Daniel Talbott News

After the critical success of its most recent Off-Broadway production, the Lucille Lortel Award winning All the Rage by Martin Moran (produced with piece by piece productions and The Barrow Group), acclaimed company Rising Phoenix Repertory returns to its longtime downtown home with the world premiere of Barn by Charlotte Miller, directed by Michael Padden. The play will be staged for eleven performances only at the Seventh Street Small Stage, where the company has produced new plays site-specifically for eight years in addition to more than 25 fully produced new plays in its lauded Cino Nights series. The production will run from March 23 - April 10, 2014, and features Brian Miskell, Laura Ramadei, and Sanford Wilson.

Chris Bellant (Warner Bros. upcoming "Into the Storm") and Sarah Jes Austell will star in the West Coast Premiere of "The Optimist" by Jason Chimonides at Elephant Stages in Los Angeles from April 3rd to April 20th.

New Brooklyn Theater has announced casting today for its site-specific production of Edward Albee's The Death of Bessie Smith at Interfaith Medical Center in Brooklyn. This rare revival will run for eight performances between January 9 and 19, 2014. Each performance will be followed by talkbacks or panel discussions with leaders in the arts, government, labor, and health. These discussions are intended to raise critical questions about health access, race, class, and the arts in New York.

After the critical success of its most recent Lucille Lortel Award winning Off-Broadway production of Martin Moran's All the Rage (produced with piece by piece productions), acclaimed company Rising Phoenix Repertory returns to its longtime downtown home with the world premiere of RPR Artistic Director Daniel Talbott's new play Extraordinary Things.

{Your Name Here} A Queer Theater is proud to present the third edition of their popular event, BLIPS!. BLIPS! is an evening of 10- minute plays designed to cultivate a base of up and coming Queer playwrights and celebrate the diversity of the community.

Playwright Franz Xaver (F.X.) Kroetz is infrequently presented in Chicago, despite being Germany's most-produced living playwright during the 1980s and 90s. All that will change when the side project - known for its hyper-intimacy - takes on Kroetz, known for his hyper-realism and unrelenting depictions of loneliness, with a two-show rep in January and February.

Following the sold out performances and overflow crowds for its Cino Nights presentations (including new plays by Gary Sunshine, Mando Alvarado, Courtney Baron, Florencia Lozano, Kristen Palmer, Emily DeVoti, Lucy Thurber, Jessica Dickey, Adam Szymkowicz, Laura Eason, Daniel Reitz, Megan Mostyn-Brown, Dael Orlandersmith, Keith Reddin, Crystal Skillman, Charlotte Miller, Brooke Berman, Cusi Cram, Daniel Talbott, Diana Stahl, Micheline Auger, Halley Feiffer, Steve DiUbaldo, Catya McMullen, Alec Silberblatt, and Emily Zemba), Rising Phoenix Rep continued the series on Tuesday, November 26th at 8 p.m. with a new play by Sarah Shaefer titled I Can't Explain It Better Than That. BroadwayWorld has photos from the show below!

Following the sold out performances and overflow crowds for its Cino Nights presentations (including new plays by Gary Sunshine, Mando Alvarado, Courtney Baron, Florencia Lozano, Kristen Palmer, Emily DeVoti, Lucy Thurber, Jessica Dickey, Adam Szymkowicz, Laura Eason, Daniel Reitz, Megan Mostyn-Brown, Dael Orlandersmith, Keith Reddin, Crystal Skillman, Charlotte Miller, Brooke Berman, Cusi Cram, Daniel Talbott, Diana Stahl, Micheline Auger, Halley Feiffer, Steve DiUbaldo, Catya McMullen, Alec Silberblatt, and Emily Zemba), Rising Phoenix Rep continues the series on Tuesday, November 26th at 8 p.m. with a new play by Sarah Shaefer titled I Can't Explain It Better Than That.

Mermaid Sand Productions and Kid Brooklyn Productions announced today that they will produce Sarah Shaefer's searing drama The Gin Baby, directed by Daniel Talbott, January 19 through February 2, 2014 at the IRT Theater in downtown Manhattan.

Stable Cable Lab Co. has announced the cast and creative team for the workshop production of Nibbler, a play by Ken Urban, directed by Stephen Brackett. Nibblerwill begin invited presentations on Friday, November 15, 2013 at Theatre 54 at Shetler Studios (244 W. 54th St - between Broadway & 8th Ave.) and is scheduled to run through November 23rd, 2013. The results of the workshop production - including the actors' experience with the work, the aesthetics of the director and designers, and the audience's feedback - will be invaluable to the development of this play and talkbacks will follow several performances to discuss the work.

Storytelling - part acting, part writing and part solo performance piece - is possibly the world's oldest art form. The original medium for classics like Beowulf and Homer's Odyssey, storytelling as performance will be celebrated in 21st Century style in the side project's second Festival of Storytelling, Each night, three to four different artists will take the stage to perform 5- to 12-minute pieces, prior to a full-length story offered by one of the festival's three headliners. Multi-instrumentalist Matt Wills will provide musical accompaniment. The Festival, kicking off October 20 at The Side Project, will run Sunday through Wednesday evenings at 7:30pm through November 6.

Rising Phoenix Repertory continues its acclaimed CINO NIGHTS series with MIDDLE VOICE CINO, with Four new short plays by Steve DiUbaldo, Catya McMullen, Alec Silberblatt, and Emily Zemba, directed by John Michael DiResta and Jenna Worsham. Fully produced on half a shoestring and performed, warts and all, one night only, Sunday, September 29th at 8:00 p.m.

Theater for the New City, Crystal Field, Executive Director, presents the Lesser America production of Just Right Just Now, directed by Peter James Cook and Stella Powell-Jones. The show is an evening of original and premiere short plays by Clare Barron (Baby Screams Miracle), Eric Dufault (The Year of the Rooster), Anna Kerrigan (The Talls), Lauren Morelli (Orange is the New Black), Marco Ramirez (Sons of Anarchy), and Brian Watkins (The Prairie Plays).

The Side Project has announced it will present The Kindness of Strangers: A Festival of Storytelling. Forty storytellers will converge in a three-week festival featuring first-time and experienced tellers nightly, accompanied by live multi-instrumentalist, Matt Wills. The Festival, kicking off October 20, will run Sunday through Wednesday eves at 7:30pm through November 6.

Rattlestick Playwrights Theater presents Lucy Thurber's The Hill Town Plays, a cycle of five plays--Scarcity, Ashville, Where We're Born, Killers and Other Family, and Stay-- whhich opened last night, September 5, 2013; the closing date is Saturday, September 28, 2013.

In its 2013-14 season of nine shows, the side project continues its drive to create world premiere collaborations. Artistic Director Adam Webster says, 'We are thrilled to present a world premiere from renowned playwright Kathleen Tolan (Goodman Theatre's Memory House), as well as continue the relationship we have with NY-based playwright Daniel Talbott, whose play Slipping we world premiered in 2008, and which was subsequently shortlisted for the 2010 Lambda Award, along with The Brother/Sister Plays. Further, we are excited to team up with Tympanic Theatre Company for our first co-production, Sandalwood.' Tympanic's last co-production was Scott Barsotti's Brewed.

Angelina Fiordellisi, Founding Artistic Director of Cherry Lane Theatre, announces the following productions for the company's 2013-14 season:

All productions (other than the site-specific show, It Comes In) will take place at The Side Project Theatre, located at 1439 Jarvis Avenue. Tickets are $12-$20 and may be purchased online. Also: All season, the side project is continuing its $10 "rush" tickets for all empty seats to Rogers Park residents with I.D. bearing 60626 and 60645 ZIP Codes. For more information, visit www.thesideproject.net or call the theatre's box office at 773-340-0140.

MCC THEATER has announced the line-up for their upcoming PlayLabs reading series, featuring new plays by members of the company's Playwrights' Coalition. Traditionally held in the Spring, MCC'sPlayLab will now shift to the autumn months, launching this year on four consecutive Mondays throughout September (beginning September 9th) at the Lucille Lortel Theatre (121 Christopher Street). All readings are at 7pm. New York actors currently scheduled to appear in the readings include: Tony Award nomineeJeremy Shamos, Patch Darragh, Brett Donaldson, Maxwell Hamilton, Rachel Lee, Christopher McLinden, Deirdre O'Connell, and Shannon Sullivan. The series is offered free of charge, but reservations are recommended. For reservations and more info, please visit www.mcctheater.org.

Rising Phoenix Rep and Kid Brooklyn Productions have announced their first collaboration, The Beach Plays, a production of five newly commissioned short plays written to be performed on San Francisco's Ocean Beach. The plays will be fully produced and presented environmentally, with audiences gathering in front of the gift shop at The Cliff House at 1090 Point Lobos Ave, San Francisco, Calif., and traveling to and through the plays on foot.