Process Group Presents 2nd Annual Required Reading Series 1/18-3/1

THE PROCESS GROUP presents their 2nd Annual Required Reading Series, 7 weeks, 7 new plays by both renown playwrights and dazzling new talent, at The Barrow Group Garret Theater Sunday nights at 7:30pm from Sunday January 18th- Sunday, March 1st. The Barrow Group Garret Theater is located at 312 West 36th street, 6th floor. Subway: A, C, E to Penn Station or 1,2,3, to 34th street. Admission for The Process Group's 2nd Annual Required Reading Series is free, though it is recommended that you arrive at the theater at least 15 minutes prior to the show to ensure a seat..

TPG's 2nd annual Required Reading Series features 7 weeks, 7 new plays by up-and-coming and established American playwrights. The Required Reading Series showcases profound, hilarious, vulgar, and poetic plays that will both trouble and move you, shake you and inspire you, rile you and drive you to drink.

The Series begins with a bang on January 18th with "Seaguts" by Michael Aronov, an adaptation of Chekhov's classic is unlike any that's been done. Dark dirty and hilarious, "Seaguts" explores the complexities, of love, death, sex, art and family. Jan 25th hails "Faith In Humanity" by Jennifer Makholm, an eviscerating opus on humanity and need. Set in a New York strip cub, FIH reels you into the night, eases you into the arms of a vanilla-scented blonde, and dumps you- wasted, alone, and broke in the back alleys of New York city, wondering what love is.

February 1st presents "Population 8" by Nicholas Gray, a startling fresh and unusual slice-of-life piece detailing the deceptively simple existence of the remaining eight citizens on the dying plains of the fictional Loki, North Dakota.

On February 8th, TPG is thrilled to have New York Foundation for the Arts Fellowship recipient Liz Duffy Adams' "Or," a post-modern Restoration comedy about Aphra Behn. While war rages and Aphra and her friends celebrate free love, cross-dressing, and pastoral lyricism, the 1660s start to look a lot like the 1960s.

On February 15th, The Process Group is also honored to present Tony nominated playwright David Bar Katz's "What A Way To Go," a tragi-comedy about a man whose obsession with his death is destroying his life, not because of neurosis, but because the moment of his death literally keeps appearing before him!

February 22nd marks a first for TPG with our first play with music, Harpoon guitarist Jahn Sood's Folk Opera, "The Disappearing Man and Other Sad Songs," set in the old days of circus. A study in the act of fanfare, Sood draws from inspiration as diverse as Bertold Brecht, Tom Waits, Leonoid Andreyev, and Bob Dylan. Last but certainly not least, on March 1st, is LAByrinth Theater Playwright Michael Puzzo's one-man show, "Guaranteed Second Base." In the summer of ‘84, Prince was Puzzo's wing-man. He took three different girls to see the movie Purple Rain. And whether it was Sharon, Leslie or Carol, that movie was, without fail, guaranteed second base.

The breathtaking cast are luminaries of Broadway, Off-Broadway, Off-Off-Broadway, Film, and TV. They include: Michael Aronov (Joe Chaikin's "The Late Henry Moss," (The Signature Theatre), "Spain" (Lucille Lortel Theatre, MCC), and the World Premiere of Terence McNally's "Unusual Acts of Devotion"), Katherine Boyton ("Cat's Cradle," (Off-B'way)), David Deblinger, ( "Dutch Heart of Man" (Off-B'way), "Philip Roth in Khartoum" (Off B'way)), Julie Fitzpatrick, ("RiddleLikeLove (with a side of ketchup)," (Off-B'way)), Kathryn Kates ("Seinfeild," "Sa Ka La" (Off-B'way), "The Sexual Nuerosis of Our Parents" (Off-B'way with Grace Gummer), Cindy Katz ("Amadeus," B"way, Sir Peter Hall's "Measure for Measure," The New Group's "Ten Thousand Years"), Donnie Keshwarz ("Tarzan," (B'way), "24," "The Sopranos"), Rock Koli ("Love's Labour's Lost," (Swan Theatre: Stratford-upon-Avon)), Sayra Player, ("Paper Covers Rock" (SXSW 2008), Michael Puzzo ("Doubt," (Film with Meryl Streep and Phillip Seymor Hoffman, "Philip Roth in Khartoum" (Off B'way) and "In Arabia We'd All Be Kings" (Off B'way) Ed Setrakian ("Zodiac," "The Sopranos," "Salome," (B'way)), Barbara Speigel ("Beggar on Horseback," Bway), Sarah Steele ("Spainglish" (with Adam Sandler), "Speech and Debate" (Off B'way), and "The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie" (Off-B'way with Cynthia Nixon), Michael Stuhlbarg ("Hamlet," (Delacorte Theater, Central Park as Hamlet), "The Voysey Inheritance," (B'way), "The Pillowman" (B'way)), Victor Williams ("The King of Queens," "ER, "The Preacher's Wife") Jerry Zellers (A.R. Gurney's "Mrs. Farnsworth," World Premier). . . and many more.

About THE PROCESS GROUP: Founded in 2007, The Process Group is a woman-owned, woman-run not-for-profit theater company that grants artists-playwrights, actors, and directors-the opportunity to fully explore and cultivate the art of theater-making. Through staged readings, play workshops, and professional theatrical productions, TPG not only cultivates work, but we also cultivate the artists create and participate in each project. By nurturing artists and their work in a process-based environment, from a first draft to a professional production, we make a living theater that creates resonance between art and the present world. (For more information go to: www.theprocessgroup.org)

REQUIRED READING SERIES
By: David Bar Katz, Michael Puzzo, Liz Duffy Adams, Michael Aronov, Jen Makholm, Jahn Sood, and Nicholas Gray
Directed by: Bryan Close, Patrick McNulty, David Bar Katz, Marc Stuart Weitz, Brendan Shea and Michael Aronov
Starring: Too many to mention. . .

THE PROCESS GROUP presents THE 2ND ANNUAL REQUIRED READING SERIES at the Barrow Group Garret Theater on Jan. 18th-March 1st Sunday nights at 7:30pm. The Barrow Group Theater is located at 312 West 36th street, 6th floor. Admission is FREE. Subway: A,C,E to Penn Station or 1,2,3, to 34th st.