Sarah Ruhl News

Marin Theatre Company presents the final show of its highly successful 2008-09 season with a seminal work of modern comedy, Joe Orton's uproarious farce What the Butler Saw in MTC's Boyer Theatre beginning June 4.

American Conservatory Theater (A.C.T.) announces the final show of its 2008-09 season: Edward Albee's At Home at the Zoo, staged by acclaimed director Rebecca Bayla Taichman (world premieres of Theresa Rebeck's The Scene and Mauritius and Sarah Ruhl's Dead Man's Cell Phone). This new spellbinder by the master playwright who also penned Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf? and A.C.T.'s The Goat, or Who is Sylvia?, is a meticulously calibrated and dangerously brutal look at relationships intimate and unexpected. The story opens with Peter, a tweedy book editor, and his wife, Ann, whose everyday conversation takes an unexpected turn into dangerously personal territory. It's the kind of conversation that can drive a husband out for a walk-to Central Park, where Jerry, a desperate outcast, awaits. An unforgettable pairing of Albee's original The Zoo Story with a freshly penned prequel, At Home at the Zoo (formerly titled Peter and Jerry) bares its teeth to threaten the delicately balanced world its characters inhabit. Artistic Director Carey Perloff has put together an all-star artistic team on this production, featuring Tony Award-nominated actor Manoel Felciano (Ragtime at The Kennedy Center, A.C.T.'s Rock 'n' Roll, and Sweeney Todd on Broadway) as Jerry and scenic designer Robert Brill, who received a Tony Award nomination last week for his work on Guys and Dolls on Broadway. Hailed by critics as 'a thoroughly satisfying package of jagged-edged provocation' (Newsday) and 'an essential and heartening experience' (The New York Times), Edward Albee's At Home at the Zoo plays at A.C.T. June 5-July 5, 2009. Opening night is Wednesday, June 10, 2009, at 8 p.m. Tickets-starting at $14-are available by calling A.C.T. Ticket Services at 415.749.2228, or at www.act-sf.org.

It?s like a scene from an Edward Hopper painting ? a young woman sits in a nearly-deserted café. A cell phone rings incessantly at a nearby table, but its owner, Gordon, doesn?t answer. There?s a good reason ? he?s dead. The woman, Jean, feels compelled to answer the insistent ringing, and this action starts her on an unexpected journey through the dead man?s life, as Stage West presents the area premiere of Sarah Ruhl?s Dead Man?s Cell Phone, beginning Thursday, May 21.

Following a critically acclaimed season which included the Pulitzer Prize finalist Becky Shaw and the Broadway transfer of its musical hit Next to Normal, Second Stage Theatre (Carole Rothman, Artistic Director; Ellen Richard, Executive Director) has announced three of the four plays scheduled for its upcoming 31st Season.

A new play written and directed by Paul Weitz and the rain-check run of the latest Douglas Carter Beane play are set for the 2009-10 season at Off Broadway's Second Stage Theater according to a report in Variety.

13P, the OBIE-winning company comprising 13 playwrights, will present The First (and Last) Annual 'THIRTINI AWARDS' at Joe's Pub, 425 Lafayette Street, for one performance only on Monday, May 11 at 7 p.m. (doors open at 6:00 p.m.) The coveted awards will be presented by 13P to the mentors and heroes who have inspired them with their seminal contributions to new American plays: Craig Lucas, Suzan-Lori Parks, Paula Vogel, and Mac Wellman

The SF Playhouse (Bill English, Artistic Director; Susi Damilano, Producing Director) is pleased to announce casting for the Bay Area Premiere of Sarah Ruhl's Dead Man's Cell Phone which will fill the previously unannounced 5th slot in its 2008-09 season line up.

The SF Playhouse (Bill English, Artistic Director; Susi Damilano, Producing Director) is pleased to announce that the Bay Area Premiere of Sarah Ruhl's Dead Man's Cell Phone will fill the previously unannounced 5th slot in its 2008-09 season line up.

Playwrights Horizons (Tim Sanford, Artistic Director; Leslie Marcus, Managing Director) is now accepting entries for its popular LIVEforFIVE online lottery for $5 tickets to its next production, the New York premiere of OUR HOUSE, a new play by Pulitzer Prize finalist Theresa Rebeck (The Butterfly Collection and Bad Dates at Playwrights Horizons, Broadway's Mauritius, co-author of Omnium Gatherum). At least 50 tickets will be available via the online lottery.

Playwrights Horizons (Tim Sanford, Artistic Director; Leslie Marcus, Managing Director) is now accepting entries for its popular LIVEforFIVE online lottery for $5 tickets to its next production, the New York premiere of OUR HOUSE, a new play by Pulitzer Prize finalist Theresa Rebeck (The Butterfly Collection and Bad Dates at Playwrights Horizons, Broadway's Mauritius, co-author of Omnium Gatherum). At least 50 tickets will be available via the online lottery.

Award winning Steppenwolf playwright Lisa Dillman has chosen ROGUE MACHINE to present the West Coast premiere of her play HALF OF PLENTY, for their season opener of 2009. This hilarious and chilling take on lean times and family values in America expresses some all too familiar anxieties on modern living.

Local playwright Karen Zacarías offers Arena Stage audiences the world premiere of Legacy of Light, a funny and moving romp about the passion for truth as lived by two different women in their separate eras.

Local playwright Karen Zacarías offers Arena Stage audiences the world premiere of Legacy of Light, a funny and moving romp about the passion for truth as lived by two different women in their separate eras.

13P, the OBIE-winning company comprising 13 playwrights, as previously announced, will present its spring benefit The First (and Last) Annual 'THIRTINI AWARDS' at Joe's Pub, 425 Lafayette Street, for one performance only on Monday, May 11 at 7:00 p.m. (doors open at 6:00 p.m.) The coveted awards will be presented by 13P to the mentors and heroes who have inspired them with their seminal contributions to new American plays: Craig Lucas, Suzan-Lori Parks, Paula Vogel, and Mac Wellman.

Rehearsals are now underway at Playwrights Horizons (Tim Sanford, Artistic Director; Leslie Marcus, Managing Director) for the New York premiere of OUR HOUSE, a new play by Pulitzer Prize finalist Theresa Rebeck (The Butterfly Collection and Bad Dates at Playwrights Horizons, Broadway's Mauritius, co-author of Omnium Gatherum). A scathing new comedy that shakes up Reality TV, OUR HOUSE is the final production of the theater company's 2008/2009 Season.

The Wilma Theater will celebrate co-Artistic Directors Blanka Zizka and Jiri Zizka's 30th Anniversary with The Wilma Theater and will honor Board Chair Peggy Greenawalt at its 2009 Gala on May 1, 2009 beginning at 6:30 p.m.

Acclaimed Off-Broadway theater company Playwrights Horizons (Tim Sanford, Artistic Director; Leslie Marcus, Managing Director) will hold its annual Spring Gala Benefit on Monday evening, April 27th at Guastavino's (409 East 59th Street).

The Cleveland Play House Artistic Director Michael Bloom announces the world premiere production of Thornton Wilder's novel Heaven's My Destination, adapted by award-winning playwright Lee Blessing. The play is the centerpiece of the fourth annual FusionFest, a multidisciplinary performing arts festival.

Marin Theatre Company is pleased to present the world premiere of Magic Forest Farm by Zayd Dohrn, winner of the first annual Sky Cooper New American Play Prize in 2008. The production will be staged in MTC's 99-seat Lieberman Theatre. From one of America's hottest young playwrights comes a riveting story of a young woman's desperate search for her past. Seventeen year-old Allegra is beginning to piece together the swirling memories of her early years in the beautiful woods of Northern California on a mystical commune called Magic Forest Farm. Mixing with joyous recollections of waterfalls and wildflowers are darker revelations and startling images of the people she thinks she trusts most. A journey begins that takes Allegra back to the commune, back to the past, to confront the truth.

Award winning Steppenwolf playwright Lisa Dillman has chosen ROGUE MACHINE to present the West Coast premiere of her play HALF OF PLENTY, for their season opener of 2009. This hilarious and chilling take on lean times and family values in America expresses some all too familiar anxieties on modern living.