Vital's LOOKING FOR THE PONY Begins Performances 1/21

Vital Theatre Company recently announced the rolling world premiere of Looking For The Pony by Andrea Lepcio, directed by Stephan Golux and featuring J. Smith-Cameron, Deidre O'Connell, Lori Funk and Debargo Sanyal.  The production begins previews on Wednesday, January 21st and opens on Monday, January 26th at 7pm.   Performances continue Saturday, January 24th at 4pm and 8pm, Sunday, January 25th at 4pm, and Monday, January 26th at 7pm.  From January 28th, there will be performances on Wednesdays at 2pm and 7pm, Thursdays at 7pm, Fridays and Saturdays at 8pm, and Saturdays and Sundays at 4pm through February 8th.  Tickets are $45.00; $30 for students and seniors (preview tickets are $35.00; $20 for students and seniors.)  After its New York run, Looking For The Pony will also be presented at Synchronicity Performance Group in Atlanta in February.  To purchase tickets for the New York production, please call (212) 579-0528 or visit www.vitaltheatre.org.

In Looking For The Pony, a 2008 National Endowment for the Arts Outstanding New American Play finalist, Eloisa is finally ready to leave a lifeless career in finance to pursue a childhood dream when her sister Lauren is diagnosed with breast cancer.  Lauren's perfect life and Eloisa's second chance collide as the sisters join forces to cure all that ails them.   As funny as it is heart-breaking, Looking For The Pony is a rollercoaster ride through treatment, ambition, loss and acceptance.  This play was originally developed and produced by Vital Theatre Company as part of its Vital Signs New Works Festival in 2002.

Andrea Lepcio's plays include One Night Under, Eclipse, Hook & Eye and the musical The Bronx Casket Co, which have been produced and developed at Chashama, Here, Women's Project, Hangar Theatre, Trustus Theatre, among others.  She is a member of the New Perspective Women's Work Lab and the BMI Lehman Engel Musical Theatre Librettist Workshop, and an alumnus of the Lark Playwrights' Workshop and Women's Project Lab.  Her screenplay, "A September Spring," won the Sloan Foundation Dramatic Writing Award.  A two-time finalist for the Heideman Award, her work has been published by New York Theatre Experience, Estrogenius, lichen and Smith & Kraus. Andrea is the Dramatists Guild Fellows Program Director and is a visiting faculty member in the Graduate Dramatic Writing Program at Carnegie Mellon.  Education: M.F.A. in Dramatic Writing, Carne! gie Mellon University.  M.B.A., UC Berkeley.  B.A. Human Ecology, College of the Atlantic.

J. Smith-Cameron last appeared at Second Stage Theatre in Good Boys and Ture. Other Off-Broadway credits include Sarah, Sarah by Daniel Goldfarb (Drama Desk nomination Best Actress), Fuddy Meers by David Lindsay Abaire (Outer Critics Award nomination Best Actress), The God of Hell by Sam Shepherd, Music from a Sparkling Planet and Bees in Honey Drown by Dougas Carter Beane (Obie Award, Outer Critics Award and Drama Desk nominations), and Paul Rudnick's The Naked Eye (Drama Desk nomination).  Broadway credits include Crimes of the Heart, Wild Honey, Lend Me a Tenor, The Play's the Thing, The Real Inspector Hound, Night Must Fall and Our Country's Good (Tony nomination), Tartuffe, After the Night and The Music (Elaine May). J's most recent appearance was in the ! great Charles Busch's Times Square Angel annual Christmas reading. Movies include the upcoming "Margaret" by Kenneth Lonergan, "In and Out," "Mighty Aphrodite," "Gal Young 'Un," and "You Can Count on Me." She has appeared often on "Law and Order" and "Law and Order: Criminal Intent," among others.

Deidre O'Connell has previously appeared in The Poor Itch (The Public Theater), Rag and Bone (Rattlestick Theatre), A Nervous Smile by John Belluso (Williamstown Theatre Festival) John Belluso's Pyretown (Keen Company), Manic Flight Reaction, Spatter Pattern (Playwrights Horizons); Cave Dweller (NYTW); Antigone (Dance Theater Workshop); Two Headed (Women's Project); In the Blood (The Public Theater); Mud and Drowning (Signature Theatre), 'Tis Pity She's a Whore (The Public); Approximating Mother (Women's Project); Love and Anger (Drama Desk nom., NYTW); The Geography of Luck, Three Ways Home, Stars in the Morning (Dramalogue Award, Los Angeles Critics Awards), Etta Jenks (Dramalogue Award, LA Theatre Center); The Front Page (Lincoln Center); A Lie of the Mind (Promenade Theatre). Films include "What Happens in Vegas," "Train Wreck: My Life As An Idiot," "Stephanie Daley," "Imaginary Heroes," "Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind," "Secondhand Lions," "Fearless," "Pastime" (Nominated for Independent Spirit Award-Best Supporting Actress). OBIE Award for Sustained Excellence of Performance.

Director Stephen Golux recently helmed productions of Sylvia, The Complete History of America  (abridged), Copenhagen, Jacques Brel is Alive and Well and Living in Paris, True West and Who's Afraid of Virginia Wolf for Vermont Stage Company.  He directed the world premieres of American Passenger by Theron Albis, Underworld by Josh Ben Friedman, Crawling from the Wreckage by Paul Rogalus, and Ninth Street Water by Michael Griffo.  For The Rude Mechanicals he directed Can Can by Romulus Linney, and Endgame by Samuel Beckett. At the New Theatre in Boston, he directed Self-torture and Strenuous Exercise by Harry Kondolean and The Police by Slawomir Mrozek.  Education: M.F.A. in Stage Direction, Yale School of Drama. B.S. in Philosophy of Language, Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

The design team includes sets by Adam Koch, lighting by Aaron Copp, costumes by Matthew Hemesath and sound by Jessica Paz.  Bernita Robinson is the Stage Manager.

Vital Theatre Company is a community of artists who believe that a shared theatrical experience profoundly affects people's lives.  The company creates stories that challenge its audience to ask questions, make discoveries and engage in dialogue. Programming includes Vital Main Stage, which produces work for adults on the main stage, and Vital Signs New Works Festival, a series of one-act plays.  Vital Children's Theatre commissions, develops and produces new musicals performed by adults for families.  To date the company has seen 28 plays and musicals go on to publication.  Vital Theatre Company's Arts in Education Programs have reached over 60 schools and 15,000 students through live performances, post-show workshops and long-term residencies with schools in! cluding Fordham School for the Arts, New Explorers High School in the Bronx and Brooklyn Theatre Arts High School. 

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