The Horse in Motion to Produce West Coast Premiere of WELLESLEY GIRL

The Horse in Motion announces their upcoming production, the West Coast premiere of Brendan Pelsue's political satire, Wellesley Girl.

The play takes place in the year 2465, with little remaining of the United States. For the few survivors living inside a walled citadel, politics carries on as usual - with all the pageantry and partisanship of an old government that is now a distant memory. But when an opposing army shows up at their gates, the citizens of the new United States are confronted with the most important decision of their lives. With political grandstanding, personal sacrifice, and a love triangle with a robot, Wellesley Girl asks audiences to confront the question: what if your vote could truly determine the future of the country?

The play had its world premiere at the 2016 Humana Festival at The Actors Theatre of Louisville. Playwright Brendan Pelsue is a 2016 graduate from the Yale School of Drama with a MFA in playwriting. Pelsue lives in New York City, and will be traveling to Seattle to workshop the play with the company in advance of the production. "I am excited to work on Wellesley because the play is about citizenship--to our countries, to ourselves, and to the people we love," said Pelsue. "These questions are often inspiring, but when the world is dangerous, they can also be frightening. I hope the play manages to examine them honestly. Right now that feels important."

"We were drawn to Wellesley Girl because I think it fundamentally challenges the audience," said director and Horse in Motion company member Bobbin Ramsey. "As a company that is dedicated to activating the theatrical experience for audiences, this play encourages and sometimes demands that audiences examine their personal level of civic engagement. This play asks 'what if your vote really mattered? What if the fate of all those around you was reliant on your responsibility as a citizen?' For me, that is a powerful and necessary question to be asking ourselves in our current political climate."

Wellesley Girl marks something of a departure for The Horse in Motion in form, if not in content. The company's previous shows have included a promenade production spanning three floors of the University Heights Center, brunch theatre at the Can Can burlesque club, and an immersive mashup of eight plays from the 1940s performed in numerous spaces in and around the historic Penthouse Theatre.

"It was important to us as a company that our commitment to theatre remains focused on providing audiences with an activated and meaningful experience," said Ramsey. "In the past that has meant site-specific, immersive, and promenade productions. For our upcoming production, it means looking at how theatre can reshape the way we interact with democracy and our conception of responsibility for our community. Wellesley Girl will challenge us and our audiences to take action, stay active, and investigate the relationship between theatre and civic power."

The play will open April 13, 2017 at the new 18th and Union space (formerly New City Theatre). It will run through April 29 with performances Wednesday through Monday at 7:30pm. Tickets go on sale February 20, and are $25 for general admission, and $15 for students and industry members.

Wellesley Girl

By Brendan Pelsue

Directed by Bobbin Ramsey

18th and Union

April 13-29

Tickets $15-$25

Tickets and info: www.thehorseinmotion.org

About the Playwright:

Brendan Pelsue is a playwright, librettist, and translator whose work has been produced in New York and regionally. His play Wellesley Girl premiered at the 2016 Humana Festival of New American Plays. Hagoromo, a dance-opera piece for which he wrote the libretto, has appeared at the Brooklyn Academy Of Music and the Pocantico Center. Other work includes New Domestic Architecture at the Yale Carlotta Festival, Read to Me at the 2015 Bay Area Playwrights Festival, Lost Weekend with The Actors Theatre of Louisville Apprentice Company, Parking Lot, Riverbank: a Noh Play for Northerly Americans, and a translation of Molière's Don Juan at the Yale School of Drama. He has been commissioned by South Coast Repertory, American Opera Projects, and The Actors Theatre of Louisville Professional Training Company. He was a 2017 artist-in-residence at Chateau de la Napoule, France, where he worked on the soon-to-be released audio drama series We Are Not These People. He has taught or mentored at Yale College, Wesleyan University, and Lesley University. Originally from Newburyport, MA, he received his MFA from Yale School of Drama and his BA from Brown University, where he received the Weston Prize in playwriting.

About The Horse in Motion:

The mission of The Horse in Motion is to "engage our audience in new experiences that expand the traditional conception of theatre and reshape how we interact with art, our community and the world." The company was founded in 2014 by a group of recent graduates from the University of Washington School of Drama. The company's inaugural production was a critically acclaimed staging of Martin Crimp's Attempts on Her Life, performed in multiple rooms of the historic University Heights Center. Since then the company has produced a variety of non-traditional performances including a morning festival of Brecht titled BrechtFest, two iterations of an internet-based multi-media festival, an original performance in the European Gallery at the Seattle Art Museum, and an immersive promenade piece based on eight plays from the UW School of Drama's inaugural 1940-41 season. Working with a collaborative, process-driven method, The Horse in Motion is committed to presenting theatre that is challenging and fresh, and that creates the inspiration and opportunity for dialogue, creativity and action.

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