25th Anniversary Season

January 10th - June 28th, 2010

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First Stage Productions:

Mine Eyes Have Seen the Glory created and performed by
André De Shields, directed Alfred Preisser. 

Celebrate Black History Month with Broadway star André De Shields in his one person show Mine Eyes Have Seen the Glory In this performance combining story and song, De Shields explores the life of the Great Emancipator, Frederick Douglass, his abolitionist contemporaries and his latter day progeny.

Click here to see more from this production:
www.theworkingtheater.org/MINEEYESHAVESEENTHEGLORY.html

American Jornalero by Ed Cardona, Jr., directed by Victor Maog

Working Theater presents a 2-week run of Ed Cardona Jr.'s newest play American Jornalero takes a humorous and poignant look at a group of day laborers waiting to be picked up for work and their collision with two inept citizen vigilantes fashioning themselves on the Minuteman Project,  a citizens group originally organized to patrol the U.S. Southern border in an effort to keep illegal immigrants out. Click here to see more from this production: www.theworkingtheater.org/americanjornalero.html

3 Sisters, a collaborative reimagination of Chekov's Three Sisters, directed by Maureen Towey.  The play will be set in a nursing home where the residents along with the orderlies and nurses who work in the home are in the process of putting on the play Three Sisters. The plays themes of thwarted longing and stagnation will be poignantly exposed under the unforgiving glare of the fluorescent lights in the nursing home’s rec room.

Commissions and Developmental Readings:

The Poultry Play by Lisa Ramirez, directed by Lisa Peterson

The Theater is commissioning Ms. Ramirez to write a play about immigrant women working in chicken processing plants in upstate New York. Lisa will travel to Sullivan and Columbia Counties to interview the predominately female workers at this plant in order to write a play that will focus as much on these women’s personal lives as their working conditions. Lisa Peterson will direct the developmental reading which Working Theater will present in late June.

Song to a Child Like Me by Manuel Borras, directed by Arin Arbus

Manuel Borras has been a prisoner at a New York State Correctional Facility for seventeen years.  His writing is immediate, poetic and truthful.  Working Theater has commissioned a play from him about a Puerto Rican family in the Bronx.

Working Theater Hits Reading Series:

EXIT CUCKOO (nanny in motherland)
by Lisa Ramirez, directed by Colman Domingo

For two nights only Ramirez reprises the critically acclaimed 2009 hit EXIT CUCKOO, Lisa Ramirez's one-person play about women, the choices they make, the competing pressures they are subject to, and the defining effect this has on how children are raised. The play is a hilarious and profoundly moving collage of mothers, nannies and caretakers, and the complex chemistry between them. For more about last year's acclaimed mainstage production click here.

Tabletop by Rob Ackerman,
directed by Connie Grappo

Nominated for two Drama Desk Awards, winner of special Drama Desk Award for outstanding Ensemble Performance.  Tabletop takes you into the crisis-a-minute world of a TV commercial film studio which provides the product shot, or close-up, of the item the advertisers would like to convince you is absolutely essential to your well-being and survival. The play spans an afternoon of desperate re-shoots in the studio of Marcus Gordon, an autocratic director negotiating the slippery slope of advertising's A-list. Egos clash and burn, truths are revealed and concealed, people survive their jobs, and the work survives the pathology of the workplace. Tension and hilarity alternate unexpectedly as Marcus and his crew pursues the perfect beauty shot of the hero, a pink fruit drink with a swirl on top.

Hold Please by Annie Weisman, directed by Connie Grappo

First produced by Working Theater in 2002, join the original cast (including the multi-award winning Laura Esterman and critic’s darling Jeanine Serrales) for Annie Weisman’s hysterical send-up of 21st Century office politics. "Scathingly funny."  - New York Daily News."Sparklingly original and fun...risky, bold, unusual, and witty." - Variety

I Am a Man by OyamO, directed by Bill Mitchelson

Commissioned by Working Theater in 1991 OyamO’s explosive drama about the Memphis Sanitation Strike of 1968 which culminated in the assassination of Martin Luther King has been produced in venues around the country. It returns to New York for a one-night reading directed by Working Theater founding member Bill Mitchelson.

Special Interests by Joe Sutton directed by Luke Harlan

First performed by Working Theater in 1990, join us for the reading of a Working Theater classic about a the Greyhound bus strike in 1984. Joe Sutton’s work has been produced by London's Old Vic, Seattle Rep, New York Theatre Workshop, BAM, Arena Stage, Long Wharf, the Old Globe, and other theaters around the country and abroad.   His work has been nominated for the Pulitzer Prize and for the “Best Play” by the American Theatre Critics Association. "Special Interests presents sympathetic views of people caught in situations that bring out the best and worst in them. It is a traditional play well told, an observer of how we behave rather than a proponent of how things should be." Richard P. Shepard, The New York Times, February 18, 1990

Artistic Associates:
	Ed Cardona, Jr. Working Theater will present a first stage presentation of Ed’s play American Jornalero. The play takes a humorous look at a group of day laborers waiting to be picked up for work and two inept citizen vigilantes fashioning themselves on the civilian minute men in Texas who patrol the border in an effort to keep illegal immigrants out.
	André De Shields We will celebrate Black History Month with a two-week run of André De Shields in his one person show Mine Eyes Have Seen the Glory… In this solo performance, two-time TONY nominee De Shields explores the life of the Great Emancipator, Frederick Douglass, his abolitionist contemporaries and his latter day progeny through a rich tapestry of stories and song.
	Honor Molloy Honor has helped Producing Director Mark Plesent curate the entire season and will be presenting a reading of her play Maiden Voyages as part of the Season, as well as acting as dramaturg on a new commission of Lisa Ramirez.
	Lisa Ramirez In addition to reprising her critically acclaimed one person show EXIT CUCKOO (nanny in motherland) the Theater is commissioning Lisa to write a play about immigrant women working in chicken processing plants in upstate New York. Lisa Peterson will direct the developmental reading in late June.
	Maureen Towey Maureen will be working with Connie Grappo to reimagine Chekov’s Three Sisters. Maureen will be setting the play in a nursing home where the residents along with the orderlies and nurses who work in the home are in the process of putting on the play.
check out all of our season artists here

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The “Future of Working Theater” Reading Series:

Maiden Voyages by Honor Molloy and Bronagh Murphy, music by Grammy-Award winning Susan McKeown, directed by Jessica Bauman          

Set in the The Rotunda, the oldest maternity hospital in Europe, Maiden Voyages weaves gritty humor, story and song to tell the unforgettable tale of five Dublin women as they navigate some tricky waters... “You see, I had trained to be a midwife in a large Dublin hospital. It had left a very lasting impression—the women I had nursed inspired the characters in the play, and a lot of the events were drawn from my experiences with them. I sat on their beds and talked with them. I knew their lives intimately.” - Bronagh Murphy

Progress in Flying  by Lynn Rosen, directed by Daniella Topol

In a defunct steel town on the beautiful shores of Lake Michigan, Lois and her mother grapple with a father gone AWOL, the legacy of an aviator who flew in their backyard a hundred years before, and a talent contest that must be won. A play about losers, winners, and those in between.

Gail by Mike Batistick, directed by Arin Arbus

Mike’s work Port Authority Throw Down was seen at Working Theater in 2006. At the home aid agency, Sheeba hears rumors about the screams that come from a certain client’s house.  But Sheeba needs a job...

Bugs of the Pigs in the Lions by Kia Corthron, directed by Kent Gash

Mum, a librarian, proudly provides her community with uncensored knowledge while her father Harmon, a former Black Panther, meticulously protects the privacy of his past. But in the wake of the Patriot Act, federal agents use library records to uncover information that begins to collapse Mum's world. While watching the situation unfold, she struggles to balance the disadvantages of censorship with the advantages of privacy—and she must confront her own family’s struggle for justice, free speech, and liberty.

Uncle by Eleanor Herman, directed by Henry Miller

Playwright, TheaterWorks! student and Local 1180 retiree has written a charming play set in Yamacraw, Georgia during a period of “urban renewal” about Uncle, a man who can’t be bought and instead fights for what he believes is priceless – the preservation of history, memories, and culture. 

New Play by Stefanie Zadravec, directed by Daniella Topol

An accident brings a group of disenfranchised New Yorkers together to help an immigrant couple care for their dying newborn son, the Electric Baby .

The Golden Vanity: william bell/ adrian on this island by Alejandro Morales, directed by Scott Ebersold

William Bell, a young man working as a singer on an inline cruiser, is surprised to learn that he must perform “extra duties” as part of his job.  Bell nervously enters the insider lounge to entertain an older passenger, but the evening takes an unexpected turn when his manager leaves the room.

Adrian's affair with his boss Theo threatens to undermine both Theo's job and his relationship with his partner Freddee. Adrian hides out in Theo's empty beach house for the summer until things cool off. While there, a chance encounter with Baxter, an out of work architect, challenges Adrian's sense of worth and sparks both his desire for love and for his vocation as a composer.

Velazquez by Gordon Dahlquist directed by David Levine

Inspired by the life of Diego Velazquez, court painter to the King of Spain, Dahlquist's play examines art in service to power, finding parallels to our own time in a dissolute 17th century court hobbled by runaway deficits, endless war, religious intolerance, and the spectre of imminent collapse.

Slay the Dragon by Victor Lodato directed by Jackson Gay

Jimmy, a young mentally retarded man, living with his aging party-girl mother and his scatter-brained grandmother, makes a confused effort to claim his independence. As Halloween fast approaches, and family skeletons jump out of the closet, Jimmy needs to think quickly and decide who he’s going to be on October 31.

2 Final Performances of TheaterWorks!

The culmination of our 16-week class, led by educational instructor Joe Roland, in which working men and women write and perform in their own short plays.

Working People’s Open Mic Night:

Working Theater gives its stage over to it’s constituents, working people from throughout New York. Join us for an evening of stories, song, poetry and monologues from the people who keep our city running.