Florida Rep Announces Directors and Casts for 2017 PlayLab Festival

Florida Repertory Theatre's 2017 PlayLab Festival of new plays and emerging voices plays in the Historic Arcade and ArtStage Studio Theatres April 27-30. The 2017 Festival features six new play readings, a keynote address and playwrights' panel, and two premieres of plays that were read as part of last year's PlayLab.

The six plays and playwrights were announced in February, and now, as the festival enters the final stages of preparation, Florida Rep is pleased to announce this year's directors and casts. The 4th annual PlayLab will again feature many of Florida Rep's ensemble members, as both actors and directors, as well as professional artists from Southwest Florida, around the state, New York, and across the country.

"Love, the Cracksman" by Mark Brown will open the festival with an 8PM reading on Thursday, April 27th. Written by one of America's most produced playwrights of the last decade, "Love, the Cracksman" is a fast paced comic love story filled with intrigue, mystery, romance, and an ensemble of actors playing multiple roles. Mark Brown is most well-known for his adaptation of "Around the World in 80 Days", which has become an international sensation.

The reading oF Brown's play will be directed by Stefan Novinski, a freelance director out of Los Angeles who is also an Associate Professor with the University of Dallas College of Liberal Arts.

"The Flower Room" by Daryl Lisa Fazio plays Friday, April 28th at 2PM, and is a zany comedy about a middle-aged woman's sexual awakening. Daryl Lisa Fazio was featured in Florida Rep's inaugural PlayLab in 2014, and her play, "Split in Three", was selected for a world premiere in 2015 - the company's first.

"The Flower Room" will be directed by Annette Trossbach, known locally as Producing Artistic Director of Laboratory Theater of Florida.

"Smoke" by Gloria Bond Clunie plays Friday, April 28th at 8PM, and is a love story set in 1960s North Carolina - when Camels were Kool and tobacco was king. This sizzling and powerful love story sees love and politics collide and asks us why we crave what might destroy us. Playwright, Gloria Bond Clunie, is a North Carolina Native now based in Chicago, where she is now working with Northwestern University's American Music Theatre Project to adapt one of her plays into a musical. Clunie is an award-winning playwright, director, and educator.

The reading of "Smoke" will be directed by Margaret Ledford, whose work as a director has earned her multiple Carbonell Award nominations (south Florida's Tony) at regional thetares across Florida's east coast.

"Damascus" by Bennett Fisher, plays Saturday, April 29th at 1PM, and is a chilling psychological thriller that follows a Muslim-American shuttle driver and his white college student passenger on a trip to Chicago from the Minneapolis airport - which has just been bombed. As the two men cross the Midwest they discover not everything is what it seems. Playwright, Bennett Fisher, is a company member of Campo Santo and People of Interest, and an associate artist with the Cutting Ball Theater. He is currently in residence as a SHank Fellowship Playwright at Chicago's Victory Gardens Theatre.

"Damascus" will be directed by Ria Cooper, an Education and Outreach Specialist with Sarasota's Asolo Repertory Theater who specializes in documentary theatre.

"We Will Not Be Silent" by David Meyers plays Sunday, April 30th at 2PM, and is the powerful true story of Sophie Scholl, a German college student who led the only act of public resistance against the Nazis. David Meyers is an actor and playwright based in New York, and this play is set to have its world premiere at the Contemporary American Theatre Festival this summer.

Florida Rep ensemble member and FGCU Theatre Department faculty member, Greg Longenhagen, will direct the PlayLab reading of "We Will Not Be Silent". Longenhagen has directed a reading in each of the past PlayLab festivals - including 2014's "Split in Three" - and was seen most recently in Florida Rep's nationally acclaimed production of "The House of Blue Leaves."

"George Washington's Teeth" by Mark St. Germain will close the festival with its reading on Sunday, April 30th at 5:30PM, and is a farce that follows the exploits of the women of the New Bunion Historical society as they go to all-out war over a pair of dentures worn by George Washington. Author of previous Florida Rep hits, "Best of Enemies" and "Camping with Henry and Tom", and the Off Broadway sensation, "Freud's Last Session", Mark St. Germain's work on stage as a playwright and librettist is widely produced across the country. He is currently working on a National New Play Network Rolling World Premiere of his play "Relativity", about Albert Einstein's public and private life.

"George Washington's Teeth" will be directed by Michael Leeds, a Broadway writer, director, and choreographer whose work has garnered multiple Drama Desk Awards and a Tony Nomination for his original revue, "Swinging on a Star". Now based in South Florida, Leeds works extensively with Broward Stage Door, Island City Stage, and others.

PlayLab tickets are $12 per reading or $60 for an All-Access Pass to see all six new works. Admission to the keynote address is $12, and the performance of "A Dream within a Dream: the Spirit of Poe" is $10. Both the keynote address and the "Poe" performance are free with the purchase of an All-Access Pass.

4th ANNUAL PLAYLAB FESTIVAL: Directors and Casts
The PlayLab Festival is generously sponsored by Lee Moore and Dee Whited.
*Denotes Member of Actors Equity Association. †Denotes member of Florida Rep's Ensemble of Artists

LOVE, THE CRACKSMAN by Mark Brown
Directed by Stefan Novinski
The Cast: Brendan Powers*†, Sarah Zanotti, Jimmy Capek, Jason Parrish*†, Jeff Binder*, Matthew Faison*, and Jordan Moore
Thursday, April 27 at 8PM • Historic Arcade Theatre

THE FLOWER ROOM by Daryl Lisa Fazio
Directed by Annette Trossbach
The cast: Kate Hampton*, Kody C. Jones, Nathaniel Ritsema, Marissa Toogood*, and Dillion Everett
Friday, April 28 at 2PM • Historic Arcade Theatre

SMOKE by Gloria Bond Clunie
Directed by Margaret Ledford
The cast: Sonya McCarter, John Archie*, Patricia Idlette*†, Peter Galman*, and Cantrella Canady
Friday, April 28 at 8PM • Historic Arcade Theatre

DAMASCUS by Bennett Fisher
Directed by Ria Cooper
The cast: Daniel Morgan Shelley*, Brady Wease, Brittany Rincon, and Anne Dodd.
Saturday, April 29 at 1PM • Historic Arcade Theatre

KEYNOTE ADDRESS & PLAYWRIGHTS' PANEL
Featuring National New Play Network Executive Director, Nan Barnett
Saturday, April 29 at 5PM • Historic Arcade Theatre

World Premiere Production
A DREAM WITHIN A DREAM: THE SPIRIT OF POE
Written and Directed by Christopher T. Parks
The Cast: Jimmy Capek, Nathaniel Ritsema, Alexis Slocum, Brady Wease, and Sarah Zanotti
Sunday, April 30 at 11AM • Historic Arcade Theatre

WE WILL NOT BE SILENT by David Meyers
Directed by Greg Longenhagen*†
The cast: Alexis Slocum, Gerritt VanderMeer*, Ryan Didato*, and Christina DeCarlo
Sunday, April 30 at 2PM • Historic Arcade Theatre

GEORGE WASHINGTON'S TEETH by Mark St. Germain
Directed by Michael Leeds
The Cast: Carrie Lund*†, Liz Abbott, Joann Haley, Ashley Chesler, Veronica Barber, and Gregg Weiner*
Sunday, April 30 at 5:30PM • Historic Arcade Theatre

Florida Rep is proud to be an Associate Member of the National New Play Network in Washington, DC, the country's alliance of nonprofit theaters that champion the development, production, and continued life of new plays, and has worked closely with the Network to develop relationships with playwrights, other theatre professionals, and theatres that champion new works.

Florida Repertory Theatre performs in the Historic Arcade Theatre and the ArtStage Studio Theatre on Bay St. between Jackson & Hendry with limited free parking in the Fort Myers River District. Visit Florida Rep online at FloridaRep.org, and by following the company on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and Youtube.

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