William di Canzio Wins Julie Harris Award, Showcases His Play 6/4-7 In Philly
By: Gabrielle Sierra Jun. 01, 2009
White Pines Productions, a newly formed Production Company, is presenting a showcase of a heartfelt new work by local playwright William di Canzio. The play, Johnny Has Gone for A Soldier, will be showcased June 4-7 at the Playground at the Adrienne, 2030 Sansom Street. The show, directed by noted local actor, Benjamin Lloyd includes a cast of celebrated local and New York actors. Tickets cost $15 and can be found online at www.johnnyhasgone.com or directly from TicketLeap at www.johnnyhasgone.ticketleap.com.
The winner of the Beverly Hills Theatre Guild Playwright Award, which is given annually as part of the Julie Harris Playwrights Awards Johnny Has Gone for a Soldier begins in a small New England town in 2005, and tells a story with ties to the Orpheus and Eurydice myth. Dan meets Sarah at the local community college. They fall in love. Within days, Dan discovers his National Guard unit will be deployed to Iraq. Not content to say good-bye, he persuades Sarah to marry him before he leaves. Across oceans and battlefields, the newlyweds communicate through passionate letters. As Sarah and Dan's mother count the days till he returns, Dan is assigned to guard a prison in Baghdad. While serving there, he encounters an Iraqi who opens his eyes to the splendor and devastation of the civilization around him and to the timeless nature of his love for Sarah. As the identity of this mysterious man unfolds, Dan discovers the depth of his own humanity. As the play advances to its surprising and inevitable ending, it takes a heartfelt look at love and the effects of war on families and communities.
Di Canzio pulled his inspiration from the play from two stories he heard on NPR. One was the story of a young widow who barely spent time with her new spouse before he was shipped off to Iraq. The other was the story of an Iraqi man whose entire family was wiped out when the building next to their house was "smart-bombed."
"I heard the young widow's story in 2006," di Canzio said. "About the same time I first heard the old Appalachian song of the title. It was as if the girl's story and the song ‘rhymed' across centuries. The next summer, I heard the story of the smart bomb told by the young American who had guided it from a computer in the Pentagon. Only when he came to Iraq did he see what he had done in reality, not on a screen. He also met the old man whose family had died. He told his radio interviewer that he decided then that he would not be reenlisting. That's when I started writing-putting my own emotions and imagination to work and weaving it all together. In two months I had a draft of the play."
Recent Temple University MFA graduate Noah Drew is playing Dan. Drew's recent credits include: one-man show Kicked (Figure/Ground Theatre) and Caucasian Chalk Circle, The Merchant of Venice, Ragtime, The Devils and How I Learned to Drive (Temple University). Amanda Schoonover is playing Sarah. Schoonover is a six-time Barrymore Award nominee, receiving two nominations (supporting actress and ensemble in a play) for her work as Dottie Smith in Theatre Exile's Killer Joe. J. Paul Nicholas, who recently appeared is Nihad in the highly acclaimed production of Scorched at The Wilma Theater, is playing The Iraqi Prisoner. Longtime People's Light and Theatre Company members Mark Lazar and Marcia Saunders are portraying Dan's commanding officer and his mother.
Benjamin Lloyd is directing this showcase. Lloyd became connected to the project after reading an early draft of the script. His directing credits include: The Dreamer Examines his Pillow (Theatre Exile), Life without Parole, Please (Kraine Theater); and Hamlet Quarto 1 and Eccentrics (People's Light & Theatre). A noted local actor, he recently appeared as Alphonse Lebow in Scorched at the Wilma. Matt Saunders is designing the set. Saunders, a founding member of New Paradise Laboratories, is the 2007 recipient of the F. Otto Haas Emerging Theatre Artist Award. He has designed for more than 60 shows locally. Christopher Colucci is composing the music and designing the sound. Colucci recently did sound for Born Yesterday (Walnut Street) and many others. He is a 2008 Barrymore Award winner for Outstanding Sound Design. Joshua L. Shulman is setting the lighting. He won a Barrymore Award for his lighting design of Art at Delaware Theater Company. Regina Rizzo is designing costumes. Her recent credits include: Long Day's Journey into Night (Simpatico); Romeo & Juliet (Delaware Theatre Festival); Jump/Cut, The Faculty Room, and Impending Rupture of the Belly (Flashpoint); and Compleat Works of Wm Shkspr Abridged and Working (Theatre Horizon).
Playwright William di Canzio has written thirteen plays. The Eugene O'Neill Theater Center, Yale University, Ensemble Studio Theatre LA, Theatre of the Open Eye, West Coast Ensemble, and Haverford College have all staged his works. He has received a commission from The Actors Theatre of Louisville. He is a three-time a resident at the National Playwrights Conference (C-Section, Open Heart, and Hindustan) and was named playwright-in-residence at the Camargo Foundation in Cassis, France, by the Jerome Foundation for his play Dooley. He has received two fellowships in theater from the Pennsylvania Council on the Arts (in recognition of Hindustan and Last Night Home) and was a finalist for the 2008 Pew Fellowships in the Arts.
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