Sarah Ruhl Moderates Talkback After Martha Jane Kaufman's LOVE POEMS FOR DEAD BODIES, 10/17

On Wednesday, October 17, {YOUR NAME HERE} presents a one-night only staged reading of "Love Poems for Dead Bodies" by Martha Jane Kaufman as part of their RADICAL ACTS series. The show will be held at TADA! Theater, 15 West 28th Street at 7 pm with a talkback immediately following moderated by Pulitzer finalist Sarah Ruhl (The Clean House, In the Next Room).

RADICAL ACTS: a new developmental play reading series designed by {YOUR NAME HERE} to give new, raw, and exciting works space and resources to help guide it towards the next step in its artistic journey.

Ms. Kaufman describes her play as such: "Romantic entanglements are growing messy at a women's Chevra Kadisha, or Jewish burial society, but when an ominous note arrives in the mail, Sassy Feigenbaum, Brooklyn's only Jewish private eye is brought into the scene. She arrives, however, just in time to find a dead body in the broom the closet."

The production will be directed by Victoria Tucci and features the talents of Ayelet Firstenberg, Rose-Emma Lunderman, Janice Picconi, Stacey Raymond, Annie-Sage Whitehurst, and Jodi Lynne Savitz.

Tickets are a suggested donation of $5 and can be reserved through Brown Paper Tickets at http://www.brownpapertickets.com/event/272461.

Sarah Ruhl's plays include, In the Next Room, or the vibrator play (Broadway 2009, 2010 Pulitzer Prize Finalist), The Clean House (2005 Pulitzer Prize Finalist; The Susan Smith Blackburn Prize, 2004); Passion Play, a cycle (Pen American Award, The Fourth Freedom Forum Playwriting Award from The Kennedy Center); Dead Man's Cell Phone (Helen Hayes Award for Best New Play); Melancholy Play; Demeter in the City (9 NAACP Image Award nominations), Eurydice; Orlando; and Late: a cowboy song.

Her plays have been produced at Lincoln Center Theater, Goodman Theatre, Playwrights Horizons, Second Stage, Arena Stage, Woolly Mammoth Theatre Company, Yale Repertory Theatre, Berkeley Repertory Theatre, Cornerstone Theater, The Wilma Theater, Madison Repertory Theatre, and the Piven Theatre, among others. Her plays have also been produced internationally, and have been translated into Polish, Russian, Spanish, Norwegian, Korean, German and Arabic.

Originally from Chicago, Ms. Ruhl received her M.F.A. from Brown University where she studied with Paula Vogel. In 2003, she was the recipient of the Helen Merrill Emerging Playwrights Award and the Whiting Writers' Award. She is a member of 13P and New Dramatists and won the MacArthur Fellowship in 2006. She is a recent recipient of the PEN Center Award for a mid-career playwright.

Martha Jane Kaufman is a playwright, dancer, and teacher. She has received awards and commissions from the Huntington, the Program for Women in Theater, the Playwrights' Foundation, the National Foundation for Advancement in the Arts, and Young Playwrights Inc. Originally from Portland, OR, Martha attended Wesleyan University and is currently studying playwriting at Yale School of Drama. Her work has been translated into Russian and performed in Moscow. Kaufman was awarded the Jane Chambers Prize for Feminist Theater in 2010 for her play A Live Dress.

{YOUR NAME HERE} is a Queer Theater Company aimed at producing and creating groundbreaking and thought-provoking new works that positively depict the LGBTIQQA community and propel these stories to a larger audience. Our aim is to inspire, empower and celebrate. Our body of work will consist of full productions, a three-tiered reading series, talk backs, as well as a community/educational outreach component. Please continue to follow us on our website yournamehereqtc.org and on our social media pages (Facebook/Twitter/Tumblr) at yournamhereNYC.

Photo Credit: Walter McBride / Retna Ltd.

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