Jenny Mercein News

The NFL takes Center Stage in X's and O's, a new, ripped-from-the-headlines play about America's love of football and the often traumatic impact the sport has on many of its players and families. X's and O's is the final production at Center Stage before building-wide renovations move the company's last two productions of the season to a temporary residency at Towson University.

Dark, feisty, and satisfyingly bawdy, 'Heathers: The Musical' offers witty dialogue and clever lyrics that highlight the humor in both the invented melodrama and the disquieting realities of the American teen experience.

Quién es Quién en el Teatro en México, permitirá conocer y reconocer a los talentos que han hecho o hacen posible esta industria en el país. Hoy: Odette Villarreal

Known for fostering playwrights at all stages of their careers, The Ground Floor: Berkeley Rep's Center for the Creation and Development of New Work today announces that it will begin hosting bi-annual salons in the fall and spring to share information with local playwrights about the new play development process at Berkeley Rep.

New Georges will present a revival reading of its 2008 hit show HILLARY: A MODERN GREEK TRAGEDY WITH A (SOMEWHAT) HAPPY ENDING by Wendy Weiner and directed by Julie Kramer, as part of The Spree, a progressive festivity to benefit New Georges. The special one night only benefit reading will take place on Monday, September 28 at Five Angels Theatre at the 52nd  Street Project (789 10th Avenue between 52nd and 53rd Streets). The reading will be at 7:30pm, with pre-show cocktails beginning at 6pm. Tickets ($25-$100) are available online at www.newgeorges.org.  

Anne Torsiglieri, KJ Sanchez, and James Still present new plays via the UCSB Launch Pad workshop program. Readings are free and open to the public: Thursdays in August: 8/6, 8/13, and 8/20.

Center Stage announces its adventurous 2015-16 Season, which includes collaborations with Berkeley Repertory Theatre, Cincinnati Playhouse in the Park, and a two-show temporary residency at Towson University.

Congratulations to all the actors, writers, and directors on a successful showcase--and congratulations to Elements on a successful event!

?Today, The Ground Floor: Berkeley Rep's Center for the Creation and Development of New Work announces that it has selected 14 projects for its fourth Summer Residency Lab featuring works from more than 20 talented artists.

Berkeley Repertory Theatre is proud to present the world premiere of X's and O's (A Football Love Story), a hard-hitting docudrama that examines our country's passion for a game that is life-giving yet lethal. Our singularly American sport is intricately woven into our culture and rituals, yet its traumatic effect on players and their families has us reexamining its place in our country's story.

The world's most famous fictional sleuth adds a novel chapter to his repertoire with playwright Jeffrey Hatcher's electrifying new whodunit SHERLOCK HOLMES AND THE ADVENTURE OF THE SUICIDE CLUB, which opens the Cincinnati Playhouse in the Park's 55th season. The play is an inventive mash-up of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's iconic characters and the Robert Louis Stevenson short story 'The Suicide Club,' providing a clever, intricately woven new mystery for Holmes to deduce. SHERLOCK HOLMES AND THE ADVENTURE OF THE SUICIDE CLUB runs today, Sept. 6 through Oct. 4 in the Robert S. Marx Theatre.

The world's most famous fictional sleuth adds a novel chapter to his repertoire with playwright Jeffrey Hatcher's electrifying new whodunit SHERLOCK HOLMES AND THE ADVENTURE OF THE SUICIDE CLUB, which opens the Cincinnati Playhouse in the Park's 55th season. The play is an inventive mash-up of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's iconic characters and the Robert Louis Stevenson short story "The Suicide Club," providing a clever, intricately woven new mystery for Holmes to deduce. SHERLOCK HOLMES AND THE ADVENTURE OF THE SUICIDE CLUB runs Sept. 6 through Oct. 4 in the Robert S. Marx Theatre.

Today, Berkeley Repertory Theatre is proud to announce that it has completed its 2014-15 subscription programming with the addition of X's and O's (A Gridiron Love Story) written by KJ Sanchez. Memory, myth, and football meet head on in this hard-hitting world premiere directed by Michael Leibert Artistic Director Tony Taccone. Working with collaborator Jenny Mercein, Sanchez delivers a gripping docudrama dramatically based on brutally honest and heartrending interviews with football players, their families, and their fans about traumatic brain injuries and their impact on the game. The play takes an unflinching look at the lives and loves around this singularly American sport - and the lingering questions it asks of us all. This dynamic world premiere is commissioned by Berkeley Rep and developed through The Ground Floor: Berkeley Rep's Center for the Creation and Development of New Work. It begins previews on Berkeley Rep's intimate Thrust Stage on Friday, January 16, 2015, opens Friday, January 23, 2015, and runs through Sunday, March 1, 2015.

Today, The Ground Floor: Berkeley Rep's Center for the Creation and Development of New Work announces that it has selected 18 projects from more than 30 innovative artists for its third Summer Residency Lab. This June, as part of an extraordinary laboratory for collaboration, some of the nation's most prominent and promising writers, directors, and composers will unite at the Theatre's campus in West Berkeley for an intense four-week period to live, dine, and create new plays together. Dozens more local and out-of-town actors and directors will join The Ground Floor process, bringing the number of artists involved close to 100.

Center Stage announces today the first Play Lab of the 2013-14 Season. KJ Sanchez (ReEntry) and American Records will present a workshop reading of their newest piece under development, The American Football Project, December 6-8.

Center Stage announces today the first Play Lab of the 2013-14 Season. KJ Sanchez (ReEntry) and American Records will present a workshop reading of their newest piece under development, The American Football Project, December 6-8.

Theatre 167 will present the Manhattan Premiere of THE JACKSON HEIGHTS TRILOGY, a rotating repertory of three plays about the Queens, New York neighborhood famous for being the world's most diverse community. Created by 18 playwrights and starring a company of 37 actors playing 93 multicultural roles, the plays were conceived and will be directed by Ari Laura Kreith. The trilogy will inaugurate the newly renovated 777 Theatre, located at 777 8th Avenue at 47th Street beginning February 8th. While each of the plays has been presented individually in Queens to critical acclaim, this is the first time any of these plays will be seen in Manhattan and the first time they are being presented together in repertory, where audiences can see them individually or all in one day.

The New York International Fringe Festival will feature the award winning musical Mother Eve's Secret Garden of Sensual Sisterhood, book by Uma Incrocci, Erica Jensen, and Kirk McGee, with music by Christian Pedersen, lyrics by Uma Incrocci, choreography by Ashley Wren Collins, musical direction by Jason Wynn and directed by Erica Jensen. Mother Eve will play at The Players Theatre (115 MacDougal Street) from August 15 - 26. Tickets are available at www.FringeNYC.org for $15 in advance, $18 at the door.

Mother Eve's Secret Garden of Sensual Sisterhood, a 60 minute version of the hit full-length musical comedy that was nominated for 7 awards and won 3 at the 2011 Midtown International Theatre Festival, and has also been presented live at The People's Improv Theater (The PIT) in New York City, will open the Los Angeles Comedy Festival on Friday, April 20th at 7:00p.m.

Mother Eve's Secret Garden of Sensual Sisterhood, a 60 minute version of the hit full-length musical comedy that was nominated for 7 awards and won 3 at the 2011 Midtown International Theatre Festival, and has also been presented live at The People's Improv Theater (The PIT) in New York City, will open the Los Angeles Comedy Festival on Friday, April 20th at 7:00p.m.