Core Creative Productions will premiere an updated version of CHOKEHOLD by Anthony P. Pennino, directed by Tim Cusack. An earlier version of this intense drama about police brutality won Outstanding Overall Production of a New Play at the 2015 Planet Connections Festivity. Previews begin September 16 at The Theatre at the 14th Street Y with opening slated for September 22.
#BlackLivesMatter first arose in response to police brutality in Ferguson, Missouri. Then came incidences in Maryland, Ohio, Louisiana, and Minnesota, among too many others. Another could happen tomorrow. In CHOKEHOLD, five friends have come to the conclusion that peaceful protests will no longer change the course of justice. So they take the extraordinary step of committing to an act of violence to shake the nation out of its complacency. But what they discover is that planning an act of violence against the innocent is one thing, executing that plan is something else entirely. CHOKEHOLD walks the razor's edge of what is right and what is necessary, of the political and the personal, of rage and reason. Casting and production team will be announced shortly. Anthony P. Pennino (playwright) has had his work performed across the US and around the world. He has written Dia de los Muertos (at CSV in 2011), Iron Tongue of Midnight (produced by The Neighborhood Playhouse in 2016), Drones (Planet Connections 2016), I, Horatio (FringeNYC 2015 and London's Rose Theater), A Thousand Deaths (FringeNYC 2014), Call It Peace (Finborough Theater in London, 2002), Story of an Unknown Man (Gorilla Rep 2000), the libretto for the folk musical The Devil and Tom Walker (Metropolitan Playhouse, 2008) and many more. He has been awarded two fellowships from the New Jersey Council of the Arts. He holds an MFA in Playwriting from Columbia University and a Ph.D. from the University of London in Drama. He currently teaches literature and theatre at Stevens Institute of Technology in Hoboken, NJ.Videos