American Theatre for Actors Presents SPEND A NIGHT IN JAIL Double-bill 5/1

Beginning May 1, 2010 Genet and Saroyan will be on display in a double-bill at the American Theatre for Actors (314 W. 54th Street). Nutshell Productions will present " Spend a Night in Jail" including the plays HELLO OUT THERE by William Saroyan, directed by Robert Haufrecht and DEATHWATCH by Jean Genet, directed by Richard Hymes-Esposito. Opening night is Wednesday, May 5 and run through May 23. Tickets are $20 and can be purchased www.SmartTix.com or call (212) 868-4444.

HELLO OUT THERE by William Saroyan, directed by Robert Haufrecht
Falsely jailed for an alleged rape of a married women, a young man awaits certain death is a small town jail cell. There he meets young woman; both outcasts, they decide to run off together with the hopes of finding happiness elsewhere. Hello Out There is a play about the human need to connect and be loved despite circumstances.

Cast includes: Kerry Fitzgibbons (Film: Dandelion Fall, Polycarp. Stage: GI Joe Jared), Richard Hymes-Esposito (This Isn't Paradise, Film: Last Days of Simon).

DEATHWATCH by Jean Genet, directed by Richard Hymes-Esposito.
One of Genet's earliest plays, Deathwatch is set cramped cell as three inmates struggle for status and acceptance of their ring leader. It examines criminal behavior, survival, masculinity and the universal need for belonging despite the abject and hopeless social standing of its hierarchy.

Cast includes: Raul Sigmund Julia (The Great Recession), Greg Engbrecht (The Tragedy of John
Mountain Jews), John Paul Harkins (IT Award for Taming of the Shrew) and Kevin McGraw (Film: September 12th).

Creative team for both shows include: Craig Napoliello (Sets), Eric Nightengale (Light and Sound).
And Set Design for both shows will be done by Craig Napoliello

HELLO OUT THERE by William Saroyan, directed by Robert Haufrecht
DEATHWATCH by Jean Genet, directed by Richard Hymes-Esposito
Begins performances May 1, opens May 5 through May 23, 2010.
Performance schedule: Monday at 8PM; Thursday - Saturday at 8PM; Sunday at 5PM
(Added show on Wednesday, May 5 at 8PM; NO show on Sunday, May 16 at 5PM)
American Theatre for Actors is located at 314 W. 54th Street 4th floor.
Tickets are $20 and can be purchased by calling (212) 868-4444 or visiting www.smarttix.com
For more information please visit www.spendthenightinjail.com
Running time: 2 hours with intermission
Press Performances: Sunday, May 2 at 5PM; Monday, May 3 at 8PM;
Wednesday, May 5 at 8PM (opening)

Bios
WILLIAM SAROYAN (playwright, Hello Out There) was born in Fresno, California, as the son of an Armenian immigrant. His father moved to New Jersey in 1905 - he was a small vineyard owner, who had been educated as a Presbyterian minister. In the new country he was forced to take farm-labouring work. He died in 1911 from peritonitis, after drinking a forbidden glass of water given by his wife, Takoohi. Saroyan was put in an orphanage in Alameda with his brothers. Many of Saroyan's stories were based on his childhood, experiences among the Armenian-American fruit growers of the San Joaquin Valley, or dealt with the rootlessness of the immigrant. As a playwright Saroyan's work was drawn from deeply personal sources. He disregarded the conventional idea of conflict as essential to drama. MY HEART' IN THE HIGHLANDS (1939), his first play, was a comedy about a young boy and his Armenian family. It was produced at the Guild Theatre in New York. Among Saroyan's best known plays is THE TIME OF YOUR LIFE (1939), set in a waterfront saloon in San Francisco. It won a Pulitzer Prize. Saroyan refused the honor, on the grounds that commerce should not judge the arts, but accepted the New York Drama Critics Circle award. In 1948 the play was adapted into screen, starring James Gagney. Saroyan died from cancer on May 18, 1981, in Fresno. "Everybody has got to die," he had said, "but I have always believed an exception would be made in my case." Half of his ashes were buried in California, and the rest in Armenia.

ROBERT HAUFRECHT (director, Hello Out There) currently teaches at the School of Visual Arts and coaches privately. Most recently, he directed Satre's No Exit and Richard Hymes-Esposito's This Isn't Paradise, and Thomas Dunn's The Iris Picker at the American Globe Theater 15 minute play festival. He is an active member (as a director) of the Playwrights/Directors Workshop at the Actors Studio where he directed the much acclaimed staged reading of Lizabeth Zindel's screenplay Girl Hamlet. For 10 years he was the managing director of the Common Basis Theatre here in New York, where he acted, directed and produced. Productions included Betrayal, Burn This, and many originals, including The Devil's Home Movies, for which he won an OOBR award as actor and director. In Europe he acted in and helped produce the haunting Bells and Trains, a holocaust play, in Berlin (in English) and performed in View From The Bridge in Paris. He has worked in film and TV, most recently - Thomas Kim's The Ride.

JEAN GENET (playwright Deathwatch) who is regarded by many critics as the greatest French writer of his generation was born in Paris in 1910. An illegitimate child who never knew his parents, he was sent at the age of ten to a reformatory, because of stealing. After years spent in various such institutions, he ran away and joined the Foreign Legion, which he soon deserted. During subsequent years he wandered through Europe, spending time in prisons in almost every country he visited. In 1943, during a long prison term, he wrote his first book Our Lady of the Flowers. During the five, intensely creative years which followed, he wrote three novels, two plays -- The Maids and Deathwatch, a volume of poems, and A Thief's Journal. Genet's unique career came to a climax in 1948 when he was convicted of theft for the tenth time and only escaped life imprisonment through the intervention of a group of prominent writers--among them Claudel, Gide, Sartre and Cocteau--who submitted a petition to the president of the Republic. He was granted a pardon.

RICHARD HYMES-ESPOSITO (director Deathwatch) born and raised in New York city. Graduate of the High School of the Performing Arts (Drama Major), English Major at Earlham College, located in Richmond Indiana. Member of "The Actors Project NYC". Has done many student films and off-off Broadway productions in New York City. Writer, Producer and Principal in This Isn't Paradise. Attended many acting schools in NYC, to Caymicheal Patten Studio to Bruce Ornsteins' acting class (among others).

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