Public's UNDER THE RADAR Series Begins 1/7

By: Eddie Varley Dec. 17, 2008

The Public Theater will begin performances for UNDER THE RADAR 2009 on Wednesday, January 7, 2009. This 12-day festival, committed to tracking new theater from across the U.S. and around the world, will run through Sunday, January 18. Tickets are $15 to UNDER THE RADAR shows at The Public and are currently on-sale.

Now in its fifth year, UNDER THE RADAR is an explosively diverse kaleidoscope of new theater-examples from around the world and the U.S. that spotlight artists ranging from emerging talents to masters in the field. Located at The Public Theater as well as partner venues, UNDER THE RADAR offers a crash course in theater that is exciting, independent, and experimental, created by some of the most dynamic artists working today.

"In five short years, Mark Russell has made Under the Radar indispensible," said Public Theater Artistic Director Oskar Eustis. "The Public has always been a crossroads, a place where uptown meets downtown, where experimental art cohabitates with new plays, where the great classics of the past meet with theater of the future. UTR is the straw that stirs that drink."

"Under the Radar is about the future--the future of theater, the future of society as our artists imagine it. It is about artists, often overlooked, rising to a wider awareness and moving forward above the radar," said Producer Mark Russell. "I look forward to the dialogue that will take place all around Under the Radar - in our lobby, in our lounge, in the many public panels we will host."

Complete Line-Up for UNDER THE RADAR (January 7-18, 2009):

3 Years, 8 Months, 20 Days

January 7-11 (Running time: 60 minutes)
Amrita Performing Arts (Cambodia)

Directed by Annemarie Prins (The Netherlands)

Three Cambodian actresses turn their childhood memories of the brutal Pol Pot regime into an intimately spoken, epic tale that incorporates Cambodian songs, poetry and live video. Performed in Khmer with English Supertitles.

Architecting

January 9-18 (Running Time: 150 minutes, with intermission)

The TEAM and The National Theatre of Scotland

Created by the TEAM

Fri. Jan 9th 8pm | Sat. Jan 10th 1pm | Sun. Jan. 11th 7pm | Wed. Jan 14th 7pm |

Thurs. Jan 15th 7pm | Sat. Jan 17th 7pm | Sun. Jan. 18th 2pm

A musical, time-bending multimedia requiem for modern America that weaves through the country's past, present and future. Athletic physicality crashes against text and hoop skirts in this saga about the reconstruction of nations and selves.

COUNTY OF KINGS: the beautiful struggle

January 7-18 (Running Time: 90 minutes)

The Public Theater in association with American Place Theater

Written and Performed by Lemon Anderson

Developed and Directed by Elise Thoron

Sun. Jan 18th 7 pm

Brooklyn based hip-hop artist Lemon spins his version of the coming-of-age memoir with this jarring and poignant performance. From hard-edged drama to urban poetry, COUNTY OF KINGS is a true story of finding passion and purpose in life, against all odds.

First Love

January 9-18 (Running Time: 75 minutes)

By Samuel Beckett

Gare St. Lazare Players Ireland

Performed by Conor Lovett

Directed by Judy Hegarty Lovett

One of Samuel Beckett's early novellas, First Love contains much of his distinctive black humour and a plot that is regarded as a masterpiece of Beckettian perversity. A young man, expelled from the family home, takes refuge on a bench by a canal. There he meets a woman who takes him home, with comically disastrous consequences.

Into The Dark Unknown: The Hope Chest

January 8-18 (Running Time: 80 minutes)

Created by Holcombe Waller

Performed by Holcombe Waller and the Healers

Folk singer Holcombe Waller presents a music theater experience about moving, storage and, of course, crushes on sexy people. He holds a potent mirror to his generation, tracing an elusive but vitally tenable sense of hope and renewal.

LIGA, 50% reward & 50% punishment

January 7-18 (Running Time: 60 minutes)

Kassys (The Netherlands)

LIGA starts with the end on video. A live "flashback" follows as the actors learn to pretend. Young and easily influenced, their human need to conform makes them susceptible to manipulation.

Sight is the sense that dying people tend to lose first

January 8-11 (Running Time: 60 minutes)

Written and directed by Tim Etchells (UK)

Performed by Jim Fletcher

Thurs. Jan 8th 3pm | Sat. Jan 10th 7pm | Sun. Jan. 11th 1:30pm

Sight is the sense... is a long, free-associating monologue that tumbles from topic to topic to create a vast failing explanation of the world. Comical in its apparent naiveté and preposterously encyclopedic in scope, it exposes the absurdity and horror of consciousness as it tries and fails to define everything that it encounters.

the break/s: a mixtape for stage

January 8-17 (Running time: 75 minutes)

Marc Bamuthi Joseph for The Living Word Project

Directed by Michael John Garcés

Produced by MAPP International Productions

A multimedia choreographed excursion across planet hip-hop, the break/s dramatically recreates the living history of the hip-hop generation through the personal narrative of poet Marc Bamuthi Joseph.

Transition

January 7-17 (Running Time: 60 minutes)

Performed by Reggie Watts

Created by Reggie Watts and Tommy Smith

Directed by Tommy Smith

Reality is boring. Drugs are harmful. How does one escape? Reggie Watts knows. Take a trip with Transition, a cutting-edge comedic explosion of stereophonic effects and multimedia interactions.

Woyzeck

January 9-15 (Running Time: 70 minutes)

Sadari Movement Laboratory in association with AsiaNow (Korea)

In this gripping, stripped-down version from Korea, wooden chairs are used as a changeable metaphor, while Astor Piazzolla's tango music pulses throughout, revealing the characters' emotional states with shattering clarity and force. Performed in Korean with English supertitles.

UNDER THE RADAR 2009 PARTNER VENUES:

ArKtype presents

World/Inferno Friendship Society's

Addicted to Bad Ideas: Peter Lorre's 20th Century

One Night Only!

Co-Conceived and Directed by Jay Scheib

Presented in association with Bowery Presents

Webster Hall, 125 East 11th Street (Between 3rd and 4th Avenues)

$20 Tickets: ticketmaster.com or walk-up at Mercury Lounge (217 E. Houston St.) or Music Hall of Williamsburg (66 N. 6th St.) Box Offices. $16 (code: LORRE) up to day of show

Fri. Jan 9th 9:30pm

An unprecedented fusion of one of today's best live punk acts with real time performance media, Addicted To Bad Ideas is a furious song cycle dedicated to 20th century movie star, archetype of alienation, Peter Lorre.

Call Cutta In A Box

January 7-18 (Running Time: 50 minutes)

An intercontinental phone play by Rimini Protokoll (Haug/Kaegi/Wetzel)

Presented by Goethe-Institut New York

Goethe Institut New York, 1014 Fifth Ave (Between 82nd and 83rd St.)

$15 Tickets: 212-439-8700

Presented daily from Wed 1/7 through Sun 1/18 between 11 a.m. and 4 p.m.

You enter an unknown office and the phone rings. The person on the phone is a call center agent in Calcutta, India. Offering you an exclusive performance - a story unfolds in which Sagnik and his colleagues, but above all you and your city are the actors, the audience, the setting, and the performance.

England

Jan 8-Jan 18 (Running Time: 50 minutes)

By Tim Crouch (UK)

Chelsea Art Museum 556 West 22nd Street

$15 Tickets: 212.255.0719

Two guides in a gallery. Two lovers with a lifestyle to maintain. Two hearts beating four thousand miles apart. A moving evocation of the relative values we place on precious things.

Pataphysics Penyeach: Summa Dramatica/Porco Morto

Jan 8 - Jan 18 (Running Times: 40 minutes, Summa; 45 minutes, Porco)

Mabou Mines

Written and Directed by Lee Breuer

Mabou Mines Studio 150 First Avenue (Corner of 9th Street)

$25 for both, or $15 each: theatermania.com, 212-352-3101 or 866-811-4111

Summa:

Porco:

Lee Breuer's new "Pataphysical" one acts: Summa Dramatica -a spiritual acting lesson starring Ruth Maleczech and Porco Morto -a memorial for an avant-garde "pig" -starring Greg Mehrten.

Removable Parts

January 7-11 (Running Time: 60 minutes)

Created by Corey Dargel

Performed by Corey Dargel and Kathleen Supove

Directed by Emma Griffin

With dances by Yvan Greenberg and production design by Raquel Davis

HERE Arts Center (145 6th Ave., between Spring and Broome)

$20 Tickets: here.org or 212-352-3101

Wed. Jan 7th 7pm | Thurs. Jan 8th 7pm | Fri. Jan. 9th 7pm | Sat. Jan 10th 7pm and 10pm| Sun. Jan 11th 1pm and 5pm

A theatrical series of love songs about voluntary amputation in which the unrequited lover - whose heart is broken - begins to question the usefulness of his other body parts.

Siren

January 8-11 (Running time: 40 minutes)

By Ray Lee

Performed by Ray Lee and Harry Dawes

HERE Arts Center (145 6th Ave., between Spring and Broome)

$20 Tickets: here.org or 212-352-3101

Thurs. Jan 8th 6pm & 8:30pm| Fri. Jan 9th 4pm, 6pm & 8:30pm | Sat. Jan. 10th, 4pm, 6pm & 8:30pm | Sun. Jan 11th 2pm, 4pm & 6pm

Siren is a whirling, spinning spectacle of mechanical movement, electronic sound and light by award winning artist, composer and performer Ray Lee.

The Crumb Trail

January 7-17(Running time: 1 hour and 40 minutes)

Written by Gina Moxley & directed by Gavin Quinn

Presented by Pan Pan Theatre (Ireland)

Performance Space 122 (150 First Avenue at 9th Street)

$15 (Code:UTR) Tickets: ps122.org or 212-352-3101

Where did being good ever get anyone? A sharp, surprisingly blunt new show exploring the death of the Fairy Tale from this endlessly inventive Irish company.

The Public Theater (Artistic Director Oskar Eustis; Executive Director Andrew D. Hamingson) was founded by Joseph Papp in 1954 as the Shakespeare Workshop and is now one of the nation's preeminent cultural institutions, producing new plays, musicals, productions of Shakespeare, and other classics at its headquarters on Lafayette Street and at the Delacorte Theater in Central Park. The Public's mandate to create a theater for all New Yorkers continues to this day on stage and through its extensive outreach and education programs. Each year, over 250,000 people attend Public Theater-related productions and events at six downtown stages, including Joe's Pub, and Shakespeare in the Park. The Public has won 40 Tony Awards, 141 Obies, 39 Drama Desk Awards, 23 Lucille Lortel Awards and 4 Pulitzer Prizes.

Mark RusselL (Producer) is an independent producer/curator working in New York City. He is also the guest Artistic Director for the Portland (Oregon) Institute of Contemporary Art - Time Based Arts Festival for 2006, 2007. From 1983-2004, Russell was the Executive Artistic Director of Performance Space 122 (P.S. 122).

THE ASSOCIATION OF PERFORMING ARTS PRESENTERS (Executive Producer), based in Washington DC, is the national service organization for the field of arts presenting, with nearly 2,000 organizational members and more than 5,000 registered individuals. Members range from the nation's leading performing arts centers, to civic and university performance facilities, to the full spectrum of artist agencies, managers, national consulting practices that service the field, and a growing roster of self-presenting artists. A non-profit 501(c)3 organization governed by a volunteer board of directors, Arts Presenters is led by its CEO Sandra Gibson, now in her eighth year. In addition to presenting the annual APAP Conference NYC - the world's leading forum and marketplace for the performing arts (January 9-13, 2009) -- Arts Presenters also provides a broad array of professional development programs.

$15 single tickets for UNDER THE RADAR shows at The Public Theater are on-sale now at The Public Theater box office, 425 Lafayette Street; on-line at www.publictheater.org or by phone at 212-967-7555. Seating for all UTR shows at The Public is general admission. Seats are available on a first-come, first-served basis.

Box office hours are Tuesday through Saturday from 1:00 pm to 7:30 pm, and Sunday and Monday from 1:00 pm to 6:00 pm.

For more information, visit www.publictheater.org

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