Downtown Urban Theatre Festival Runs Off-Bway June 14-24

For its 5th Anniversary season, the Downtown Urban Theater Festival (DUTF) will return to the legendary Cherry Lane Theatre in Greenwich Village, June 14 to June 24, with two weeks of new theatrical works by a cross section of urban playwrights.

This season's diverse collection of works covers topics ranging from love to war, prostitution to gentrification and terrorism to AIDS. In tribute to Cherry Lane's long history of opening the door for urban playwrights, Amiri Baraka (formerly known as LeRoi Jones) also makes a much-anticipated return to the theater where his acclaimed and OBIE-winning first play Dutchman launched him into theatre stardom. Hosted by Miguel Algarin, founder of the Nuyorican Poets Café and its theater program, this rare conversation with Baraka will cover everything from his early experiences at the Cherry Lane Theatre where his work was presented alongside Edward Albee's plays in 1964 to the state of urban theatre today," state press notes.

"Now entering its fifth year, the annual DUTF has an unwavering commitment to promote diversity in theater by showcasing urban theatrical expression and supporting the playwriting process. Inaugurated in 2002 to help boost the spirit of downtown theaters after the post-9/11 slump, DUTF, using an inclusive, multicultural perspective, presents works that echo the true spirit of urban life and speak to a whole new generation whose lives defy categorizing along conventional lines. It has been a catalyst for some of New York City's most vibrant and creative playwrights including Desmond Hall, Reg E. Gaines, Mayda del Valle and Vanessa Hidary. Since its inception, DUTF has presented 41 original theatrical works that have attracted more than 5,000 festival-goers." This season, DUTF has announced that Time Warner Inc. will be its Presenting Sponsor.

DUTF will take residency at the landmark Cherry Lane Theatre in Greenwich Village for a second consecutive year. "The Cherry Lane shares DUTF's mission and has served as a vital lab for the development of new American works and the cultivation of a diverse, multigenerational audience. As New York's longest running off-Broadway theater, it has helped to define American drama, fostering quality theater that is daring and relevant, for over 80 years."

Descriptions of the one-acts follow.

Black at Michigan, by Dominique Morisseau, will be performed on June 15th. "Morisseau recreates the true events of a historical campus protest at the University of Michigan through Chara, a student struggling to remain in school without the much-needed assistance of financial aid."

Emma Terese's Freedom will be seen on June 22nd. "This daring new play is about a girl named Freedom who grew up on the streets of NYC and the people she met along the way."

Georgia, by Gian DeDonna, will be presented on June 17th. The play "details that on the eve of Ronald Reagan's funeral in June 2004, an African-American elder struggles with the fact that Ray Charles' passing is not receiving adequate attention.

On June 22nd, Karen & Thomas (I Touch Myself), by Mel Nieves, will be performed. "They smashed into each other's lives like a head-on collision on the interstate, both desperately seeking to close fresh wounds. Now in their final six hours together Karen and Tomas cut open, dissect and finally heal those very same wounds that turned them into lovers, but not they would soon discover a couple."

Descriptions of the full-length plays follow.

Herb Donaldson's The Brighter Burn will be seen on June 14th. "Calvin Lincoln, a young man from small town America, is shipped off to fight in the current war. In his wake, he leaves behind a baffling array of family and friends who fear for his safety – and their own – as the individual war of the American spirit approaches."

Helena D. Lewis' Call Me Crazy will be seen on June 15th. "After being assigned more work than she can handle, social worker Lewis has a nervous breakdown and recalls her true-life experiences working with prostitutes, drug addicts and prisoners."

El Building, by Jane Lippman, will be performed on June 23rd. "Bitchy, over-therapized, self-centered—pretty standard population for a gentrified apartment building—so busy bickering and whining, they don't even notice the pernicious enemy within."

Joel R. Johnson's Hearts and Minds will be presented on June 24th. The play "takes place in post 9/11 America. While traveling through an airport, Anton experiences love-at-first-sight, then arrest and interrogation from paranoid, pre-emptive airport security on the hunt for terrorists. Love, like luggage, is lost and found, and so is
Anton's sense of security."

Speak Your Mind, by Michael Ramirez, will be performed on June 17th. The play "is a witty and moving anthology of four stories, each giving voice to diverse urbanites speaking aloud on aspects of life from memories of family and home to the idea of marriage."

Francisco Roque's Touch will be seen on June 20th. "Set in a counselor's office, touch, a one-man show, provides a glimpse into the lives of six Latino young men in NYC. During a series of counseling sessions, these men reveal their vulnerabilities while struggling with issues of isolation, acceptance, identity and illness."

Trans Plantations, by Janis Astor del Valle, will be performed on June 21st. The show "is a one-woman play exploring issues of cultural and sexual identity from the point of view of a New York-born Puerto Rican uprooted from her Bronx barrio and transplanted to rural Connecticut at age seven."

Melissa Fendell's When Santo Domingo Isn't Enough will be seen on June 16th. It "exposes the complicated and often painful debate over immigration in the United States, as Chris, a first-generation Dominican-American and his American girlfriend Gabby, find themselves trapped in ambivalence."

Discount tickets for DUTF 2006 are $20 and on sale now at TheaterMania (www.theatermania.com or 212-352-3101.) Tickets purchased the evening of the performance are $25. The Amiri Baraka discussion is free and open to the public but reservations are required (RSVP to ttownsend@arcos-ny.co.). The Cherry Lane Theatre, 38 Commerce Street. The opening night performance starts at 8pm. All other performances start at 7:30pm. The Amiri Baraka discussion starts at 7pm on June 14. For info visit www.downtownurban.net or www.theatermania.com.