Aurora Theatre presents EUREKA DAY by Jonathan Spector, 4/13-5/13

Aurora Theatre Company presents the world premiere of EUREKA DAY by Jonathan Spector with Josh Costello to direct. Set in a Berkeley private school, a debate over child vaccinations hits home in this comedy of liberal manners, as the school community confronts the central question of our era: how do you find consensus when you can't agree on the facts?

EUREKA DAY runs April 13 through May 13, opening April 19 on the theatre's mainstage and is underwritten in part by Zellerbach Family Foundation.

At forward-thinking Eureka Day School, all decisions are made by consensus and everyone's opinion is valued. But when a crisis puts their children in danger, it turns out that Eureka Day parents have different definitions of safety.

Between headlines about California's low-childhood vaccination rate that highlights a Berkeley private school (https://www.nytimes.com/2018/01/16/upshot/measles-vaccination-california-students.html) and the swirling national debate over what is a fact, EUREKA DAY couldn't be more topical.

Aurora's Originate+Generate (O+G) program commissioned EUREKA DAY from Spector, an Oakland-based playwright and two-time Aurora Global Age Project-winner. O+G focuses primarily on developing new work for the Aurora stages, putting an emphasis on supporting local theater makers.

Spector's plays include Good. Better. Best. Bested., This Much I Know, Adult Swim, and In From The Cold.? His work has been developed with San Francisco Playhouse, Source Theater Festival (Washington, DC), Playwrights Foundation, Aurora, Something Marvelous (Chicago), Mugwumpin and Stanford's National Center for New Plays. He has received Theatre Bay Area's TITAN award, an Emerging Playwright Award from PlayGround, been a two-time winner of Aurora Theater's Global Age Prize. He is a Resident Playwright at Playwrights' Foundation and co-artistic director of the Berkeley-based Just Theatre.

Josh Costello directs this incisive new work that is funny, poignant, and oh-so-Berkeley. Literary manager and artistic associate at Aurora Theatre Company, where he previously directed Detroit, Wittenberg, and The Heir Apparent. He received the Theatre Bay Area Award for Outstanding Direction for the world premiere of Ideation by Aaron Loeb at San Francisco Playhouse, which was named a New York Times Critics Pick when it transferred to 59E59 in New York.

Costello has assembled a cast of Bay Area favorites: Elizabeth Carter, Charisse Loriaux, Lisa Anne Porter, Rolf Saxon, and Teddy Spencer.

Returning to Aurora, Elizabeth Carter's (Trouble In Mind, Wittenberg) stage performing credits include Marin Theatre Company, Magic Theatre, San Jose Stage, and TheatreWorks.

Charisse Loriaux also returns to Aurora (Trojan Woman, Posing for Gauguin). Her stage credits include San Francisco Playhouse, Magic Theatre, Shotgun Theatre, Lorraine Hansberry Theatre and Crowded Fire.

Lisa Anne Porter makes her Aurora debut. Her stage credits include Magic Theatre, Syracuse Stage, Boston Theatreworks, Bay Area Playwrights Festival, Cal Shakes. As a dialect coach, her work for Aurora includes Salamania, "MASTER HAROLD" ... and the boys, and Temple.

Rolf Saxon returns to Aurora (After the Revolution, Talley's Folly). His stage and film credits include Theatreworks, Jewel Theatre, Royal Shakespeare Company, Theatre Complicite, Mission Impossible, Entrapment, and Saving Private Ryan.

Teddy Spencer (Talley & Son) makes his mainstage Aurora debut. Hia stage credits include ACT, Center REP, Dallas Theatre Center, Milwaukee Repertory Theatre, and the Universal film Steve Jobs.

Creative team includes: Teddy Hulsker--sound/video design; Richard Olmsted--set design; Jeff Rowlings--lighting design; Maggie Whitaker--costume design.