MARY-KATE OLSEN IS IN LOVE Begins November 1 at The Flea Theater

By: Robert Diamond Oct. 05, 2013

The Flea Theater has announced the World Premiere of Mallery Avidon's Mary-Kate Olsen IS IN LOVE. This satire about love and growing-up and "being real" will be directed by Flea Resident Director Kristen Seemel and feature members of The Bats. Previews begin November 1 with opening slated for November 18. Says Producing Director Carol Ostrow, "this witty and wise play by on-the-rise writer Mallery Avidon tackles the notion of love, sex and marriage and the challenges of 20-somethings who think they know how to have it all."

In Mary-Kate Olsen IS IN LOVE, Grace is twenty-seven-going-on-dead and she's done everything a self-actualizing woman is supposed to do. All the same, her marriage to her high-school sweetheart is a lonely existence, lodged inside a maze of empty pizza boxes, TV commercials and the incessant blips of Call of Duty. That is, until the Olsen Twins arrive on the scene and transform everything.

The production stars Crystal Arnette, Katherine Folk-Sullivan (These Seven Sicknesses), Alex Grubbs (a cautionary tail, These Seven Sicknesses), Kana Hatakeyama (Sarah Flood in Salem Mass), John Paul Harkins (Sarah Flood in Salem Mass), Christine Lee (a cautionary tail, Sarah Flood in Salem Mass), Rachel Lin, Alex Mandell (Restoration Comedy), Elizabeth May, Vicki Rodriguez, and Bonnie White.

The design team includes Scott Tedmon-Jones (Set Design), John Eckert (Lighting Design), Ásta Hostetter (Costume Design), Kevin Brouder (Sound Design) and Michael Wieser (Fight Direction).

Mallery Avidon's play O Guru Guru Guru, or why I don't want to go to yoga class with you received its world premiere at the 2013 Humana Festival of New American Plays, and will be produced by Carolina Actors Studio Theatre in November. Her play queerSpawn (a commission from the COLAGE foundation) premiered spring 2013, produced by a Collection of Shiny Objects at HERE Arts Center, NYC. Mallery's work has been produced by Pavement Group and Target Margin Theater, among others. Mallery is an alumna of Soho Rep's Writer/Director Lab, co-curator of The Bushwick Starr's monthly reading series and a dramaturge for the company Saint Genet. She holds an M.F.A. in playwriting from Brown University.

Kristan Seemel has directed premieres of The Electric Lighthouse by Ed Himes (The Flea), MUTT by Lava Alapai and The Vespiary by Matthew Zrebski as well as Northwest regional premieres of Carlos Murillo's Mimesophobia and Paula Vogel's The Long Christmas Ride Home. Favorite recent revivals include The Threepenny Opera, The Duchess of Malfi and Gertrude Stein's Doctor Faustus Lights the Lights (Portland Dramatic Critics Circle Award for Directing). Kristan has developed plays at Playwrights Horizons/Clubbed Thumb (SuperLab), Target Margin Theater, Brave New World Repertory Theatre and Portland Center Stage. He is a member of the 2012/13 Soho Rep Writer/Director Lab and a Resident Director at The Flea.
MFA Directing Brown/Trinity Rep. www.kristanseemel.com

The Bats are the resident Acting Company members of The Flea Theater. Each year over a thousand actors audition for a place in this unique company. The Bats perform in extended runs of challenging classic and new plays. The Bats have recently appeared in premieres by A.R. Gurney, Will Eno, Adam Rapp, Beau Willimon, Mac Wellman, Elizabeth Swados, Thomas Bradshaw, Itamar Moses, Sheila Callaghan, Julian Sheppard, Ken Urban, Tommy Smith, Jonathan Reynolds, Trista Baldwin, Laurel Haines, Qui Nguyen, Sean Graney, and Amy Freed.

The Flea Theater, under Artistic Director Jim Simpson and Producing Director Carol Ostrow, is one of New York's leading off-off-Broadway companies. Winner of a Special Drama Desk Award for outstanding achievement, Obie Awards and an Otto for political theater, The Flea has presented over 100 plays and numerous dance and live music performances since its inception in 1996. Past productions include the premieres by Steven Banks, Thomas Bradshaw, Bathsheba Doran, Will Eno, Karen Finley, Amy Freed, Sean Graney, A.R. Gurney, Hamish Linklater, Enrique Gutiérrez Ortiz Monasterio, Itamar Moses, Anne Nelson, Qui Nguyen, Adam Rapp, Jonathan Reynolds, Roger Rosenblatt, Adriano Shaplin, Elizabeth Swados, and Mac Wellman. Recent successes include Drama Desk nominated She Kills Monsters, These Seven Sicknesses and Restoration Comedy.

Mary-Kate Olsen IS IN LOVE runs November 1 through December 8. Wednesday - Sunday at 7pm. The Flea Theater is located at 41 White Street between Church and Broadway, three blocks south of Canal, close to the A/C/E, N/R/Q, 6, J/Z and 1 subway lines. Tickets $15 - $35 with lowest priced tickets available on a first-come, first-served basis. They can be purchased by calling 212-352-3101 or online at www.theflea.org.

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