy Or Errors, Laertes in Hamlet, Cassio in Othello, and Borachio in Much Ado About Nothing. Regional theatre credits: Christian in Cyrano De Bergerac (Milwaukee Repertory Theatre); Rosencrantz in Hamlet, Howard in Death Of A Salesman(Delaware's R.E.P.); The Last Night Of Ballyhoo (UW -Madison); and The School For Husbands, Coriolanus, and Pericles (Texas Shakespeare Festival). He received his MFA from the P.T.T.P at the University of Delaware.

SCHEDULE AND PRICING

iambic lab will be presented on Friday, February 12, Saturday, February 13 and Sunday, February 14 at Independent Studio, 3191 Casitas Ave., #168, (between Fletcher Drive and Glendale Blvd.) at the Atwater Crossing Arts + Innovation Complex, Los Angeles, CA 90039. Free, ample lot and street parking.