Charlestown Working Theatre Announces Spring 2011 Season

The Charlestown Working Theater announces its Spring 2011 Season, including performances by companies from Armenia, Poland and new Russian drama. CWT has a strong history of presenting compelling contemporary performance work by leading companies and artists including Mabou Mines (New York), Double Edge Theatre (Ashfield, MA), Beau Jest Moving Theatre (Boston), Teatre Kranevit (Berlin), Grupa Jicara (Buenos Aires) and Garzienice Theatre Association (Poland). This spring the CWT will present Armenia's NCA Small Theatre, Teatr ZAR, and The Natasha Plays by Russian playwright Yaroslava Pulinovich- information below. All performances to take place at the Charlestown Working Theater, 442 Bunker Hill Street in Charlestown, MA.

U.S. PREMIER!
SEVENTH SENSE
National Centre for Aesthetics SMALL THEATRE (Yerevan, Armenia) in collaboration with Versiliadanza Cultural Association (Florence, Italy)
April 27th - May 1st, 2011
Preview performance Wednesday at 8pm, Thursday- Saturday at 8pm, Sunday at 7pm

NCA Small Theatre presents their acclaimed dance-theatre performance SEVENTH SENSE as part of an on-going exchange with CWT. SEVENTH SENSE is a performance inspired by "The Book of Lamentations" by the 10th Century Armenian poet, musician, and philosopher G. Nareghatsi. Artistic Director Vahan Badalyan describes the performance as a contemplation of the human body and soul - a practical meditation. NCA Small Theatre has been described as one of the most important emerging companies in Armenia today.

CWT presented its acclaimed adaptation of The Odyssey at NCA Small Theatre at the HIGHFEST International performance Festival in October, 2010. The CWT/NCA artistic exchange is supported by The Trust for Mutual Understanding.

CAESAREAN SECTION
Teatr ZAR (Wroclaw, Poland)
Presented in partnership with
Double Edge Theatre
May 29th - June 1st, 2011
Sunday-Wednesday at 8pm

Teatr ZAR is a multinational group formed in Wroc?aw, Poland, by apprentices of the Grotowski Institute (Wroc?aw) during its annual research expeditions to Georgia in the years 1999-2003. During these expeditions, ZAR researched and collected musical material, the core of which is a group of centuries-old polyphonic songs that have their roots in the beginning of the human era and are probably the oldest forms of polyphony. 'Zar' is the name of the funeral songs performed by the Svaneti tribe who inhabit the high regions of the Caucasus, in North-West Georgia.

The performance CAESAREAN SECTION develops the group's work with polyphony and its aim to create theatre out of the spirit of music. The musical structure of this performance was developed from a base of polyphonic Corsican songs, through which Bulgarian, Icelandic, and Chechen songs have been woven. The title of the performance is essentially a metaphor for the compulsion towards and the condition of suicide, and the involuntary force that pulls one back from the brink.

Read more about Teatr ZAR in American Theatre Magazine

THE NATASHA PLAYS
by Yaroslava Pulinovich
Directed by Stephen Nunns
Translated by John Freedman
Presented in association with Towson University
June 8th - 11th, 2011
Wednesday - Saturday at 8pm

THE NATASHA PLAYS is triptych of monologues by one of the Russia's freshest new theatrical voices, 23-year-old Yaroslava Pulinovich.

NATASHA'S DREAM, tells the story of a 16-year-old orphan, Natasha Banina (Julia M. Smith), who finds herself experiencing the first rustlings of love-with dire consequences. The second monologue, I WON, chronicles the upward mobility of another teenager, Natasha Vernikova (Sarah Lloyd), who is a middle-class overachiever who lets nothing get in the way of her personal and professional success. Finally, there is EPILOGUE, a short piece in which yet another Natasha (Shannon McPhee) offers up a love letter to her favorite pop star, Dima Bilan.

"The unleashed, visceral teenage angst of these monologues is the driving force of this work. For a moment, thanks to Pulinovich, we get the unfettered voice of a younger generation." John Barry, Radar Redux: Baltimore Arts and Culture

THE NATASHA PLAYS were first presented in the United States as part of the Towson University Department of Theatre Arts new Russian drama season, developed in collaboration with The Center for InterNational Theatre Development, Philip Arnoult, director.

Read about this and several other projects in "The New Intertwining of Russian and American Theatre" in The Moscow Times.

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