The Herbert Berghof (Hb) Studio Presents a Staged Reading of STARR STREET

The Herbert Berghof (HB) Studio of New York presents a staged reading of Starr Street (July 26 & July 28), a new, work-in-progress play written by Jesse Regis and directed by Pat Golden, as part of the Rehearsal Space Residency project.

It's showtime at the House of Donna D'Affari, a Brooklyn-based drag house, but 26 transgender people have been murdered in America this year alone and tensions rise as Tanisha's father Reuben arrives to violently challenge her identity. Brandhi, grappling with the loss of her brother at the hands of a police officer, is unable to see the value in her own story; while the house's newest tenant Gigi, a transgender servicemember (played here by XaXa McQueen, a trans- identifying former army sergeant), returns home to find an America that's as unwelcoming to its veterans as it is to its young, queer and black.

Starr Street: Text by Jesse Regis, with Direction by Pat Golden.

The cast: Demetrius Blocker (Theater: RolyPoly Productions' Horse, Medicine Show Theatre's Mr. Chekov Mr. Porter andCaligula; TV: HBO's Girls; Film: The Other Woman, Fish, My Dinner with Schwartzey), Tyler Modéle (Theater: Hi-Tops), Sizo Mahlangu (Theater: The Galloway Theatre's Othello; TV: Starz' Black Sails, National Geographic's Origins: The History of Mankind), XaXa McQueen (Miami Acting Conservatory), Mike Press (Theater: Patricia Lawler Kent's Patti Did Us In, Torn Out Theatre's Hamlet; Film: To Raise A Child; TV: The Single Man Series), and Jay Ward (Theater: Lynn Nottage's Sweat, New Federal Theater's Cool Blues, Negro Ensemble Company's A Soldier's Play; TV: HBO's The Night Of, NBC's The Blacklist, CBS's Person of Interest; Netflix's Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt, Fox's Arrested Development).

Creative team: Sarah Chiriboga (Stage Manager), Amanda Enzo (Assistant Director), Demetrius Blocker (choreographer).

Free ticketed performances for Starr Street will take place at 8pm on Friday, July 26 & Sunday, July 28 at HB Studio located at 120 Bank Street in Manhattan. The performances are not open to review.

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