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What Price Freedom at Moving Arts Theatre

Dates: 4/9/2026 - 5/3/2026

📍 Theatre:
Moving Arts Theatre


3191 Casitas Ave
Atwater Village, CA 90039

Phone: 323.472.5646

Tickets: $15 - $33


Moving Arts Theatre proudly presents The World Premiere of What Price Freedom by Tony Blake 

One Chance. Two Voices. A Nation in the Balance. 

Timed at this crucial juncture of history, What Price Freedom stars Rob Nagle and Brandon Bales. It’s 1776, the Declaration of Independence has just been signed. With war looming, John Adams and Benjamin Franklin attempt a covert peace negotiation with Britain, only to find their greatest obstacle is not the Crown, but each other. The fate of the new nation hangs on whose version of freedom will triumph in this new play asking us what independence means, and what are the costs. 

What Price Freedom’s creative team includes Set & Lighting Design by Justin Huen, Sound Design by Warren Davis, Costume Design by Mylette Nora, and Props Design by Dana Schwartz. 

 

What Price Freedom at Moving Arts Theatre Schedule

What Price Freedom will open Saturday, April 11th at 8PM with a run through May 3rd. Performances are on Friday, Saturday, Monday at 8 PM and Sunday at 4 PM. There will be two preview performances on Thursday, April 9th and Friday, April 10th at 8PM.

Cast and Creative Team for What Price Freedom at Moving Arts Theatre

Cast

Rob Nagle
Benjamin Franklin
Rob was seen last year at Moving Arts in Tom Jacobson’s Tasty Little Rabbit. Theater includes: Antaeus Theatre Company, Denver Center for the Performing Arts, Fountain Theatre, New World Stages, Pasadena Playhouse, Portland Center Stage, Road Theatre Company, Rogue Machine, Skylight Theatre Company, South Coast Repertory, Mark Taper Forum, Troubadour Theater Company. Film includes: The Wolf and the Lamb, Alien Vacation, Bad Samaritan, New Year’s Eve. Television includes: S.W.A.T. Exiles, Good American Family, Suits LA, Good Trouble, NCIS: Los Angeles, Batwoman, Criminal Minds, Grey’s Anatomy, Dynasty. Training: Northwestern University.
Brandon Bales
John Adams
Selected Film & TV: 9-1-1, For All Mankind, Adam McKay's Vice. With Moving Arts: Apocalypse Play, @Playaz, Hello, My Name Is. Other L.A. Theatre: Work with Sacred Fools, Open Fist, & The Speakeasy Society. VO: Multiple titles with VR gurus Tender Claws and over ten years of a main character on the online RPG Guild Wars 2.

Creative Team

Darin Anthony
Director
Darin s the Artistic Director of Moving Arts in Los Angeles, a company dedicated to the development, production, and promotion of adventurous new works by Los Angeles artists. For Moving Arts, he directed: world premieres of RESET, @Playaz, Isolation Inn – A Zoom Series, Apple Season, BLISS (or Emily Post is Dead!) (LA Times Critics' Choice), Apocalypse Play (LA Times Critics' Choice), the west coast premieres: The Kill-or-Dies, Viral by, and The Gun Show. Other recent productions: Daniel’s Husband at Dezart Performs (Best Director Award DTL), Dinner with Friends at CV Rep (Nominated best director DTL), the world premiere of the rhythm and blues musical The Devil You Know for Devilish Productions, and the premiere of Nureyev’s Eyes at American Stages (FL), and The Bluebarn Theatre (NE). Other productions include New York premieres: The Good Boy at the Abington Theatre and The Incident Report at The Lion Theatre. Regional credits: premieres for La Jolla Playhouse, Unbound Productions, Bootleg Theatre, Shakespeare Santa Cruz, The Theatre @ Boston Court, Radar LA, Odyssey Theatre, The Road, The Open Fist, Moving Arts Car Plays, The Blank Theatre, Syzygy, InterACT, Furious Theatre. Academically, he has directed at The American Academy of Dramatic Arts, Theatre of Arts, and Miami University of Ohio. Darin’s film directing debut, Hitting the Cycle, was awarded Best Feature Film by The Manhattan Film Festival. He also directed and developed the web series Before We Go to Sleep with Steve Serpas. His productions have received many awards and nominations, including The Ovation Award, The Los Angeles Drama Critics Circle Awards, The LA Weekly Awards, Desert Theatre League Award, Stage Scene LA, and The Backstage Garland Awards. He would like to thank his family who make this all possible.
Dana Schwartz
Producer
Dana is an award winning Los Angeles theater artist. Her play “Meet the Maker” was written in the EPG Writer’s Group with Circle X in Los Angeles. “The Bomb” will be produced in San Francisco in March. "@Playaz" was an O'Neill Finalist and had its World Premiere in 2021. "Early Birds" premiered in 2019 and was also presented at the Curtis Theatre. “Presto!”, an O’Neill Semi-Finalist, was developed with The Workshop Theater in New York, and was part of the Hudson Valley Theater Festival. “The Grotto” was part of the Valdez Theater Conference in Alaska, “First Time” was in the Lanford Wilson New Play Festival, and “The April & Mr. Bigglesworth Super Special Funtime Show” was created in 14/48 and produced by Thrown Stone in Ct. She has also had plays at Morgan Wixon, Surfside Theater, Nomad Theatre, Parish Players, Eclectic Theater, Echo Theatre, Theatre of NOTE, LeftEdge, Sky Pilot, REDcat LA, Disney Hall, Segerstrom Center, La Jolla Playhouse, and LACMA. She has directed plays across the country, most recently the critically acclaimed “Tune In” at Theatre of NOTE and “here comes the night” at Moving Arts, as well as productions at The Road Theater, Topanga Arts Center, Lyric Hyperion, Fierce Backbone and the Victory Theater. As an actress she has performed around the world, most recently in “Paper Walls” at the Inkwell and the 50 character immersive play “Convention”. Dana is the Program Director of the MADLab New Play Development Program at Moving Arts.
Laura Buckles
Producer
Laura is an actor, producer, writer, and director working across stage, film, and digital media. At Moving Arts, she has performed in main stage productions, the MADLab series, and the company’s acclaimed Car Plays, and written short plays for the Holiday House Party series. On screen, she appears in the award-winning thriller 8 Found Dead and both produced and acted in the award-winning feature film Broken. Her producing work has earned Tellies, Webbies, and a Remi Award, with projects spanning independent film and digital storytelling. She previously co-produced with Joe Camareno and looks forward to collaborating with him again. Laura balances wit, strength, and heart in her performances and has directed and developed new works highlighting unique voices and inventive storytelling. She is proud to call Moving Arts home and grateful to work alongside such adventurous creatives.
Deborah Frieden Reed
Managing Director
Deborah has worked in the arts for over twenty years, as an administrator, producer, director, and actor. In addition to Moving Arts, she has worked at various theatres throughout Southern California, including Deaf West Theatre, and Center Theatre Group. She also serves as an independent consultant to small and midsize arts nonprofits through her company, All Funded Consulting. She served on the Board of Buzzworks Theatre Company for eight years, was an Ovation Awards voter for seven years, and has served as a grant panelist for the California Arts Council.
Justin Huen
Set and Lighting Design
Justin is an award-winning actor/director/designer. Recent design credits include Misery, Hello, My Name Is…, Paper Walls from the Inkwell Theater and The Wedding Singer and Death of a Salesmen staring Francis Fisher at the Colony Theater. He designed the multi award winning sets for Pang Spa and Two Stop - the CTG:Forward, LANPP, and Venturous Theater Fund winning productions at EST LA and Chalk Rep. He was the production and lighting designer for the IATSE Celebrity Benefit fundraiser at the Colony Theater to support striking artists, starring Kaley Cuoco and Tom Pelphrey. He designed the set and lights for A Steady Rain starring Lewis Pullman and Shaun Sipos both in New Mexico and at the Hudson Theatre in LA.
Mylette Nora
Costume Designer
Ovation Award and NAACP Theatre Awards for best costumes, listed in the honors edition of The Cambridge Registry of Who’s Who Among Executive and Professional Women, works world wide consists of television, film, video and stage, and was seen nightly on "The Tonight Show" with Jay Leno and now “You Bet Your Life” with Jay Leno and Kevin Eubanks, and weekly on "Jay Leno's Garage". The famed artist Synthia St. James noted Mylette as being the inspiration for her world renowned painting "Ensemble" which graced the cover of the best selling novel "Waiting To Exhale" by Terry McMillan. Mylette’s designer lines are, doggie wear, www.FromTheHeartDoggieWear.com, heirloom dolls, "My Mind's Eye", and now face mask by, Mylette!
Warren Davis
Sound Designer
Warren is an award winning sound designer working in the Los Angeles theatre community for over 20 years. Previous collaborations with Darin Anthony include the Blank Theatre's long-running production of The Book of Liz, Dinner With Friends for Coachella Repertory and the Moving Arts productions of Hello, My Name Is…, Apple Season and @Playaz. As an actor, he just worked with Darin in the Inkwell Theatre production of Paper Walls. Favorite sound designs include The Tragedy of JFK (Blank Theatre at the Skylight Theatre), The 39 Steps (Actors Co-op), The Santaland Diaries (Blank Theatre), Dusk Rings A Bell (Blank Theatre), Lend Me a Tenor (Actors Co-op), and My Children! My Africa (Actors Co-op), for which Warren won an NAACP Theatre award. He is also an actor and director, an avid bicyclist and a former designer and programmer of video arcade games. His play The Jury Game was accepted into the 2025 MADLab playwriting workshop sponsored by Moving Arts.

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About the Theatre

Moving Arts Theatre

3191 Casitas Ave
Atwater Village, CA 90039

Phone: 323.472.5646

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Moving Arts Theatre
3191 Casitas Ave, Atwater Village, CA

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