Jonathan Solari's multi-media performance, "The Love Letter You've Been Meaning to Write New York," in which a 51-member ensemble performs in the street while an audience looks on from inside a theatre, receives its world premiere in a four-week engagement produced by Peace Belt Productions. Conceived and directed by Jonathan Solari, "The Love Letter" plays from Wednesday September 21 through Sunday October 16, at 3LD Art & Technology Center, 80 Greenwich Street. The show, which was developed at Ohio Interrupted's Ice Factory 2011 at 3LD in February, opens Off-Off Broadway on Saturday September 24 at 8pm.
Tickets are $15 and available via OvationTix by phone at 212/352-3101, or online at www.theloveletteryouvebeenmeaningtowritenewyork.com
Combining video, movement, puppetry, live music and scripted performance, "Love Letter" uses 3LD's floor-to-ceiling windows to not only frame the proceedings, but also to invert the play-going perspective so that the interior world of the play mostly unfolds outside in the real world. From this inside-out vantage point, audience members, assisted by sensitive audio and video equipment, see and hear what is happening in the street and in other mental precincts of the characters.
"The Love Letter" introduces us to a disillusioned young man, played by Arnaud Spanos, on the day he has decided to leave New York for good. Like so many who come here to pursue their dreams, this idealistic dreamer has had a rough time of it. He thinks he has hit rock bottom, but as he sinks deeper into his day of reckoning, an eclectic array of colorful and wonderful New Yorkers show him he has much, much further to go, and what may seem like a downward spiral is nothing of the kind in the rabbit hole that is New York.
Solari, who is a theatre and opera director, recently directed the premiere of
Ricky Ian Gordon's "Green Sneakers." In the past year he has directed at
Lorin Maazel's Castelton Festival, and several original works for the Belarus Free Theatre and the Prague Playhouse. An assistant director to
Daniel Sullivan, and
Bartlett Sher on Broadway, and to
Jo Bonney and
Fabrizio Melano Off-Broadway, he was also, for five years, the founding artistic director of The Centrifuge, where he oversaw dozens of multi-disciplinary projects.
Solari's collaborators include composer Brian Cherchigilia, who leads a band that plays songs in a variety of styles (jazz, punk, gypsy punk, salsa, Afro-beat, hip-hop, and alternative rock) representing corresponding New York neighborhoods; puppeteers who animate the show's 10 punk puppets; and Sarah Wolff, who produces the filmed elements -- a medley of scripted scenes, man-on-the-street interviews, and video postcards of New York.
The actor-pedestrian interplay Solari has developed requires that the company's 40-member corps de ballet, several of whom are first-time performers, easily walk a fine line between reality and movement design, or choreography and improvisation. The scripted elements of "The Love Letter You've Been Meaning to Write New York" grew out of the rehearsal process where speech and dialogue were improvised at first and then codified.
The production includes an underground concert series after each performance, featuring only New York bands. All shows are free and open to the public. See the show's website for artist details and set times.
"The Love Letter You've Been Meaning to Write New York" performs 28 times in a limited four-week run from Wednesday September 21 to Sunday October 16, at 3LD Art & Technology Center, 80 Greenwich Street. The performance schedule is as follows: Wednesday & Thursday at 8pm, Friday & Saturday at 7pm & 9pm, and Sunday at 5pm. For tickets, which are $15, call OvationTix at 212/352-3101, or online at
www.theloveletteryouvebeenmeaningtowritenewyork.com
