OZMA OF OZ Set for Playwrights Foundation's Rough Readings Series Today & Tomorrow

The Playwrights Foundation's 2013 Winter Rough Readings Series concludes with readings of Rob Melrose's adaptation of OZMA of OZ today, December 2, 7:30pm at Roble Hall, Stanford University and tomorrow, Tuesday, December 3, 7pm at The Thick House, San Francisco. Directed by Rob Melrose, OZMA of OZ is a trip-hop musical based on L. Frank Baum's third book in the Wizard of Oz series and presented in partnership with Cutting Ball Theatre.

OZMA of OZ chronicles Dorothy's return to Oz and is a kind of sequel to The Wonderful Wizard of Oz. OZMA of OZ features music by Bay Area electro-rock group Z.O.N.K. giving the piece its own 21st Century San Francisco spin. Dorothy and a talking chicken Billinia are the sole survivors of a shipwreck and find themselves in the fairy kingdom of Ev. Ev is separated from Oz by a dangerous, impassable desert. In order to rejoin her old friends the Scarecrow, the Tin Man, and the Cowardly Lion in Oz, Dorothy must gather a New Group of friends in Ev in order to defeat the Nome King of Ev. If you thought a Tin Man and a Talking Scarecrow was strange, wait until you meet a Princess with 31 interchangeable heads, a talking Sawhorse, the world's first robot, a hungry tiger and the beautiful and powerful OZMA of OZ!

Rob Melrose is the Artistic Director and co-founder of the Cutting Ball Theater and works nationally as a freelance director. He has directed at The Guthrie Theater (Happy Days,Pen, Julius Caesar - with The Acting Company); The Oregon Shakespeare Festival (Troilus and Cressida - in association with The Public Theater), Magic Theatre (An Accident, World Premiere); PlayMakers Rep (Happy Days); California Shakespeare Theater (Villains, Fools, and Lovers); Black Box Theatre (The Creature, World Premiere, BATCC Award for direction), as well as Actors' Collective; The Gamm Theatre; and Crowded Fire, among others. His directing credits at Cutting Ball include Strindberg Cycle: The Chamber Plays in Rep (the first time all five of Strindberg's Chamber Plays have been produced together in rep in any language including Swedish), Krispy Kritters in the Scarlett Night (World Premiere) , Pelleas & Melisande, the Bay Area Premiere of Will Eno's Lady Grey (in ever lower light); The Tempest; The Bald Soprano; Victims of Duty; Bone to Pick and Diadem(World Premiere); Endgame; Krapp's Last Tape; The Taming of the Shrew; Macbeth;Hamletmachine; As You Like It; The Death of the Last Black Man in the Whole Entire World; Mayakovsky: A Tragedy; My Head Was a Sledgehammer; Roberto Zucco; The Vomit Talk of Ghosts (World Premiere); The Sandalwood Box; Pickling; Ajax for Instance;Helen of Troy (World Premiere); and Drowning Room (World Premiere). Translations include No Exit, Woyzeck, Ubu Roi, Pelléas and Mélisande, The Bald Soprano, The Chairs, Communiqué #10, and Ubu Roi. His translations of Woyzeck, Ubu Roi, and Pelléas & Melisande have been published by EXIT Press. He is a recipient of the NEA / TCG Career Development Program award for directors. He has taught at Stanford University, UC Berkeley, USF, the University of Rhode Island and Marin Academy. He has a B.A. in English and Theater from Princeton University where he graduated magna cum laude and an M.F.A. in directing from the Yale School of Drama.

For the Rough Readings Series selected writers are assigned a stellar cast and director drawn from the 'A' list of local talent, and recieve eight hours in our studio to work out with a new play in its early development,. The plays are then subject to two open rehearsal sessions in front of audiences who are eager to hear this rough work. The results are often extraordinary. Many of these plays and playwrights are first introduced to the Bay Area theaters through the series, or are presented in collaboration with theaters interested in producing the work. Previous Rough Readings Serieshave included Katori Hall (The Mountaintop) , Rajiv Joseph (Bengal Tiger at the Baghdad Zoo) and Peter Nachtrieb (Bob).

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