Steven Anthony Jones, Julia Brothers, & Margo Hall Head Up Company For 32nd Annual Playwrights Festival 7/17-7/26

The Playwrights Foundation (PF) is proud to announce its company of top actors, directors and dramaturgs for the 32nd annual Bay Area Playwrights Festival, which will take place July 17-26 at the Magic Theatre in San Francisco. Helming the winning Festival plays are directors Ben Guillory of the Robey Theatre in Los Angeles, Sean Daniels, of Actors Theatre of Louisville, Mark Routhier, Molly Aaronson Gelb, Jonathan Spector and new comer Lila Neugebaur, who will collaborate with dramaturgs Jayne Wenger (former PF Artistic Director), Dominic Orlando, Maryanne Olson, Beatrice Basso, Laura Brueckner and Sonia Fernandez. Over 40 actors will participate this year, and represent a diverse cross-section of the most celebrated performing artists in the Bay Area. Heading The company are: Stephen Anthony Jones, Julia Brothers, Margo Hall, C. Kelly Wright, Soren Oliver, Naomi Newman, Peter Nachtrieb, Corey Fisher, Nick Pelzcar, Jeri Lynn Cohen, Domenique Lozano, Catherine Castallanos, Arwen Anderson and Danielle Levin. As creative collaborators in PF's in-depth development process during the Festival's two weeks, these artists will provide the playwrights with the creative resources and tools they need to advance their plays to completion, helping them to realize their creative vision in three dimensions. "Talented collaborators are key to a playwright being able to hear where a play needs improvement and sculpting," says PF Resident Dramaturg Maryanne Olson, "and the Playwrights Foundation has attracted some of the best talent in the region to foster excellence and innovation in the American theater." All seven plays will be performed script in hand, rendered in two beautifully staged readings at the intimate Magic Theatre where audiences can participate in the creation of a play, meet actors and directors and interact with contemporary playwrights.

The artists who have gathered to support the development of new theater is a testament to the growing importance of Playwrights Foundation as a top regional center to support fresh, vanguard playwrights in the development of national new plays. "With these talented artists, playwrights have access to truly exceptional resources to test their material in front of the Bay Area's discerning audiences," says Amy Mueller, Playwrights Foundation's Artistic Director, "and, it's a great time celebrate the diversity and range of our incredible creativity as a region. In an era when safe, tried-and-true Broadway hits are being performed on regional stages across the country, it's so important to continue to support riskier, as-yet-unknown artists. The Bay Area is known as a vital artists' community, and we can't wait to bring that unique perspective to the national stage."

This year's festival includes five full-length, previously unproduced plays by Christopher Chen, Deborah Stein, Robert Henry Johnson, Sharyn Rothstein and Julia Jarcho; and two commissioned one-act plays for the Festival's Bay Area SHorts (BASH!) program, by young local writers. "Lauren Yee and Martha Jane Kaufman are truly unique up-and-comers in the American Theater. Each of these young women have a distinct, singular voice, and are in the best sense, experimental writers with an edge. We are thrilled to be among the first to discover their talents, and push them forward as artists." says Mueller.

BAY AREA PLAYSWRIGHTS FESTIVAL 2009:

· Robert Henry Johnson with "The Othello Papers" (San Francisco);
In a hilarious hip-hop infused romp set in present day Venice, Othello convenes all 6 of Shakespeare's black characters for a secret meeting to plot revolution against The Master. But they're up against a pen as mighty as any sword (or AK-47 for that matter) - what will it take to escape the pull of destiny?
Director: Ben Guillory; Dramaturg: Dominic Orlando
Actors: Steven Anthony Jones, Lisa Morse, Myers Clark, Margo Hall, Michael Louis Wells, Lance Gardner, Detroit Dunwod, and Amaya Alonso Halifax

· Christopher Chen with Anomienaulis (San Francisco);
An absurdist adaptation of Euripides' Iphigenia at Aulis in which an entire army of young, virile, waiting men entertain themselves with video games and sitcoms - while King Agamemnon prevaricates the sacrifice of his youngest virginal daughter, Iphigenia. Seen against the cruelty of ancient Greek sacrificial rituals, the ennui of contemporary culture reveals its dark psychic stain.
Director: Mark Routhier; Dramaturg: Beatrice Basso
Actors: Robert Parsons, Soren Oliver, Ryan Tasker, Liz Anderson, Peter Ruocco, Aaron Wilton, Kalli Johnson, Lily Balsen and Torie Laher.

· Deborah Stein with Natasha and The Coat (Minneapolis);
A hip, contemporary young woman, comes face to face with her 19th Century Jewish roots when she becomes entangled with a Hasidic family, and their young unmarried son. Coffee, a priceless fur coat, and a dry cleaner all play a part in this comic take on fashion, mysticism, and religious tradition.
Director: Sean Daniels; Dramaturg: Laura Brueckner
Actors: Danielle Levin, Corey Fisher, Naomi Newman, Dominique Lozano and Nick Pelzcar.

· Sharyn Rothstein with March (New York)
Unbeknownst to their parents, two lonely teenagers meet nightly as avatars in a Second Life-like game to battle monsters on increasing levels of danger and skill. Meanwhile, their respective families, living at opposite ends of the same state, struggle with monsters of a different sort. A real-life crisis threatens to defeat even the most skilled players, real and imagined.
Director: Jonathan Spector; Dramaturg: Sonia Fernández
Actors: Jackson Davis, Jeri Lynn Cohen, Thomas Azar, Katie Tkel, Trevor Roderick, Jayne Deely, Catherine Castellanos and Rueben Gonzalez.

· Julia Jarcho with American Treasure (San Francisco) (PF Resident Playwright)
A real History Detective gets a hot tip from a young vagabond with a harrowing past, while the Hauntus keeps singing her sad song... This play is a comic thriller a la 1940's pulp fiction, infused with a film noir sensibility, and dissects the classic American good guy/bad guy legend and its mythic relationship to ‘real' American Indians.
Ms. Jarcho is also the Director; Dramaturg: Maryanne Olson
Actors: Christen Karle and Peter Nachtrieb
BASH! (Bay Area SHorts!) for local emerging playwrights.

· Martha Jane Kaufman has created House and Junction
Director: Molly Aaronson Gelb; Dramaturg: Jayne Wenger
Actors: C. Kelly Wright, Katherine Zdan, Alexandra Creighton and Michael Asberry.

· Lauren Yee has created Our Peculiar Institution
Director: Lila Neugebauer; Dramaturg: Jayne Wenger
Actors: Robert Hampton, Cathleen Riddley, Anthony Nemirovsky, Arwen Anderson.

Two very different takes on the relationship of blacks and whites during the American civil war.

The 32nd Annual Bay Area Playwrights Festival
July 17 - 26, 2009
Magic Theatre
Fort Mason, Bldg D
San Francisco
For more information, guests can visit http://playwrightsfoundation.org