Martin Denton To Hold Talkback Following Aliens With Extraordinary Skills

Ego Actus is set to present a special talkback with Martin Denton of nytheatre.com, following the 3:00 pm performance of Aliens With Extraordinary Skills, the critically acclaimed play by Saviana Stanescu, on November 6, 2011. The talkback will include the cast of the production, director Joan Kane, and playwright Saviana Stanescu. Aliens With Extraordinary Skills opens on November 2, 2011 and will run through November 20, 2011 (Wed.-Sat. @ 8pm, Sun @ 3pm, Sat. 12th and 19th at 5pm). All performances held at Theatre 54, 244 West 54th Street in New York City. Tickets for all performances are available at www.smarttix.com, by phone (212)868-4444. Tickets are $20.00. For more information, please go to http://www.EgoActus.com

Martin Denton is the founder, editor, and chief reviewer of nytheatre.com. He is the Executive Director of nytheatre.com's nonprofit parent organization, The New York Theatre Experience, Inc. (NYTE); the editor of NYTE's annual Plays and Playwrights anthologies, along with the collections Playing with Canons and Unpredictable Plays; the founding producer of nytheatrecast, NYC's first original, regularly scheduled theatre podcast; and the founding editor of Indie Theater Now, an innovative online publishing resource that's been called "iTunes for plays." Martin received an OTTY (Our Town Thanks You) Award for contributions to the community in 2008; and with NYTE's Managing Director Rochelle Denton, he was honored with the 2008 Stewardship Award from the New York Innovative Theatre Foundation. http://www.nytheatre.com

Joan Kane (Director) recently directd Play Nice! off Broadway at 59E59 Theaters and The God Particle which was presented in the Lower East Side Festival and the Planet Connections Theatre Festivity. She has directd plays and readings at Theater for the New City, Ensemble Studio Theatre, Abingdon Theatre, Theatre of the Open Eye, Henry Street Settlement, Samuel French Short Play Festival, Strawberry Festival and for the Scandinavian American Theater Company. She has an MFA in Directing from The New School, an MS in Museum Education from Bank Street and is a member of the Dramatists Guild and the Society of Stage Directors and Choreographers.

Saviana Stanescu is a Romanian-born multi-award-winning playwright. Her work has been widely presented internationally and in the US. Recent New York productions include Aliens With Extraordinary Skills off-Broadway at Women's Project (published by Samuel French), Waxing West (2007 New York Innovative Theatre Award for Outstanding Full-length Script) and YokastaS Redux at La MaMa Theatre, Suspendida and Vicious Dogs on Premises (with Witness Relocation) at the Ontological Theatre, Polanski Polansk and Aurolac Blues at HERE Arts Center, The E-Dating Project at Strasberg Institute for Theatre&Film, and the site-specific "I want what you have" at the World Financial Center. Aliens With Extraordinary Skills (Inmigrantes con Habilidades Extraordinarias) and Final Countdown (Cuenta Regresiva) ran for 8 months in Mexico City at Teatro La Capilla and Teatro El Milagro. Bucharest Underground won the 2007 Marulic Prize for Best European Radio-Drama. In Stockholm, Sweden, Saviana's play White Embers produced by Dramalabbet made it in the TOP 3 of Best Plays in 2008, and in NYC is published by Samuel French as one of their 2010 OOB festival winners.
Saviana is a member of EST (Ensemble Studio Theatre) and a Usual Suspect with New York Theatre Workshop. She was a 2005-2007 TCG fellow with the Lark Play Development Center, where her plays Waxing West and Lenin's Shoe had barebones productions. She also was a 2007-2008 NYSCA playwright-in-residence with Women's Project and writer-in-residence for Richard Schechner's East Coast Artists. Ms Stanescu is the Director of Eastern European Exchange for The Lark Play Development Center, the curator of playgroundzero for undergroundzero festival, and the founder/president of Immigrant Artists and Scholars in New York. Her website: www.saviana.com

Ego Actus: Founded by Joan Kane and Bruce Kraemer, Ego Actus (Latin for "My Way") is dedicated to doing art for art's sake. We produce, direct and design plays that are presented as a complete audience experience using all the elements of theatre: developed scripts, accomplished acting, designs for set, costumes, lighting, sound and props by people who have made those disciplines a focus of their lives. They each bring their own way of doing things to our shows and we unify them into a collective "My Way." We are affiliated with A.R.T. NY and Fractured Atlas.

WHERE:Theatre 54
244 West 54th Street
between Broadway & 8th Avenue
12th Floor
New York, NY 10019

Subway: 1, 9, C, E to 50th Street
N, R to 57th Street