Ira Brind School of Theater Arts Presents Top Girls & High Fidelity

Two emerging female directors and University of the Arts alumni will lead a new generation of undergrads in October productions produced by the Ira Brind School of Theater Arts. Award-winning director Jackson Gay will direct Caryl Churchill's Top Girls (Oct. 6 - 9). Megan Nicole O'Brien, a Barrymore nominated director and co-founder of Philadelphia's 11th Hour Theatre Company, will direct the Philadelphia premiere of the musical High Fidelity (Oct. 14 - 16 & 20 - 22).

Gay graduated from The University of the Arts (UArts) in 1999 with a BFA in acting. She received her MFA in directing from the Yale School of Drama and currently directs off-Broadway and throughout the U.S. at prestigious venues like People's Light & Theatre, Red Bull Theater in New York, Alley Theatre in Houston and at new play festivals such as Sundance, Ojai and PlayPenn.

Caryl Churchill's Top Girls begins as a fantasy encounter with iconic historical figures, as Marlene, a modern-day executive, hosts a dinner party to celebrate a recent job promotion and invites five women from the past as her guests. As the play unfolds, Churchill examines the kinds of challenges that ambitious women must face in their pursuit of success, and the price that Marlene has paid to become a "Top Girl." Since its premiere at the Royal Court Theater in 1982, Churchill's play has been hailed as a "bold and provocative" (Variety) milestone in contemporary playwriting. Top Girls runs Oct. 6 - 9 at UArts' Caplan Studio Theater, located at 211 South Broad St., 16th Floor. [A full schedule and ticket information follows below.]

Later in the month, Brind School students will offer two weekends of performances in High Fidelity in a production directed by Megan Nicole O'Brien. A Philadelphia-based director, O'Brien is most recently credited with the revival of 11th Hour Theatre Company's hip-hop take on Shakespeare The Bomb-itty of Errors, and is nominated for the 2011 Barrymore Award for Outstanding Direction of a Musical for The Great American Trailer Park Musical for 11th Hour, of which she is a co-founder and Resident Director.

High Fidelity is a musical adaptation of the 1995 Nick Hornby novel (also known as the Touchstone Pictures film from 2000 starring John Cusack). A high-voltage score becomes Rob Gordon's soundtrack as he revisits past relationships in an attempt to better understand love and life. High Fidelity runs Oct. 14 - 16 and 20 - 22 at the Arts Bank Theater, located at 601 South Broad St.

The casts of the two productions are comprised of students in the Brind School's BFA conservatory programs in Acting and Musical Theater. Scenic, costume, and lighting design and stage management are also provided by Brind School students in the BFA Theater Design & Technology and Directing, Playwriting, and Production programs. This hands-on approach to training is a requirement of the university, creating a formidable reputation for producing talented theater artists, many of whom continue to work in the Greater Philadelphia area. This year alone, UArts alumni and faculty garnered 12 Barrymore Award nominations.
SCHEDULE & TICKETS

Tickets for Top Girls and High Fidelity are available online at tickets.uarts.edu. Further information is available by phone at (215) 717-6499.

 

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