Woolly Mammoth Theatre Company Announces STUPID F***ING BIRD House Lights Up Events

As part of Woolly Mammoth Theatre Company's ongoing initiative to "ignite an explosive engagement between theatre artists and the community," Woolly is pleased to announce the House Lights Up events for its upcoming world premiere of playwright Aaron Posner's Stupid f-ing Bird. Loosely based on Chekhov's The Seagull, Woolly Artistic Director Howard Shalwitz directs this re-imagined version May 27 through June 23, 2013.

An aspiring young director rampages against the art created by his mother's generation. A nubile young actress wrestles with an aging Hollywood star for the affections of a renowned novelist. And everyone discovers just how disappointing love, art, and growing up can be.

In this irreverent, contemporary, and very funny remix of Chekhov's The Seagull, award-winning playwright Aaron Posner wages a timeless battle between young and old, past and present, in search of the true meaning of it all. Through the Connectivity Department and generous grants from the Doris Duke Charitable Foundation, The Andrew Mellon Foundation, and the Theatre Communications Group, Woolly's House Lights Up events will examine these major themes and motifs, challenging audiences to engage past the walls of the theatre. Events will include a technologically-infused lobby experience, an artist mixer, and an interactive art event with FIGMENT DC, as well as post show discussions about the psychological impact of art on the human brain and contemporary innovations in the art world. Digital Lobby Enhancement provided by Method 121.

"We are so thrilled by the support of the Doris Duke Charitable Foundation, the Andrew Mellon Foundation, and the Theatre Communications Group (TCG), as we work to cultivate the next generation of theater audiences," says Woolly Connectivity Director, Jocelyn Prince. "This new funding will enable us to promote and facilitate dialogue with younger patrons, using new media, and encourage them, in turn, to engage their personal networks with the shows on our stage."

HOUSE LIGHTS UP EVENTS

Stupid f-ing Lobby Experience

Patrons are invited to unleash their inner rebel-artist and join us in the lobby during the run of Stupid f-ing Bird to try their hand turning text from Anton Chekhov's The Seagull into a new form - a tweet! Woolly's social media will feature an archive of the tweets from each night, and patrons can undertake the totally absurd task of turning the tweets of other audience members into their own piece of writing. Who knew 140 characters could go so far? #SFLobby

Pinspiration Board:

Patrons can interact with what inspired our artists to make the work seen on stage. Our new touch-screen Pinspiration Board in the lower lobby to will feature the inspiration behind the creation of the world of Stupid f-ing Bird. Inspiration travels, so audiences can always find what sparked an idea in our artists online at pinterest.com/WoollyMammothTC.

Artists Mixer

Thursday, May 30

Mixer at 6pm, Performance at 8pm

Woolly Classroom and Theater

Tickets: $20. For more information, and to purchase tickets, visit www.woollymammoth.net.

Artists across disciplines in the DC area are invited to a networking mixer and discussion about the challenges of creating art in our current environment, and the responsibility/burden of living up to those who have come before us. Stupid f-ing Bird playwright Aaron Posner will lead a conversation about how we create art, how we respond, retaliate against, and remix the work of previous generations. All artistic disciplines are welcome!

Artists and art makers are invited to mix and mingle and stay for the show. The evening includes a reception with discounted drinks, conversation and networking, and one ticket to Stupid f-ing Bird.

Unleash Your Inner Artist!

Saturday, June 1, 2013, 3-6pm

Woolly Rehearsal Hall

Free admission, reservation required. Reserve your tickets at www.woollymammoth.net.

Patrons are invited to bring their creativity to Woolly! In collaboration with FIGMENT DC, Woolly Mammoth invites guests to come play at the theatre. They can participate in an interactive art display, add artistic flair to an existing piece, or create a work all of their own. Patrons will work with artists from across the community to reveal their inner artist.

FIGMENT is a forum for the creation and display of participatory and interactive art by emerging artists across disciplines: a celebration of creative culture. FIGMENT presents an annual free weekend-long participatory arts and creative culture event in cities across the United States, including here in Washington, DC. Unleash Your Inner Artist! features a sampling of the multitude of activities in FIGMENT DC's upcoming fall annual event. For more information, visit www.dc.figmentproject.org.

Post-Show Discussions

Woolly Theatre

Artistic Roots and Revolution: Art that Changed the World

Saturday, June 15, 2013, following the matinee performance

History proves that great art can change the world. Woolly explores some contemporary works of art that have changed the landscape of art making today. Patrons are invited to join a discussion about how those works have impacted both society and the arts world, and which artists are revolutionizing their artistic discipline right now.

Panelists include Yana Sakellion, a designer and artist who works across mediums including graphic design, interactive media and video, and Alan Zilberman, film editor and a contributing theater critic for Brightest Young Things. This panel will be moderated by Milena Kalinovska, Director of Public Programs and Education and curator at the Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden.

Art on the Brain and in the Heart

Saturday, June 22, 2013, following the matinee performance

Art impacts both the artist and the audience. What happens when you look at a painting on a museum wall, and what happened to the painter when they created it? What was the effect of Stupid f-ing Bird on your brain and in your heart? Woolly explores why art matters to us and how art can save, change, and reinvent our lives.

Panelists include Woolly Mammoth Theatre Company Member and Stupid f-ing Bird cast member, Kimberly Gilbert; Dr. David J. Linden, Professor in the Department of Neuroscience at the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine and author of The Compass of Pleasure; and Dr. Donna Betts, an art therapist and Assistant Professor at George Washington University. This panel will be moderated by Jocelyn Prince, Woolly's Connectivity Director.

Panelist Bios:

As a designer and an artist Yana Sakellion works across mediums including graphic design, interactive media, and video. Her practice emphasizes interdisciplinary approach to making and conceptual inquiry, with special interest in Interactive Physical Interface design and Interactive Storytelling. Her clients have included Target Corporation, Johns Hopkins University, The Maryland Historical Society, and the US Postal Service. Yana earned her honorary MFA degree from the Department of Digital + Media at the Rhode Island School of Design, and her work has been exhibited and published nationally and abroad, including the How Magazine Interactive Design Annual, Video and Contemporary Art Festival, Waterpieces, Riga, Latvia and Oslo Screen Festival, Oslo, Norway. She is an Assistant Professor in the Graphic Design program at American University.

Alan Zilberman is the film editor for Brightest Young Things, where he also reviews theatre. He's contributed to The Atlantic, IndieWire, The Washington City Paper, and Tiny Mix Tapes. He holds a bachelor's degree in Economics and English from the University of Maryland, as well as a Masters in Public Policy from George Washington University.

Milena Kalinovska (moderator) is Director of Public Programs at the Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden. She was previously Director of the Institute of Contemporary Art in Boston, Adjunct Curator at the New Museum of Contemporary Art in New York, and Director of Exhibitions at Riverside Studios in London, England. Kalinovska has curated over thirty exhibitions internationally including Beyond Preconceptions: The Sixties Experiment, which toured major museums in Europe, South America, and the USA, and Art into Life: Russian Constructivism 1914 to 1935, held at the Walker Arts Center in Minneapolis and Henry Art Gallery in Seattle. She has worked with artists such as Richard Deacon, Felix Gonzalez-Torres, Nan Goldin, Antony Gormley, Isaac Julien, Cildo Meireles, Annette Messager, Mariko Mori, Richard Prince, Nancy Spero, Bill Viola, and Kara Walker. Kalinovska worked on the Gwangju Biennale 2004 in South Korea, has served on the national advisory committee ofArt21 PBS programs, and has received a number of awards including a nomination for the Turner Prize.

Kimberly Gilbert has been in the DC Theatre-verse for over ten years. She has been a Woolly Company Member since 2006. Woolly shows include: Cooking With Elvis, Big Death Little Death, Martha Josie and the Chinese Elvis, The K of D, Measure For Pleasure,Boom, Fever/Dream, Clybourne Park, The Vibrator Play, A Bright New Boise, Mr Burns, a post-electric play, You for Me for You, andStupid f-ing Bird.

David J. Linden, Ph.D. is a Professor in the Department of Neuroscience at the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine. His laboratory has worked for many years on the cellular substrates of memory storage in the brain and a few other topics. He has a longstanding interest in scientific communication and serves as the Chief Editor of the Journal of Neurophysiology. He is the author of two books on the biology of behavior for a general audience, The Accidental Mind (Harvard/Belknap, 2007) and The Compass of Pleasure (Viking Press, 2011) which, to date, have been translated into 14 languages.

Dr. Donna Betts, PhD, ATR-BC is a professor in the Art Therapy Program at George Washington University. An active clinician and scholar, she has published and presented internationally on a range of topics. Dr. Betts was co-recipient of the 2012 American Art Therapy Association Research Award, for a study she led at the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum. She is a collaborator on a GW-funded study on autism, and recipient of a Department of Defense grant to explore use of a graphic novel authoring tool with Veterans.

FREE THE BEAST!

Stupid f-ing Bird is the second production to be supported by Woolly Mammoth's innovative fundraising effort, Free the Beast!, which was publicly launched last May. Free the Beast! is raising $4 million to support the production of 25 new plays over the next ten years. Some will be commissioned from scratch; others developed from early drafts. All will be given the time and tending they need by to reach maturity, drawing from a menu of support including commissioning, research enhancement, readings and workshops, larger casts, extra rehearsals,

and increased technical resources. Most importantly, each will receive full productions on Woolly Mammoth's stage.

Free the Beast! support for Stupid f-ing Bird included a completion commission for playwright Aaron Posner, funding for the composer of the original score, a one-week workshop at Lake George Theater Lab in upstate New York, and three readings at Woolly Mammoth.

TICKETS

Tickets for Stupid f-ing Bird start at $35, and can be purchased through the Woolly Mammoth Box Office at 202-393-3939, online atwww.woollymammoth.net, or in person at 641 D Street, NW (7th & D). For directions and parking information, please visitwww.woollymammoth.net.

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