TopDog Productions in a co-production with the Elephant Theatre Company are thrilled to announce the Los Angeles Intimate Theatre Premiere of the 2002 Pulitzer Prize-winning play, TOPDOG/UNDERDOG, written by Suzan-Lori Parks and directed by Marty Papazian. TOPDOG/UNDERDOG will begin previews Wednesday, August 4, 2010 and will open on Friday, August 6 and run through Sunday, September 12 at the Lillian Theatre, 6322 Santa Monica Blvd. in Hollywood.
TOPDOG/UNDERDOG, a darkly comic fable of brotherly love and family identity, tells the story of two brothers, Lincoln and Booth, names given to them as a joke by their father. Haunted by the past and their obsession with the street con game, three-card monte, the brothers come to learn the true nature of their history as they cope with women, work, poverty, gambling, racism, and their troubled upbringings.
After a successful run off-Broadway in 2001 starring acclaimed actors
Don Cheadle and
Jeffrey Wright, Topdog/Underdog had an extended run on Broadway at the Ambassador Theatre and, in 2002, Parks won the Pulitzer Prize for Drama. It also garnered Tony Award wins and nominations.
ABOUT THE CREATIVE TEAM
Suzan-Lori Parks (Playwright) Named one of TIME magazine's "100 Innovators for the Next New Wave,"
Suzan-Lori Parks is one of the most exciting and acclaimed playwrights in American drama today. She is the first African American woman to receive the Pulitzer Prize in Drama for the Broadway hit Topdog/Underdog and is a MacArthur "Genius" Award recipient. She has also been awarded grants by the National Endowment for the Arts, the Rockefeller Foundation, the Ford Foundation, the New York State Council on the Arts and the New York Foundation for the Arts. She is recipient of a Lila-Wallace Reader's Digest Award, a CalArts/Alpert Award in the Arts (Drama) for 1996, a Guggenheim Foundation Grant and and is an alumnae of
New Dramatists. Her work is the subject of the PBS Film "The Topdog Diaries."
Suzan-Lori Parks' talks are part performance, part storytelling - always high energy, with an inspired sense of humor.
In 2007 her project 365 Plays/365 Days was produced in over 700 theaters worldwide, creating one of the largest grassroots collaborations in theater history. Her numerous plays include Topdog/Underdog, In the Blood (2000 Pulitzer Prize finalist), Venus (1996 OBIE Award), The Death of the Last Black Man in the Whole Entire World, f-ing A, Imperceptible Mutabilities in the Third Kingdom (1990 OBIE Award for Best New American Play), and The America Play. Her first feature-length screenplay was "Girl 6" written for
Spike Lee. She's also written screenplays for
Brad Pitt,
Denzel Washington, and adapted
Zora Neale Hurston's classic novel "Their Eyes Were Watching God" which starr
Ed Halle Barry and premiered on ABC's
Oprah Winfrey Presents. Parks is co-author of the screenplay for "The Great Debaters," starring
Denzel Washington (December 2007 release). Park's well-reviewed first novel "Getting Mother's Body" (Random House, 2003) is set in the west Texas of her youth and follows the scrappy Beede family as they embark on a riotous road trip in hopes of recovering a fortune of jewels - rumored to be buried with a long-dead relative. She is the author of
Ray Charles Live!, a musical based on the life of
Ray Charles that premiered at the
Pasadena Playhouse. In 2008, Parks was named the "Writer in Residence" at New York's
Public Theater, a position she will hold for three years, actively participating in the artistic community of
The Public Theater.
In November 2008
Suzan-Lori Parks became the first recipient of the master writer chair at
The Public Theater, a three-year residency in which she will also be a visiting arts professor in dramatic writing at New York University's Tisch School of the Arts.
The Public Theater will presented her new play, titled, "Father Comes Home from the Wars (Parts 1, 8 & 9)" in June 2009. Ms. Parks will also starred in this world premiere. Her play The Book of Grace premiered during the 2009-10 season at the Public.
Holding honorary doctorates from Brown University, among others, Suzan-Lori credits her writing teacher and mentor,
James Baldwin, for starting her on the path of playwrighting. One of the first to recognize Parks' writing skills, Mr. Baldwin declared Parks "an astonishing and beautiful creature who may become one of the most valuable artists of our time."
MARTY PAPAZIAN (Director) Previous LA theater credits include the sold-out run of the one woman show You Can Eat Me (Comedy Central Stage). Martin Papazian formed a unique relationship with Track 16, an art gallery in Bergamot Station, where he has directed several productions in conjunction with art exhibitions; the proceeds of which are donated to a related charity. Notably, "The Exonerated" during Malaquias Montoya's "PreMeditated: Meditations on Capital Punishment";
Eric Bogosian's "Pounding Nails Into the Floor with my Forehead" during Robbie Conal's career retrospective of protest posters, "No Spitting, No Kidding"; "Tall Tales" from "The Kentucky Cycle" during Ken Light's "Coal Hollow": a photographic journal on present-day conditions in Appalachia; "The Back Home Set" with "Michelle Rogers: Troubles at Home," paintings relating to U.S. post-September 11 and the loss of patriotism. Other directorial credits include Boyz & Girlz (Producers Club, NYC);
Tennessee Williams "Talk To Me Like The Rain And Let Me Listen" (LA). Martin also produced the West Coast Premiere of
Neil LaBute's "Autobahn" which ran in a sound stage at Sunset Gower Studios.
As a film director, Martin made his debut with the award winning short film "In The Wind" which centers on a soldier who returns to Katrina ravaged New Orleans only to discover that the place where he grew up has collapsed in his absence. The film was awarded BEST PICTURE and BEST ACTOR at the New Orleans "Big Easy" Film Festival and BEST PICTURE at the VAIL Film Festival. The film was also the Official Selection of numerous highly respected film festival: Newport Beach International, New York's UrbanWorld, Mammoth Film Fest,
Beverly Hills High Def., Los Angeles Vine Fest.,
Beverly Hills Film Fest. The feature film "Least Among Saints", written and to be directed by Martin will mark his next directorial venture. The film is currently in pre-production and slated to shoot September '10.
Martin earned a Bachelor of Fine Arts in Acting and Directing from the Arizona Reparatory Theater at the University of Arizona. He also spent a semester abroad in London training with The British Academy of Dramatic Arts.
TOPDOG/UNDERDOG features an award-winning design team. The set design is by Peter Wooley. The lighting design is by Heather Graff &
Richard Peterson. The sound design is by
Cricket S. Myers. The costume design is by Dianne Graebner. Scenic/Props design is by Abra Brayman. The executive producer is Robert Papazian. The production stage manager is Cate Cundiff.
ABOUT THE CAST
A.K. MURTADHA (Lincoln) Originally from Washington, D.C, Abdul-Khaliq "A.K." Murtadha has been performing and practicing theatre on stage and in front of and behind the camera for the past 20 years.
His most recent stage appearances include being Auburn University's featured Guest Artist in
Suzan-Lori Parks's The America Play at the Telfair Peet theatre, he was also at
Seattle Repertory Theatre in
Eduardo Machado's The Cook and as Demetritus in A Midsummer Night's Dream with the LA Shakespeare Festival. His most recent television appearances were in this year's season openers of "Medium" on NBC, "The Unit" (directed by
David Mamet) on CBS, and the season finale of Stephen Bochco's new legal drama" Raising The Bar." The New Orleans Big Easy Shorts Film Festival presented him with the Best Actor award in 2008 for his performance in the short film "In the Wind" (which also won the award for Best Film). A.K. is an active Actors Equity Association and Screen Actors Guild Member. He has a Masters of Fine Arts in Theatre from the University of California, San Diego and is a company member of the LA Shakespeare Festival and is a producing partner with the independent film company State and Cabrillo Productions, Inc.
M.D. WALTON (Booth) was raised in Schenectady NY. M.D. was last seen on FOX's TV Series LIE TO ME opposite
Tim Roth. Television credits roles on: Law and Order, Law and Order: Criminal Intent, FX's Rescue Me, NBC Digi's "The Gemini Division" opposite
Rosario Dawson, The Unit, All My Children, and Guiding Light. Film credits include:
Columbia Pictures' Reign Over Me opposite
Adam Sandler, Fall to Grace, House With Pool, and a lead in the recent horror released The Black Waters of Echo's Pond. M.D has worked extensively in theater with some of Broadway's greats. He played the leading role in the West Coast Broadway Tour (Old Globe, Seattle Rep, Golden Gate Theaters)
Richard Greenberg's Take Me Out directed by Tony Winner
Joe Mantello. Off Broadway:
Public Theater/NYSF Workshops: The Basic Training of Pavlo Hummel dir by
Philip Seymour Hoffman, The Invisible Man dir by
Joe Morton. Regional:
Williamstown Theater Festival,
Syracuse Stage, Studio Theater DC, The Pennsylvania Shakespeare Festival, The New
Century Theater, Austin Shakespeare Festival where he garnered the B
Iden Payne Award for Actor in a Leading Role for Aaron in Titus Andronicus. He received his BA in Theater from UMASS Amherst, M.F.A. in Acting from The Univ of Texas-Austin. He's also trained with
The Public Theater/NYSF Shakespeare Lab Program.
ABOUT THE SCHEDULE AND PRICING
TOPDOG/UNDERDOG will preview on Wednesday, August 4 at 8pm, Thursday, August 5 at 8pm and will open on Friday, August 6 at 8pm and run through Sunday, September 12, 2010 at the Lillian Theatre, 6322 Santa Monica Blvd in Hollywood.
Performances are Fridays and Saturdays at 8:00 pm; Sundays at 2:00 & 7:00 pm. Ticket prices are $25 for all performances (Ticket price is $15 for previews). For ticket reservations, please visit www.plays411.com/topdog or call (323)-960-7719. For more information, visit
www.topdogunderdog.com.
