SAN FRANCISCO’S PREMIER NONPROFIT THEATER COMPANY

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4 ACT-SF.ORG SAN FRANCISCO'S THEATER COMPANY

American Conservatory Theater, San Francisco’s Tony Award– A.C.T.’s 50-year-old Conservatory, led by Melissa Smith, is winning nonprofit theater, nurtures the art of live theater at the center of our work. Our three-year, fully accredited through dynamic productions, intensive actor training, Master of Fine Arts Program is at the forefront of America’s and ongoing engagement with our community. Under the actor training programs. Meanwhile, our intensive Summer leadership of Artistic Director Carey Perloff and Executive Training Congress attracts students from around the world, Director Peter Pastreich, we embrace our responsibility to and the San Francisco Semester offers a unique study-abroad conserve, renew, and reinvent our rich theatrical traditions and opportunity for undergraduates. Other programs include literatures, while exploring new artistic forms and communities. Studio A.C.T.—our expansive course of theater study for Founded by William Ball, a pioneer of the regional theater adults—and the Professional Development Training Program, movement, A.C.T. opened its first San Francisco season in which offers actor training for companies seeking to elevate 1967. We have since performed more than 350 productions their employees’ business performance skills. Our alumni to a combined audience of more than seven million people. often grace our mainstage and perform around the Bay Every year we reach more than 250,000 people through our Area, as well as on stages and screens across the country. productions and programs. A.C.T. also brings the benefits of theater-based arts education Rising from the wreckage of the earthquake and fire of 1906 to more than 16,000 Bay Area students and educators each and hailed as the “perfect playhouse,” the beautiful, historic year. Director of Education & Community Programs Elizabeth Geary Theater has been our home since the beginning. When Brodersen oversees the world-famous Young Conservatory the 1989 Loma Prieta earthquake ripped the roof apart, San (for students ages 8 to 19) and our ACTsmart education Franciscans rallied together to raise a record-breaking $30 programs, including the Student Matinee (SMAT) program million to rebuild the theater. The Geary reopened in 1996 with that has brought hundreds of thousands of young people to a production of The Tempest directed by Perloff, who took over A.C.T. performances since 1968. We also provide touring Will on in 1992 after the retirement of A.C.T.’s second artistic director, Wheels Shakespeare productions, teaching-artist residencies, gentleman artist Ed Hastings. in-school workshops, and study materials to Bay Area schools and community-based organizations. Perloff’s 25-season tenure has been marked by groundbreaking productions of classical works and new translations creatively With our increased presence in the Central Market neighborhood colliding with exceptional contemporary theater; cross- marked by the renovation of The Strand Theater and the disciplinary performances and international collaborations; opening of The Costume Shop Theater, and the recent and theater made by, for, and about the Bay Area. Her fierce appointment of Pam MacKinnon as A.C.T.’s Artistic Director commitment to audience engagement ushered in a new era Designate, A.C.T. plays a leadership role in securing the future of InterACT events and dramaturgical publications, inviting of theater for San Francisco and the nation. everyone to explore what goes on behind the scenes.

American Conservatory Theater Board of Trustees (As of March 2018) The Board of Directors of the M.F.A. Program Kirke M. Hasson Ray Apple Carey Perloff EMERITUS CHAIR Lesley Ann Clement Robina Riccitiello ADVISORY BOARD Abby Sadin Schnair Kay Yun Richard T. Davis-Lowell Sally Rosenblatt Barbara Bass Bakar CHAIR PRESIDENT Jerome L. Dodson Rusty Rueff Rena Bransten Nancy Livingston Michael G. Dovey Abby Sadin Schnair Jack Cortis Sara Barnes IMMEDIATE PAST CHAIR Olympia Dukakis Lori Halverson Schryer Joan Danforth Carlotta Dathe Celeste Ford Frannie Fleishhacker Jeff Spears Dagmar Dolby Frannie Fleishhacker VICE CHAIR Ken Fulk Robert Tandler William Draper III Arnie Glassberg Priscilla Geeslin Patti Hart Patrick S. Thompson John Goldman Christopher Hollenbeck VICE CHAIR Dianne Hoge Joaquin Torres Kaatri Grigg Luba Kipnis Jo S. Hurley Jeffrey W. Ubben James Haire David Riemer Linda Kurtz VICE CHAIR Jeri Lynn Johnson Adriana López Vermut Kent Jennifer Lindsay Alan Jones Susy Wadsworth Sue Yung Li Steven L. Swig Joseph Ratner Jascha Kaykas-Wolff Nola Yee Christine Mattison VICE CHAIR Toni Ratner Miller James H. Levy Joan McGrath Linda Jo Fitz Toni Rembe Heather Stallings Little Deedee McMurtry TREASURER Sally Rosenblatt Janet V. Lustgarten Mary S. Metz Daniel E. Cohn Anne Shonk Jamie Martin Toni Rembe SECRETARY Melissa Smith Jeffrey S. Minick Cherie Sorokin In Memoriam: Patrick S. Thompson Michael P. Nguyen Barry Lawson Williams Alan L. Stein Martim Oliveira Carlie Wilmans CHAIR EMERITUS Peter Pastreich

American Conservatory Theater was founded in 1965 by William Ball. Edward Hastings, Artistic Director 1986–92

415.749.2228 5 A WORLD-PREMIERE MUSICAL

BOOK BY PAMELA GRAY

MUSIC AND LYRICS BY PAUL SCOTT GOODMAN

ADDITIONAL LYRICS BY PAMELA GRAY

BASED ON THE MIRAMAX AND VILLAGE ROADSHOW MOTION PICTURE A WALK ON THE MOON WRITTEN BY PAMELA GRAY

DIRECTED BY SHERYL KALLER In the summer of ’69, America is on the brink Based on the award-winning film (starring of change. In the cities, crowds are protesting Diane Lane and Viggo Mortensen), this the Vietnam War. In the skies, Apollo 11 is world-premiere musical features Katie speeding towards the first moon landing. Brayben (the Olivier Award–winning star But at a Catskills resort near Woodstock, of Beautiful: The Carole King Musical), Zak New York, 31-year-old Jewish housewife Resnick (A.C.T.’s Last Five Years), and Jonah Pearl Kantrowitz and her rebellious, teenage Platt (Wicked). Driven by the uplifting daughter Alison feel stuck. All this revolution stories of cultural and personal awakening, seems to be passing them by. and scored by rock composer Paul Scott Goodman (Bright Lights, Big City), A Walk Yet, as July turns to August, Pearl and Alison on the Moon is a soaring new musical that undergo their own transformations. When will fill The Geary with love, discovery, Pearl falls for the free-thinking traveling and ’60s spirit. salesman and Alison for the guitar-playing boy next door, both embrace a spirit of exploration and sexuality, and realize they have more in common than they thought.

JUNE 6–JULY 1 A.C.T.’S GEARY THEATER act-sf.org/moon | 415.749.2228 INTRODUCING A.C.T.’S 18 19 PHOTO BY CHAD BATKA BY PHOTO

American-made drama of grit and heart A.C.T. kicks off the 2018–19 season with the Pulitzer Prize– winning drama that had Broadway critics and audiences on their feet. In Reading, Pennsylvania—the blue-collar heart of America’s steel industry—a tight-knit group of factory workers has gathered in the local bar for generations to by Lynn Nottage share laughs, hopes, and cold beers. But as recession looms Directed by Loretta Greco and a union lock-out turns assembly line into picket line, SEP 26–OCT 21, 2018, AT THE GEARY lifelong friends find themselves pitted against each other in the struggle to survive. Inspired by the stories of Rust Belt workers, two-time Pulitzer Prize winner Lynn Nottage ( ) “A bracingly topical portrait of American unites heart and humor to forge a searing drama of the grit, dreams deferred” drive, and resilience of our conflicted American dreams. The New York Times

“A thrilling gender-flipped slice of Manifest Destiny” Spinning historical, theatrical, and gender conventions on Time Out New York their heads, this subversive tale of ten men, four boats, and two rivers contains none of the above. Pack your gear for this contemporary telling of 19th-century American explorer and one-armed Civil War veteran John Wesley Powell, who MEN ON BOATS assembles a brawny band of trappers, adventurers, and soldiers to explore Wyoming’s waterways. Inspired by Powell’s by Jaclyn Backhaus actual travel log from 1869, Jaclyn Backhaus’s ingenious Directed by Tamilla Woodard and nimble script is provocative, laugh-out-loud theater, performed by a diverse cast of female-identifying and OCT 17–DEC 16, 2018, AT THE STRAND gender-fluid actors who infuse America’s historic myths of male conquest with a sly blast of subtext. “Men on Boats is off-the-canyon-walls funny” Chicago Tribune

Pulitzer Prize–winning comedy In her A.C.T. debut, Artistic Director Designate Pam MacKinnon continues her career-long exploration of American theater’s legendary playwright, Pulitzer Prize winner Edward Albee (Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf?, A Delicate Balance). In this wildly EDWARD ALBEE’S imaginative and satirical comedy, a newly retired couple on a beach and squabble when they’re interrupted by two human- sized, English-speaking lizards. Are they an evolutionary miracle, or a threat? And which couple is the greater risk to the other? As the two pairs begin to communicate, they come uneasily Directed by Pam MacKinnon together, discovering how life changes can spark terror and JAN 23–FEB 17, 2019, AT THE GEARY restlessness in any creature of habit. Albee returns to The Geary for the first time in a decade, with a sparkling fantasy of growing “Wry, charming and surprisingly hopeful” up and growing old, fear and adventure, love and laughter. Los Angeles Times An achingly poignant drama about legacy Traveling from Lagos, Nigeria, to visit her mother and American- and forgiveness born sister for the first time in two decades, thirtysomething Iniabasi arrives to a snowy landscape, and even chillier truths inside a small Manhattan apartment. As Nigerian traditions clash with American realities, the family is forced to confront HER PORTMANTEAU its literal and emotional baggage and its painful legacies across language, continents, and cultures. In spring 2019, A.C.T. and by Mfoniso Udofia Magic Theatre will each present one, independent chapter Directed by Victor Malana Maog from Mfoniso Udofia’s sweeping nine-part saga about a family FEB 13–APR 14, 2019, AT THE STRAND of Nigerian immigrants and their American-born children. PHOTO BY CHAD BATKA BY PHOTO

“Powerful . . . moving . . . extraordinary” The New York Times

Buzzer-beating basketball drama When a college basketball team from San Francisco is invited to China for an exhibition game in 1989, a smack-talking American coach faces his protégé—now grown and bent on crushing the Westerners. But after a high school star from Chinatown joins THE GREAT LEAP the American team, his actions in Beijing become the accidental focus of attention, escalating the fractured history between the by Lauren Yee coaches. Funny, urgent, and contemporary, this slam dunk of Directed by Lisa Peterson a sports drama from Bay Area playwright Lauren Yee explores MAR 6–31, 2019, AT THE GEARY identity, global politics, and the collision of cultures and generations. Soaring across time and continents, from the hardball “[This] imaginative vault over the decades . . . courts of San Francisco’s Chinatown to a Beijing on the brink of asserts a quiet, beautifully unexpected power” revolution, The Great Leap builds tension right up to the buzzer. The Denver Post

Inventive period drama that pops with From acclaimed playwright Kate Hamill (2017 Playwright 21st-century spirit of the Year, Wall Street Journal) comes a rollicking new stage adaptation of William Makepeace Thackeray’s classic 19th-century novel that pops with 21st-century spirit. Ambitious Becky Sharp may not have been born with wealth or status, but VANITY FAIR she’s determined to attain both—at any cost. Armed with fierce by Kate Hamill and calculating charm, Becky forges her own path through Based on the novel by London’s high society, dealing herself into a game she was William Makepeace Thackeray never invited to play. Displaying the celebrated audacity and Directed by Jessica Stone verve that she brought to her adaptation of Sense & Sensibility, A coproduction with Hamill conjures an inventive and lively period drama featuring Shakespeare Theatre Company one of literature’s original “nasty women.” APR 17–MAY 12, 2019, AT THE GEARY

“A gift to actors and a goody bag for its audience” The New York Times

PLUS ONE SHOW TO BE ANNOUNCED! BE A PART OF A.C.T.’S NEXT CHAPTER—VISIT ACT-SF.ORG/JOIN TO SUBSCRIBE TODAY. ENROLL FOR SUMMER CLASSES, MASTER CLASSES, AND INTENSIVES AT STUDIO A.C.T. AND NOW A.C.T.’S YOUNG CONSERVATORY!

Summer Sessions begin June 11 PHOTO BY KEVIN BERNE BY PHOTO MONTGOMERY RYAN BY PHOTO

(AGES 8–19) (AGES 19+)

A wide array of class opportunities awaits the Whether you’re interested in exploring young performer in your life at A.C.T.’s Young performance onstage or expanding your Conservatory! The summer is a great time executive presence at work, Studio A.C.T. has to explore musical theater, improvisation, the class for you. Summer classes include stage combat, and more in a safe and fun Executive Presence, Stage Combat Intensives environment. Summer Session includes (with certification in up to four weapons), and individual classes and complete tracks, making Discipline for Deviants, a workshop dedicated the summer a perfect fit for every performer. to the craft of drag performance.

Enroll now at act-sf.org/yc or act-sf.org/studio. PHOTO BY KAT YEN KAT BY PHOTO

WHAT’S INSIDE Actors Steven Anthony Jones, James Udom, Eboni Flowers, and Julian Elijah Martinez in rehearsal for ABOUT THE PLAY INSIDE A.C.T. Yale Repertory Theatre and A.C.T.’s 2018 production of Father Comes Home from the Wars (Parts 1, 2 & 3). 13 LETTER FROM THE 31 FROM GENERATION ARTISTIC DIRECTOR TO GENERATION Meet A.C.T. Producer Anne Shonk 16 WRITING FROM THE GUT By Taylor Steinbeck EDITOR The Life and Work of Suzan-Lori Parks SIMON HODGSON

By Elspeth Sweatman 32 BY MOON AND BY SUNS ASSOCIATE EDITOR A.C.T. Continues to Develop New Work ELSPETH SWEATMAN 18 BLACK, GRAY, AND BLUE with A Walk on the Moon Black Americans in the Civil War CONTRIBUTORS By Simon Hodgson CAREY PERLOFF By Simon Hodgson and TAYLOR STEINBECK Elspeth Sweatman 34 JOURNEY ON A Celebration of Our M.F.A. 20 MAKING MYTHS Program Class of 2018 An Interview with By Elspeth Sweatman VOLUNTEER! Director Liz Diamond A.C.T. volunteers provide an invaluable service By Simon Hodgson 36 A.C.T. CELEBRATES CAREY with their time, enthusiasm, and love of theater. Opportunities include helping out in our performing A Look Back at the 2018 Season Gala arts library and ushering in our theaters. By A.C.T. Publications Staff act-sf.org/volunteer

A WALK ON THE MOON THEATER ON THE COUCH* WENTE VINEYARDS WINE SERIES DON’T JUST SIT THERE . . . JUN 15, 8 PM JUN 26, 7 PM (JUN 6–JUL 1) Sponsored by Kaiser Permanente, Meet fellow theatergoers at AT THE GEARY THEATER this exciting postshow discussion this hosted wine-tasting event. series addresses audience questions BIKE TO THE THEATER NIGHT and explores the minds, motivation, PLAYTIME JUN 6, 7 PM and behavior of the characters. JUN 30, 12:45 PM Ride your bike to A.C.T. and take Get hands-on with theater at this advantage of secure bike parking and AUDIENCE EXCHANGE* interactive preshow workshop. low-priced tickets at our preshow JUN 17, 2 PM; JUN 19, 7 PM; mixer, presented in partnership with JUN 27, 2 PM the San Francisco Bicycle Coalition. At A.C.T.’s free InterACT Join us for an exciting Q&A events, you can mingle with with the cast following the show. KDFC PROLOGUE cast members, join interactive JUN 12, 5:30 PM OUT WITH A.C.T.* workshops with theater artists, Go deeper with a fascinating preshow JUN 20, 8 PM and meet fellow theatergoers discussion with a member of the Mix and mingle at this hosted Walk on the Moon artistic team. at hosted celebrations in our postshow LGBTQ+ party. lounges. Join us for A Walk on the Moon and InterACT with us! To learn more and order tickets for InterACT events, visit act-sf.org/interact.

*Events take place immediately following the performance.

415.749.2228 11 UP NEXT

“A great storytelling success” SAN FRANCISCO CHRONICLE BACK BY

POPULAR DEMAND!

JULY 17–29 | A.C.T.'S GEARY THEATER

A THOUSAND SPLENDID SUNS BY Ursula Rani Sarma BASED ON THE NOVEL BY Khaled Hosseini ORIGINAL MUSIC WRITTEN AND PERFORMED BY David Coulter DIRECTED BY Carey Perloff

Visit act-sf.org/suns to book your tickets today for this beloved hit play!

8 | AMERICAN CONSERVATORYPhotography: © Shaul THEATER Schwarz/Getty Images. Design by David Mann Calligraphy/Stephen Raw. ACT-SF.ORG FROM THE ARTISTIC DIRECTOR

Dear Friends,

Welcome to The Geary and Father Comes Home from the Wars particularly vivid. Wilson calls Odysseus “a complicated man,” (Parts 1, 2 & 3)! Producing a Suzan-Lori Parks play has been and he is both admirable and arrogant, heroic and horrifying. a dream of mine since I came to A.C.T. 25 years ago, so it’s He longs to come home, but repeatedly destroys that possibility fortuitous and joyful for me that it’s finally happening now. through his own recklessness. He dreams of reuniting with his beloved wife, Penelope, but is constantly unfaithful. Who is this Father Comes Home is a play of immense scope and ambition. contradictory man, and what is the nature of his conflict? Suzan- What you are seeing today represents the beginning of a Lori gives us her own speculations in Father Comes Home. proposed nine-part cycle, with the first three parts covering the Civil War, slavery, and the American South. Having grown up in It’s very gratifying to have the imaginative and visionary Liz a military household, Suzan-Lori has said that her childhood was Diamond at the helm of this production, a director who has a defined by her father leaving for and coming home from war. In 30-year history with Suzan-Lori Parks. Liz runs the directing her latest work, she has created a young enslaved man, aptly program at Yale School of Drama, and we are co-producing named Hero, who is agonizing about whether to go off to war this production with Yale Rep, another great pleasure. While we himself. His quandary is immeasurably more difficult because he welcome many new artists to A.C.T. with this production, Father has been promised his freedom in exchange for fighting on the Comes Home also serves as a homecoming for beloved A.C.T. Confederate side. The play asks us to think about the price and actors Gregory Wallace and Steven Anthony Jones, whom we nature of freedom. Is freedom something bestowed from the welcome back with great joy. outside, or something we must grant ourselves from within? In times of immense turmoil, what do we owe ourselves, our families, One epic will follow another, as our acclaimed production of A our community? These existential questions are endlessly Thousand Splendid Suns returns to The Geary in July. There are complex and dramatically thrilling. now two companies of Suns, one playing across Canada and the other traveling up the West Coast, and we couldn’t be happier Father Comes Home represents a writer at the top of her that this adaptation of Khaled Hosseini’s beloved novel is having game. I remember my very first encounter with Suzan-Lori, such an extended life. Suns was commissioned by A.C.T.’s New nearly 30 years ago, when Liz Diamond told me about a play Works program, which is now hard at work developing another she was directing at BACA Downtown called Imperceptible new piece, the musical A Walk on the Moon, which closes our Mutabilities in the Third Kingdom. We trekked out to Brooklyn season this year. As with Suns, we have created a custom- to see it, and the swirl of language, laughter, horror, and history made development process for Moon to support the creative was intoxicating. I vowed to follow the work of this major new team of Pamela Gray, Paul Scott Goodman, and Sheryl Kaller voice, who had already coined a theatrical language all her as they shape the original film into a sexy and bittersweet own. Turning history on its head, Suzan-Lori looks deep into musical about a Borscht Belt bungalow colony in the summer the hole in which African American stories have disappeared that a man first walked on the moon and hippies took over a and resurrects them. She asks new questions about things we field for the Woodstock music festival. While wildly different in thought we understood, transforms Abraham Lincoln into a tone and location, both Moon and Suns tell the story of three Black man, and watches women reinventing their identities so generations of women navigating change in a turbulent world. as to feel that they even exist in the world. We hope you’ll have the opportunity to experience them both this summer. In the case of Father Comes Home, she uses the Odyssey as a loose framework to explore the archetypal hero’s journey. Finally, we’re excited to introduce Pam MacKinnon’s first season This is an interesting moment for that Homeric reference, as as A.C.T.’s next artistic director, which begins with the Pulitzer it coincides with the publication of the first major translation Prize–winning Sweat. Everyone here looks forward to sharing of the Odyssey by a female scholar, Emily Wilson. In Wilson’s the next chapter of A.C.T.’s life with you. version, the moral contradictions inherent in Homer’s tale seem And now, enjoy Father Comes Home from the Wars!

All my best,

Carey Perloff Artistic Director 13 AMERICAN CONSERVATORY THEATER PRESENTS

MAY 17–20 THE STRAND THEATER Join us at The Strand for a 1127 MARKET STREET week of free readings, master classes, panel discussions, art PRESENTING SPONSOR installations, happy hours, and performances of new work!

VISIT ACT-SF.ORG/NEWSTRANDS FOR MORE INFORMATION. CAREY PERLOFF, Artistic Director PETER PASTREICH, Executive Director IN ASSOCIATION WITH YALE REPERTORY THEATRE

PRESENTS

BY SUZAN-LORI PARKS DIRECTED BY LIZ DIAMOND CHOREOGRAPHED BY RANDY DUNCAN

CREATIVE TEAM CAST SONGS AND ADDITIONAL MUSIC SUZAN-LORI PARKS SECOND, SECOND RUNAWAY ROTIMI AGBABIAKA* SCENIC DESIGNER RICCARDO HERNÁNDEZ PENNY EBONI FLOWERS* COSTUME DESIGNER SARAH NIETFELD THIRD, THIRD RUNAWAY SAFIYA FREDERICKS* LIGHTING DESIGNER YI ZHAO THE COLONEL DAN HIATT* SOUND DESIGNER AND THE OLDEST OLD MAN STEVEN ANTHONY JONES* MUSIC DIRECTION FREDERICK KENNEDY HOMER JULIAN ELIJAH MARTINEZ* FIGHT DIRECTOR RICK SORDELET THE MUSICIAN MARTIN LUTHER MCCOY* VOCAL SUPPORT CHRISTINE ADAIRE LEADER, FIRST RUNAWAY CHIVAS MICHAEL* CASTING DIRECTORS TARA RUBIN CASTING, SMITH TOM PECINKA* JANET FOSTER, CSA HERO JAMES UDOM* DRAMATURGS CATHERINE MARÍA ODYSSEY DOG, FOURTH GREGORY WALLACE* RODRÍGUEZ, CATHERINE SHEEHY ASSISTANT DIRECTOR KAT YEN UNDERSTUDIES

SECOND, THE OLDEST OLD MAN, LEADER, STAGE MANAGEMENT FIRST RUNAWAY MICHAEL J. ASBERRY* SECOND RUNAWAY, PENNY, STAGE MANAGER DEIRDRE ROSE HOLLAND* THIRD, THIRD RUNAWAY BRITNEY FRAZIER* ASSISTANT STAGE MANAGER CHRISTINA HOGAN* HOMER, HERO, ODYSSEY DOG, FOURTH KADEEM ALI HARRIS** THE MUSICIAN DAVID JAMES THIS PRODUCTION MADE POSSIBLE BY THE COLONEL, SMITH CRAIG MARKER* COMPANY SPONSORS FRED M. LEVIN AND NANCY LIVINGSTON, THE SHENSON FOUNDATION Father Comes Home from the Wars, Parts 1, 2 & 3 is JACK AND SUSY WADSWORTH presented by special arrangement with Samuel French, Inc.

EXECUTIVE PRODUCERS JOHN LITTLE AND HEATHER STALLINGS LITTLE Father Comes Home From the Wars, Parts 1, 2 & 3 was developed by The Public Theater (Oskar Eustis, Artistic Director; Patrick Willingham, Executive Director) and had PRODUCERS its world premiere there on October 27, 2014. The premiere LLOYD AND JANET CLUFF was presented in association with The American Repertory KIRKE AND NANCY SAWYER HASSON DIANNE AND RON HOGE Theater at Harvard University (Diane Paulus, Artistic ROBINA RICCITIELLO Director; Diane Borger, Artistic Producer). DAVID AND CARLA RIEMER CHERIE SOROKIN *Member of Actors’ Equity Association, the union of professional actors and stage managers in the United States ASSOCIATE PRODUCERS DR. ALLAN P. GOLD AND MR. ALAN C. FERRARA **Member of A.C.T.’s M.F.A. Program class of 2018 appearing EMMETT AND MARION STANTON in this production courtesy of Actors’ Equity Association

415.749.2228 15 ABOUT THE PLAY PHOTO BY TAMMY SHELL

WRITING FROM THE GUT THE LIFE AND WORK OF SUZAN-LORI PARKS

BY ELSPETH SWEATMAN

16 ACT-SF.ORG Don’t ask playwright Suzan-Lori Parks what her plays mean. Following Topdog/Underdog’s Broadway run, many theater “This meaning thing, I think it’s something made up by people critics tried to define Parks asthe Black woman playwright. who didn’t want to feel anymore,” she says. “They wanted to “I don’t mind the label, but I do mind what happens next: compartmentalize, they wanted to contain, so they made up Black woman playwright equals some sort of play. People meaning.” Parks is a force that refuses to be contained. She say the black experience is X, and usually the X is the is a lover of jazz and opera, William Faulkner and William sorrows and frustrations and angers of people who have Shakespeare, Roots and Downton Abbey. Her beaming smile, been wronged. That’s all we get to write about. That’s booming laugh, and rhythmic voice draw you in. She is fiercely the black experience. Well, that’s very important, but intelligent, puckish, meticulous. it’s not my thing.”

Parks was born on May 10, 1963, in Fort Knox, Kentucky. As the middle child in an army family, she moved around a lot, living in Texas, California, North Carolina, Maryland, Vermont, and Germany. From an early age, Parks was an energetic storyteller, “LANGUAGE IS A PHYSICAL but it wasn’t until she was in a college writing class taught by novelist James Baldwin that the idea of being a playwright ACT. IT’S SOMETHING WHICH crossed her mind. Baldwin saw how animated Parks was when she was reading her work for the class, and suggested she try INVOLVES YOUR ENTIRE BODY— writing plays. “And I was like, ‘What the fuck? Plays?’ I hated theater,” said Parks. “Just fake people doing bullshit. But NOT JUST YOUR HEAD.” James Baldwin said try it, so there I was.” —SUZAN-LORI PARKS After graduating from Mount Holyoke College, Parks studied acting for a year at Drama Studio London. She wanted to understand the physicality of language onstage. “Language is a physical act,” she says. “It’s something which involves Since winning the Pulitzer in 2003, Parks has continued to your entire body—not just your head. Words are spells push the boundaries of her storytelling. She has written several which an actor consumes and digests—and through digesting screenplays, a novel, and the book for Unchain My Heart, the creates a performance on stage. Each word is configured to Ray Charles Musical. She has edited and updated the libretto give the actor a clue to their physical life.” From this acting for the Tony Award–winning 2012 Broadway production of The training grew her unique, muscular voice; her specificity of Gershwins’ Porgy and Bess. And in 2006, she broke the record language down to each syllable imbues her characters for the largest collaboration in American theater history, when with energy. roughly 700 theaters premiered 365 Days/365 Plays over the course of a year. In 1986, Parks moved to New York City, where she temped as a paralegal and searched for a home for her work. On a subway Parks’s latest challenge is Father Comes Home from the Wars, ride home, Parks approached Village Voice theater critic a nine-part play cycle. Parts 1, 2, and 3 feature all of the Alisa Solomon and asked her where she could send her plays. elements that make Parks’s work so unique: her muscular “They’re kind of unconventional,” Parks told her. Solomon language; her jazz-inspired rhythms, repetitions, and revisions; passed her manuscripts on to Mac Wellman, the literary and her impeccable timing and sense of humor. In this story of advisor at Brooklyn Arts and Cultural Association (BACA). Hero and Homer, Parks fuses her love of the plays and poetry “He sort of flipped, and sent it to me,” says director Liz of ancient Greece with her exploration of history—both her Diamond, “and I sort of flipped.” own memories of waiting for her father to return from a tour in Vietnam, and unearthed areas of American history—to tackle Diamond directed Parks’s Imperceptible Mutabilities in the big concepts of identity and freedom. the Third Kingdom at BACA Downtown in 1989. It was an immediate success, winning the Obie Award for Best New Parks is in no hurry to complete the other six parts of this epic. American Play in 1990. “1990 was like a brave-new-world She knows it will follow the descendants of Hero and Homer kind of thing,” says Parks. “Everybody and their mama was into the 20th century, and has written a rough outline. But her telling me what they were going to do for me. And talk is gut is telling her to wait. “When you’re pregnant with a baby, cheap.” But one voice rose above the clamor: director and when it’s 5 months old, are you going to pull it out and take a producer George C. Wolfe. As artistic director of The look at it? No. It will come in time.” Public Theater, Wolfe played an active role in developing and producing Parks’s next four plays: The America Play (1994), Venus (1996), In the Blood (1999), and the Pulitzer Prize–winning Topdog/Underdog (2003).

415.749.2228 17 ABOUT THE PLAY PHOTO BY JOAN MARCUS JOAN BY PHOTO

BLACK, GRAY,

AND BLUE OF CONGRESS LIBRARY COURTESY BLACK AMERICANS IN THE CIVIL WAR BY SIMON HODGSON AND ELSPETH SWEATMAN

As soon as the first shots rang out on April 12, 1861, the American Civil War was classified, glorified, and romanticized as a white man’s war. The voices of the nearly four million Black Americans, more than 90 percent of whom were enslaved, were erased. It is their voices that playwright Suzan-Lori Parks re-earths in Father Comes Home from the Wars (Parts 1, 2 & 3), bringing us face to face with a painful, complicated, and shameful aspect of America’s history, one with which we are still coming to terms.

1 8 ACT-SF.ORG Like Parks’s protagonist, Hero, many enslaved Black men were 180,000 would serve in the army and see action on more than forced to accompany their owners from the cotton field to the 50 occasions. Despite proving themselves on the battlefield, battlefield. Up before dawn, body servants had to polish boots, Black Union soldiers faced inequality in the provisions and mend uniforms, clean weapons, forage for food, and cook meals. medical care that they received, the promotion opportunities Throughout all of this, these enslaved men had no agency. Even that they were offered, and the punishments that they in uniform, their lives were a never-ending ordeal of surviving received. If captured by Confederate soldiers, they faced the cruelty, humiliation, and brutality of white men. execution or the terror of being sold into slavery.

While it was the battlefields that captured public attention, in Although slavery was technically abolished in the United States a war where railroads, large-scale manufacturing, and logistical in December 1865, Black Americans have continued to face campaigns were as vital as soldiers, no Black American survived systemic discrimination, racism, and prejudice. The threat of untouched. Toiling away as laborers, miners, hospital porters, violence, torture, and lynching, as well as the Jim Crow laws— and factory workers were 3.5 million free and enslaved Black dehumanizing legislation passed in many Southern states that people. Some free men volunteered for this dangerous war systematically kept Black Americans in de facto slavery—were work, wishing to defend their city or state. But they frequently daily reminders of the limitations of their “freedom.” Even worked side by side with enslaved men who were impressed, now, 50 years after the passing of the 1964 Civil Rights Act, conscripted, or simply offered up by their owners. millions of Black Americans struggle to gain equal access to housing, healthcare, education, social services, fair treatment For those on the home front, the Civil War was a time of faith within the judicial system, and the opportunity to participate and fear. Reports of approaching Union troops buoyed hopes of in America’s political system. escape and freedom, but also raised the threat of families being torn apart as owners marched away all able-bodied enslaved The repercussions of slavery, segregation, and the Civil War men to prevent them falling into the enemy’s hands. The are very much alive in contemporary America. We see this introduction of curfews, travel permits, and local patrols further in scholarly research into Post Traumatic Slave Syndrome, restricted the daily lives of many Black Americans. Communities the current Black Lives Matter movement, and theatrical were divided as communication with neighboring free men explorations of how this history continues to impact Black and women was forbidden. Punishments for escape attempts communities, such as A.C.T.’s 2018 Every 28 Hours Black became even more brutal; in many instances, they were death Arts Festival: A Healing Experience and Parks’s Father sentences. Those who did manage to reach Union lines quickly Comes Home from the Wars. When Hero raises his arms in discovered that they were no more welcome there; white Union the “Hands up, don’t shoot” pose, Parks shows us how her soldiers were just as cruel, with some even turning escapees protagonist’s struggle for freedom is one that is ongoing. For over to their former owners. millions of Black Americans, the question of what it means to be free in America is yet unanswered. In 1863, President Abraham Lincoln relented to pressure from abolitionists and Black civic leaders and allowed Black Americans to enlist in the Union Army. Over the next two years, PHOTO BY JAY YAMADA JAY BY PHOTO

OPPOSITE, FROM TOP Dan Hiatt and James Udom in Yale Repertory Theatre and A.C.T.’s 2018 production of Father Comes Home from the Wars (Parts 1, 2 & 3); 44th Mississippi Infantry Regiment Sergeant A. M. Chandler and his enslaved body servant, Silas Chandler.

LEFT A.C.T.’s 2018 Every 28 Hours Black Arts Festival: A Healing Experience, inspired by the Black Lives Matter movement.

415.749.2228 19 ABOUT THE PLAY PHOTO BY JOAN MARCUS JOAN BY PHOTO

MAKING MYTHS AN INTERVIEW WITH DIRECTOR LIZ DIAMOND

BY SIMON HODGSON

The first time director Liz Diamond picked up a script by Suzan-Lori Parks, she was smitten. “I fell in love with her work,” says Diamond, “with the stories she was telling, with her voice as a writer, and with Suzan-Lori herself—this blazingly smart, fierce, funny, vibrant, young artist.” In 1989, Diamond directed Parks’s Imperceptible Mutabilities in the Third Kingdom at Brooklyn Arts and Cultural Association (BACA) Downtown, launching a partnership that has lasted 30 years. As she prepared to direct Father Comes Home from the Wars (Parts 1, 2 & 3) at both Yale Repertory Theatre and A.C.T., the chair of directing at Yale School of Drama spoke to us about the images that have inspired her design, her collaboration with the playwright, and why Parks’s play matters now.

20 ACT-SF.ORG What was your initial reaction to Parks’s work? How do you approach the challenge of playing at both The playwright Mac Wellman sent me her play Imperceptible Yale Rep and A.C.T.? Mutabilities in the Third Kingdom. As I began to read, my We’re lucky, because in both cases we’re working in understanding of dramatic structure was blown away. Here proscenium houses with a comparable stage footprint, wings, was a work by an American writer playing with what it means flyspace, and substantial depth, so the design doesn’t have to to be a play! Suzan-Lori was using popular and poetic forms undergo radical revision. But The Geary is big. [Laughs] I’ve of speech—rhythmic wordplay, jokes within jokes, puns—to never worked in a house with two balconies. I’m going to be such a radical degree. She was messing with theatrical time: learning a lot. Happily, some of the cast are Geary veterans. telling a story across great swaths of history, and through “You’ve got to lift your chin up,” is what [actor] Gregory characters who morphed into others from one part of the play Wallace tells us. to the next. I had never read a play by a writer that so gleefully deconstructed and reconstructed time, space, and character. What impact does the Odyssey have on Father Comes Home? I think that Suzan-Lori would like us to understand that she’s not just drawing on epics from across the world, but creating a new one, hers and ours. “When you think about this play,” she said to me, “you want to say to yourself: ‘As the Agamemnon “THE QUESTION IS ALIVE IN ALL [the classic Greek play by Aeschylus] was to the Trojan War, so Father Comes Home is to the Civil War.’” It’s a kind of myth- OF US, AND ACHINGLY SO: WHAT making. The Odyssey is telling the story of the return of a hero, and this play is too. Suzan-Lori riffs—on the Homeric DOES IT COST TO BE FREE? epic, the Bhagavad Gita, and the American tall tale—and ingeniously mixes lyric poetry with 21st-century vernacular, THAT PARADOX—WHY SHOULD weaving it together with song to construct a deeply moving and subversively funny story about the struggle of an enslaved FREEDOM COST ANYTHING?—IS African American man to recognize, to understand, and AT THE HEART OF THE PLAY.” ultimately to practice freedom. Is it that focus on freedom that gives this play its haunting resonance today? The question is alive in all of us, and achingly so: what does Which images or artists have sparked your thinking for it cost to be free? That paradox—why should freedom cost this production? anything?—is at the heart of the play. With our country so I looked at photographs of war ruins: images of Richmond, divided by racism, xenophobia, and grotesque economic and Virginia, after it was burned, and of World War I battlefields. social inequality, it feels more important than ever to stage I also shared with the design team an image I’ve always held Parks’s great play. We need her unflinchingly honest and onto: the silhouetted figures on a hill at the end of Ingmar humane plays on our stages, to show us, with all her warm Bergman’s Seventh Seal [1957]. Also one image that scenic humor and fierce compassion, what it costs in America to designer Riccardo Hernández brought—a still from Ivan’s “own your own self.” Throughout her artistic life, Suzan-Lori has Childhood [1962], directed by Andrei Tarkovsky, of a Russian tried to practice freedom, and that commitment is alive in this boy peering into the war-devastated ruins of his home. play, and in all her work.

There’s an extraordinary African American artist named Elizabeth Catlett, who did a series of black-and-white linoleum cuts called The Negro Woman (1946–47), featuring the figures of African American women renowned and unknown. In using shadow and silhouette in our design, we were inspired by the high contrast between dark and light, and the way Catlett captures the idiosyncrasy of an individual human face but also Want to know more about Father Comes Home from magnifies it to become universal, representing a much larger the Wars (Parts 1, 2 & 3)? Words on Plays is full of human struggle. Yi Zhao’s lighting design is geared toward interviews and original essays that give you a behind- that. He likens it to a double exposure on a film negative. And the-scenes look. Proceeds from sales of Words on Riccardo’s set is a canvas on which the larger shadows of these Plays benefit A.C.T.’s education programs. characters can play.

Available at the box office and lobby, at the bars, and online at act-sf.org/wordsonplays.

415.749.2228 21 WHO S WHO IN FATHER COMES HOME FROM THE WARS’ (PARTS 1, 2 & 3)

ROTIMI Purple Plastic Purse (Alabama Guildenstern Are Dead, Cornelius Hackl in AGBABIAKA* Shakespeare Festival). She has been seen The Matchmaker, and Sid Davis in Ah, (Second, Second on television in Blue Bloods, Show Me a Wilderness! His Bay Area credits include Runaway) is Hero, and Friends of the People. She Joe Turner’s Come and Gone and Dinner performing on the received her bachelor’s degree from with Friends at Berkeley Repertory Geary stage for the Clark Atlanta University, and her MFA Theatre, The Life and Adventures of first time. He most from the Alabama Shakespeare Festival/ Nicholas Nickleby and many others at recently appeared as University of Alabama. California Shakespeare Theater, The 39 Pegleg in The Black Rider: The Casting of Steps at TheatreWorks, Picasso at the the Magic Bullets (Shotgun Players). SAFIYA Lapin Agile at Theatre on the Square, Other credits include Bootycandy (Brava! FREDERICKS* Breakfast with Mugabe at Aurora Theatre for Women in the Arts); Sojourners and (Third, Third Company, and Anne Boleyn at Marin runboyrun (Magic Theatre); Choir Boy Runaway) returns to Theatre Company. Regional theater credits (Marin Theatre Company); A Raisin in the A.C.T., where she include work with Shakespeare Theatre Sun (California Shakespeare Theater); previously appeared Company, Seattle Repertory Theatre, Once on This Island (TheatreWorks); The in ’s Arizona Theatre Company, Huntington Amen Corner (Alter Theater); and several Hard Problem and as Theatre Company, Pasadena Playhouse, productions with the San Francisco Mime the female understudy in Small Mouth and Ford’s Theatre. Troupe, of which he is a member. As a Sounds. Other regional credits include director, he helmed the world premiere Grandeur at Magic Theatre, the world STEVEN of VS. (TheatreFIRST). His solo play, premiere of Aubergine at Berkeley ANTHONY Homeless, won Best Solo Performance at Repertory Theatre, Once on This Island at JONES* (The the San Francisco Fringe Festival, and his TheatreWorks, the Witch in Into the Oldest Old Man) was latest solo piece, Type/Caste, received the Woods at San Francisco Playhouse, and the artistic director of Theatre Bay Area Award for Outstanding Much Ado about Nothing and black the Lorraine Solo Production. Rotimi studied at the odyssey at California Shakespeare Hansberry Theatre, Moscow Art Theatre and received an MFA Theater. Past favorites include The the premier African in acting from Northern Illinois University. Civilians’ production of In the Footprint American theater company in the Bay at ArtsEmerson in Boston and By Hands Area. Most recently, he appeared in A.C.T.’s EBONI Unknown at the New York International Hamlet as Claudius/Ghost, and he also FLOWERS* Fringe Festival. On screen, she can be directed Philip Kan Gotanda’s After the (Penny) is making seen as the female lead in Black Gold War Blues at UC Berkeley. He has worked her A.C.T. debut with (America Is Still the Place) alongside in theater, television, and film for 40 years. Father Comes Home Mike Colter, Bitter Melon made last fall, He has performed in the works of August from the Wars (Parts and the upcoming movie Sorry to Bother Wilson, Charles Fuller, Athol Fugard, Tom 1, 2 & 3). Most You, which premiered at the 2018 Stoppard, Samuel Beckett, , recently she was Sundance Film Festival. Molière, Shakespeare, and Anton Chekhov. seen in the same production at Yale He was in the original cast of the Pulitzer Repertory Theatre. Her New York credits DAN HIATT* Prize–winning A Soldier’s Play produced include Too Heavy for Your Pocket (The Colonel) was by the Negro Ensemble Company (Obie (Roundabout Theatre Company), Dead most recently seen Award for Distinguished Ensemble Dog Park (Bedlam), Paradox of the Urban at A.C.T. as Petey in Performance). He performed, taught, and Cliché (The Wild Project), Miss Julie The Birthday Party. directed at A.C.T. for 22 years as a member (August Strindberg Repertory Theatre), Other roles at A.C.T. of the core acting company. His film and and Court-Martial at Fort Devens (Castillo include Polonius in television credits include Midnight Caller Theater). Other theater credits include Hamlet, James Reiss and Trauma. Jones received his theater Too Heavy for Your Pocket (Alliance in King Charles III, the ensemble of Love training at Karamu House in his hometown, Theatre); Times! (Youth Ensemble of and Information, Tom in Round and Cleveland, Ohio. He is a graduate of Atlanta); and Three Sisters, The Trojan Round the Garden, Bob Acres in The Yankton College. Women, A Winter’s Tale, and Lilly’s Rivals, Guildenstern in Rosencrantz and

* Member of Actors’ Equity Association, the union of professional actors and stage managers in the United States 22 ACT-SF.ORG JULIAN ELIJAH CHIVAS MARTINEZ* MICHAEL* (Homer) was most (Leader, First recently seen in Mud Runaway) is making with Boundless his A.C.T. debut. His Theatre Company. other theater credits Other theater credits include Antony and include Alligator Cleopatra (The Royal (New Georges); The Square Root of Three Shakespeare Company; The Public Sisters (The Dmitry Krymov Lab); Adam Theater); Brooklyn OMNIBUS (Brooklyn Geist (Yale Summer Cabaret); 9 Circles Academy of Music); Romeo and Juliet (Forum Theatre); Locomotion (The John (Classic Stage Company; Villa La Pietra, F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Florence); The Broadway Problem Arts); The Hampton Years (Theater J); (Lincoln Center Out of Doors Festival); Romeo and Juliet and A Midsummer Sliding into the Beast (New York Theatre Night’s Dream (Chesapeake Shakespeare Workshop; Continuum Company); The Company); Man of La Mancha (The Caucasian Chalk Circle (Yale Repertory Hangar Theatre); and Hamlet and All’s Theatre); Wild with Happy (Baltimore Well That Ends Well (Orlando Center Stage); The Servant of Two Shakespeare Theater). Television credits Masters (The Guthrie Theater); A Doctor include Elementary, Big Dogs, High in Spite of Himself (Berkeley Repertory School Lover, and Madam Secretary. Theatre); A Funny Thing Happened on the Martinez is a former co-artistic director of Way to the Forum (Williamstown Theatre Yale Cabaret, and a company member of Festival); Much Ado about Nothing and A the Chesapeake Shakespeare Company Midsummer Night’s Dream (Shakespeare and FullStop Collective. Martinez received on the Sound); Hamlet and The Illusion his MFA from Yale University and his BFA (New Orleans Shakespeare Festival); and from Elon University. Airline Highway (Southern Rep Theatre). Michael received his BA from Dillard MARTIN University and his MFA from New York LUTHER University’s Graduate Acting Program. MCCOY* (The Musician) TOM PECINKA* is an actor, guitarist, (Smith) was most singer-songwriter, recently seen in the producer, and a San world premiere of Francisco native. Adrienne Kennedy’s One of the prominent figures in the Bay He Brought Her Area’s 1990s neo-soul scene, McCoy Heart Back in a Box continues to create and support socially at Theatre for a New conscious music today. He tours as lead Audience. Other New York theater singer with the interdisciplinary alt-art- credits include Troilus and Cressida (The rock performance group Moon Medicin, a Public Theater’s Shakespeare in the project led by keyboardist and visual Park), Torch Song (Second Stage artist Sanford Biggers. In the near future, Theater), and A Soldier’s Tale (a he will release his fourth full-length collaboration of the Yale School of Music studio album, a self-titled LP focusing on and Yale School of Drama at Carnegie original material. McCoy is best known Hall). His regional credits include for his work with the seminal hip-hop (Yale Repertory Theatre, Connecticut collective the Roots, as well as his Critics Circle Award nomination); Cloud 9 performance in Julie Taymor’s 2007 film (Connecticut Critics Circle Award Across the Universe. He has performed nomination) and A Midsummer Night’s with Dave Matthews, Jill Scott, Red Hot Dream (Hartford Stage); Deathtrap, Chili Peppers, and many others. Design for Living, and The Cat and the Canary (Berkshire Theatre Group); and As You Like It and The Two Gentlemen of

415.749.2228 23

* Member of Actors’ Equity Association, the union of professional actors and stage managers in the United States United the in managers stage and actors professional of union the Association, Equity Actors’ of Member 24 24 Theatre Company, and Dell’Arte Shakespeare &Company, Steppenwolf among others.Hehastrained with Night, andThe Odyssey (We Players), Summer Cabaret); andMacbeth , Twelfth Lear (Hubbard Hall);Miss Julie(Yale Company); OfMice andMen andKing Romeo andJuliet(ElmShakespeare Julius Caesar(Shakespeare &Company); Other regional theater credits include Winter’s Tale (Pearl Theatre Company). Macbeth (The PublicTheater), andThe the Great (Theatre for aNew Audience), Broadway credits includeTamburlaine and hisMFA from Yale SchoolofDrama. received hisBAfrom Fordham University Verona (Shakespeare ontheSound).He A.C.T. Support to Proud www.sflg.com 415.834.1120 San Francisco, CA94105 575 Market Street, Suite 4000 client’s dignityandhumanity. Our goalisto preserve our final resolution thoughtful litigation Personal a F A M I L YL ttention A

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FAMILY LAW School of Drama. of School Yale at acting of aprofessor and Diego San UC at acting of professor associate Story Nothing about Ado Much Theater), Public (The It You Like As Workshop), York Theatre Light Shining in Buckinghamshire (Broadway), Good Country’s include Our credits theater Other Award). Circle Critics Theatre Area Bay Francisco (San Ocean the of Park Clybourne including productions, dozen two than more in A.C.T. at seen been has and Company); ... andtheBoys (Sacramento Theatre Whipping Man,and“Master Harold” Theatre); include REPertory Company. Othertheater credits was last seeninRedSpeedowithCenter for Best Actor. National Irene Ryan ScholarshipAward LeVine Theatre Award) andthe2012 of the2017 Princess Grace Award (Grace School ofDrama. Udomistherecipient this year withanMFA inactingfrom Yale International Ensemble, andisgraduating Ramirez include Peter Dr. of Sellars’s Cabinet Repertory Theatre). Screen credits (Berkeley Stratagem Beaux’ and The Stage), Center (Baltimore Rebels the Lear (Williamstown Theatre Festival), King The Learned Theater), (Guthrie Ladies The Queen and and Queen The Theatre), (Whole , and Internal Affairs , and (Pacific Conservatory (Alliance Theatre), The Screens Theatre), (Alliance The Beverly Hillbillies Beverly , The Driving Miss Daisy , Nora (Shotgun Players); America in Angels , and The Tosca Project , The member for 12 years years 12 for member company acting core and artist associate A.C.T. Fourth) Dog, (Odyssey WALLACE* GREGORY . Asberry 2 &3).Asberry the Wars (Parts 1, Comes Homefrom debut withFather is makinghisA.C.T. (Understudy) ASBERRY* MICHAEL J. . Wallace is an an is . Wallace The The was an an was Crime , Crime (New (New

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of Participants at TheatreFIRST. Take theTicket intherecent production Directing credits includeStar Finch’s commission from TheatreFIRST). Dysphoria, Pressure High,and Laveau (a written four originalplays: Obeah, Marsh. Asaplaywright, Frazier has Buena Center for theArts,andThe Performing Arts,StageWrite, Yerba Theater, theEast Bay Center for Productions, California Shakespeare Frazier hasdirected for Disney Theatrical Hansberry Theater. Asateaching artist, Woman #2inHomeat theLorraine at TheGabler CuttingBall Theater and recently, Frazier played Heddain San Francisco Playhouse, andA.C.T. Most Arts Festival, Berkeley Repertory Theatre, Company, SanFrancisco International Ubuntu Theater Project, MarinTheatre Players, Brava! For Women intheArts, The CuttingBallTheater, Shotgun General Motors, andElectronic Arts. voiceover spotsfor PineSol,Sweetos, Bridges (CBS). Asberryhasrecorded Chance (Hulu),Trauma (NBC),andNash Storage. Television credits include Pals, include Theatre Company). Filmappearances Street Playhouse); andSatellites (Aurora (TheatreWorks); Hansberry Theatre); SuperiorDonuts Re-Education of Undine(Lorraine Hedley II,andFabulation, orthe Crumbs from theTable of Joy, Repertory Theatre); Day of Absence, PlayGround; Landless (Alter Theater); theBest of (San Francisco Shakespeare Festival);  Box The Chasing Rodriguez, andPortable San Andreas, Z Space); (Z Seven Guitars(Artists Topdog/Underdog Romeo andJuliet FRAZIER* BRITNEY with CampoSanto, She hascollaborated and teaching artist. director, playwright, Bay Area actor, (Understudy) Mr. Incredible and ACT-SF.ORG King King isa (6th (6th

Barbara Bream, joined in 2011

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EAP full-page template.indd 1 10/3/17 3:28 PM KADEEM ALI Marker has performed at California Gibraltar; Marcus Gardley’s Dance of HARRIS** Shakespeare Theater, San Jose Repertory the Holy Ghosts; and Suzan-Lori Parks’s (Understudy) is in Theatre, Portland Center Stage, La Jolla Death of the Last Black Man in the his third year of the Playhouse, Berkeley Repertory Theatre, Whole Entire World, The America Play, A.C.T. Master of Fine San Francisco Shakespeare Festival, Betting on the Dust Commander, and Arts Program and Aurora Theatre Company, TheatreWorks, Imperceptible Mutabilities in the Third made his Geary Shotgun Players, the Barbican Centre Kingdom. Productions of classical and debut this past (UK), Birmingham Repertory Theatre modern works include Brecht’s Caucasian December with A Christmas Carol. His (UK), Edinburgh Festival Fringe, and the Chalk Circle, Shakespeare’s Winter’s favorite roles in M.F.A. productions have International Festival of Ancient Greek Tale, and new translations of Phèdre, been Zak in Clickshare, Romeo/Tybalt in Drama. Marker is a graduate of the The Trojan Women, and Miss Julie. She Romeo and Juliet, and Wong in The Good theater program at California State is the winner of the Obie Award for Woman of Setzuan. Regional credits University, East Bay. Outstanding Direction and a Connecticut include Fences (California Shakespeare Critics Circle Award. She will direct her Theater) and Love and Information SUZAN-LORI PARKS (Playwright, translation of Stravinsky’s Soldier’s Tale at (Ensemble Theatre Cincinnati). Harris has Songs, Additional Music) was named Carnegie Hall’s Zankel Hall later this year. appeared in readings with the Bay Area one of TIME magazine’s “100 Innovators Playwrights Festival and Shotgun Players. for the Next New Wave,” and is the first RANDY DUNCAN (Choreographer), He’s a committed teaching artist who has African American woman to receive a native of Chicago, is a three-time taught in New York City, Cincinnati, and the (Topdog/ recipient of Chicago’s Ruth Page Award the Bay Area. He is a recipient of the Underdog). She is also a MacArthur for Outstanding Choreographer of Bratt Family Diversity Scholarship. “Genius Grant” prize recipient. Other the Year. He has received numerous awards include the Tony Award for Best other awards, including the Artistic DAVID JAMES Revival of a Musical (The Gershwins’ Achievement Award from the Chicago (Understudy) Porgy and Bess), the Gish Prize for National Association of Dance Masters has toured Excellence in the Arts, an Edward M. and three Black Theatre Alliance Awards. internationally and Kennedy Prize for Drama Inspired Duncan’s work can be seen in the Joffrey recorded with the by American History, a Horton Foote Ballet, Giordano Jazz Dance Chicago, hip-hop groups Prize, and three Obie Awards. Her and many others. While working in Spearhead and the screenwriting credits include Girl 6 such theaters as the Goodman Theatre, Coup, as well as with (directed by Spike Lee), Their Eyes Were Manhattan Theatre Club, South Coast the Beth Custer Ensemble, with whom he Watching God (produced by Oprah Repertory, Court Theatre, and the has performed live scores to silent films Winfrey), and Anemone Me (produced Oregon Shakespeare Festival, he has in the Czech Republic, Ireland, Russia, the by Christine Vachon and Todd Haynes). created original choreography for Hair, Republic of Georgia, and the Museums of Parks teaches at New York University Carousel, Zoot Suit, Once on This Island, Modern Art in San Francisco and New and serves at The Public Theater as its The Rose Tattoo, Amadeus, Antigone, York. James currently leads the ensemble Master Writer Chair. She has recently Death and the King’s Horseman, The David James’s GPS, and co-leads the written a screen adaptation of Richard Pirates of Penzance, and the Pulitzer group Afrofunk Experience. Wright’s Native Son, a new screenplay Prize–winning play Ruined. Duncan about Billie Holiday, two new stage teaches worldwide and for the past 23 CRAIG plays, and a musical adaptation of the years has been on the faculty of The MARKER* film The Harder They Come. She fronts Chicago Academy for the Arts, where he (Understudy) her band Suzan-Lori Parks & The Band. now serves as Dance Department Chair. returns to A.C.T. having performed in LIZ DIAMOND (Director) is a resident RICCARDO HERNÁNDEZ The Circle and Curse director at Yale Repertory Theatre, (Scenic Designer) serves on the of the Starving Class. the chair of directing at Yale School of faculty of Yale School of Drama and has Recent credits Drama, and has been directing new plays designed the following plays for Yale include his roles as King Henry VIII and and classical work off Broadway and Repertory Theatre: Assassins, Indecent, James I in Anne Boleyn and Nick Bright nationally for over 30 years. Regional Marie Antoinette, Autumn Sonata, Battle in The Invisible Hand at Marin Theatre and world premieres of new work include of Black and Dogs, The Evildoers, The Company, Frederick Fellows in Noises Off Catherine Trieschmann’s Crooked; America Play, and The Death of the Last at San Francisco Playhouse, and Alcippe Lucinda Coxon’s Happy Now?; Seamus Black Man in the Whole Entire World. in The Liar at Center REPertory Company. Heaney’s Cure at Troy; Octavio Solis’s His Broadway credits include Indecent,

* Member of Actors’ Equity Association, the union of professional actors and stage managers in the United States * * Member of the A.C.T. M.F.A. Program class of 2018 appearing in this production courtesy of Actors’ Equity Association

26 ACT-SF.ORG , The Gershwins’ Porgy and Bess, The People in the Picture, Parade, The Tempest, and Bring in ’da Noise, Bring in ’da Funk. Hernández has designed over 250 national presence and international theater and opera productions. His most recent credits include Admissions (Lincoln Center Theater), Oedipus El Rey (The Public Theater), The Invisible Hand (New York Theatre Workshop), Don Giovanni (Santa Fe Opera), Grounded (The Public Theater collaboration and Westport Country Playhouse), and The Dead (Abbey Theatre). Hernández has an Obie Award for Sustained Excellence in Scenic Design.

SARAH NIETFELD (Costume Designer) is making her A.C.T. debut with Father Comes Home from the Wars innovation (Parts 1, 2 & 3). Her recent costume design credits include Everything That Never Happened and Bulgaria! Revolt! (Yale School of Drama); How We Died of Disease-Related Illness (Yale Cabaret); and Antarctica! Which Is to Say Nowhere (Yale Summer Cabaret). leadership Her recent scenic design credits include The Quonsets and This Sweet Affliction (Yale Cabaret). Seattle credits include August: Osage County (Balagan Theatre), Austen Translation (Jet City Improv), and The Old Maid and the Thief (Cornish College of the Arts). Born in Ireland and raised in Seattle, she has worked PROFESSIONAL on both sides of the pond, including DEVELOPMENT Fuel Theatre in London in association with the Royal National Theatre, the TRAINING Royal Lyceum Theatre in Edinburgh, La Jolla Playhouse, the Guthrie Theater, CLIENTS INCLUDE: and Seattle Opera. Sarah holds a BFA from Cornish College of the Arts and an MFA from Yale School of Drama.

YI ZHAO (Lighting Designer) is designing at The Geary for the first time with Father Comes Home from the Wars (Parts 1, 2 & 3), which previously played at Yale Repertory Theatre. His New York credits include Pipeline at Lincoln Center To learn more, visit act-sf.org/growth or Theater; Actually at Manhattan Theatre contact Program Director Dan Kolodny at Club; Suzan-Lori Parks’s In the Blood and [email protected]. The Death of the Last Black Man in the Whole Entire World at Signature Theatre; Red Speedo at New York Theatre Workshop; and Futurity and Revolt. She

415.749.2228 27 Said. Revolt Again. at Soho Repertory numerous film and television credits, Playwrights Conference, Center Stage, Theatre. Regionally, his work is frequently such as Dan in Real Life, The Game and on a project in development at seen at the Oregon Shakespeare Festival, Plan, Kevin Can Wait, and Guiding Light. HBO. She is a former associate editor Yale Repertory Theatre, Dallas Theater Sordelet is an instructor at Yale School of of American Theatre magazine and a Center, and The Wilma Theater, and Drama, and is the recipient of the Edith former editor of Theater magazine. She has appeared on the stages of the Oliver Award for Sustained Excellence received her doctorate from Yale in Guthrie Theater, Mark Taper Forum, from the Lucille Lortel Foundation 1999 for her dissertation If You Care to Huntington Theatre Company, and and the Jeff Award for Outstanding Blast for It: Excavating the Lost Comic Berkeley Repertory Theatre. His designs Fight Director for Romeo and Juliet at Masterpieces of the American Canon. for opera, music, and dance have been the Chicago Shakespeare Theater. seen at ArtsEmerson, Curtis Institute of TARA RUBIN (Casting Director) has Music, and Ballet de Lorraine in France. CATHERINE MARÍA RODRÍGUEZ been casting at Yale Repertory Theatre He is a recipient of the 2016 Vilcek (Dramaturg) names New Orleans and since 2004. Her Broadway credits include Prize for Creative Promise in Theatre. Nicaragua home and calls culture-making Falsettos, A Bronx Tale, Dear Evan her vocation. She is a graduating MFA Hansen, Cats, Disaster!, School of Rock, FREDERICK KENNEDY (Sound candidate in dramaturgy and dramatic Doctor Zhivago, It Shoulda Been You, Designer and Music Direction) is criticism at Yale School of Drama, where Gigi, Bullets Over Broadway, Aladdin, Les making his A.C.T. debut with Father her credits include founding El Colectivo, Misérables, Mothers and Sons, Big Fish, Comes Home from the Wars (Parts 1, Yale School of Drama’s Latinx affinity The Heiress, How to Succeed in Business 2 & 3). Kennedy is a third-year MFA space, as well as dramaturging Seven Without Really Trying, A Little Night candidate at Yale School of Drama, Guitars (Yale Repertory Theatre); If Pretty Music, Billy Elliot, Shrek, Guys and Dolls, where his credits include If Pretty Hurts Hurts Ugly Must be a Muhfucka and Young Frankenstein, The Little Mermaid, Ugly Must Be a Muhfucka, ’Tis Pity She’s Amy and the Orphans (Yale School Mary Poppins, Monty Python’s Spamalot, a Whore, and Othello. Other credits of Drama); Antony + Cleopatra (Yale The 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling include Native Son (Yale Repertory Summer Cabaret); and Camille, This Bee, The Producers, Mamma Mia!, Jersey Theatre); The Trojan Women, Adam American Wife, and And Tell Sad Stories Boys, and The Phantom of the Opera. Off Geist, Alice In Wonderland, and ENVY: of the Death of Queens (Yale Cabaret). Broadway, Rubin has worked on Here The Concert (Yale Summer Cabaret); She currently serves on the Latinx Lies Love, Old Jews Telling Jokes, and and Re:union, Débâcles, Lake Kelsey, Theatre Commons advisory committee Love, Loss, and What I Wore. Her regional Vignette of a Recollection, The Bitter and Literary Managers & Dramaturgs of credits include productions at Paper Mill Tears of Petra von Kant, And Tell Sad the Americas board of directors. Past Playhouse, La Jolla Playhouse, the Old Stories of the Death of Queens, How We credits include productions at Joe’s Globe, and Bucks County Playhouse. Died of Disease-Related Illnesses, and I’m Pub/Kimmel Center, Baltimore Center with you in Rockland (Yale Cabaret). In Stage, National Endowment of the Arts, JANET FOSTER, CSA (Casting addition, he recently wrote, co-directed, El Círculo Teatral (Mexico), Borderlands Director) has cast for A.C.T. for six and performed in Collisions, also at Theater, Steppenwolf Theatre Company, seasons including Hamlet, The Hard Yale Cabaret, and was the associate and Northwestern University. Problem, King Charles III, John, Arcadia, sound designer and music coordinator Stuck Elevator, The Orphan of Zhao, for Yale Rep’s Scenes from Court Life, CATHERINE SHEEHY (Dramaturg) Elektra, Endgame and Play, Scorched, or the whipping boy and his prince. is resident dramaturg at Yale Repertory and Napoli! On Broadway she cast Theatre and the chair of dramaturgy The Light in the Piazza (Artios Award RICK SORDELET (Fight Director) and dramatic criticism at Yale School nomination), Lennon, Ma Rainey’s Black has worked on 72 Broadway shows of Drama. Her Yale Rep credits Bottom, and Taking Sides (co-cast). including The Lion King, Beauty and include Happy Days, Elevada, These Off-Broadway credits include True Love, the Beast, and Indecent. His most Paper Bullets!, In a Year with 13 Floyd Collins, The Monogamist, A Cheever recent credits include The Seafarer Moons, The Winter’s Tale, Bossa Evening, and Later Life. Regionally, (Irish Repertory Theatre) and Cyrano Nova, POP!, Trouble in Mind, and The she has worked at Intiman Theatre, de Bergerac (Perseverance Theatre). King Stag. She’s a founding member Seattle Repertory Theatre, California He has 53 international tour credits, of New Neighborhood. Her adaptation Shakespeare Theater, Berkeley Repertory including Tarzan, Aida, The Lion King, of Pride and Prejudice has been Theatre, Yale Repertory Theatre, Beauty and the Beast, and Ben Hur Live. produced at Asolo Repertory Theatre Goodman Theatre, Steppenwolf Theatre Sordelet has worked for several opera and Dallas Theater Center. She has Company, The Old Globe, and American companies, including the Metropolitan worked at Theatre for a New Audience, Repertory Theater. Film, television, and Opera, the Royal Opera House, and Royal Shakespeare Company, The Public radio credits include Cosby, Tracey Takes La Scala in Milan. In addition, he has Theater, Signature Theatre, O’Neill On New York, The Deal, Advice from a

* Member of Actors’ Equity Association, the union of professional actors and stage managers in the United States 28 ACT-SF.ORG Caterpillar, The Day That Lehman Died FRED M. LEVIN AND NANCY Yale Rep productions have advanced (Peabody, SONY, and Wincott awards), LIVINGSTON (Company Sponsors) to Broadway, garnering more than 40 and “T” Is for Tom (Tom Stoppard radio are stewards of the Shenson Foundation Tony Award nominations and ten Tony plays, WNYC and WQXR). She also and theater-goers who have subscribed Awards. Yale Rep is also the recipient cast LifeAfter, a GE Theater podcast. to A.C.T. for 28 years. They recently of the Tony Award for Outstanding supported King Charles III, The Regional Theatre. Yale’s Binger Center DEIRDRE ROSE HOLLAND* Unfortunates, and Between Riverside for New Theatre, established in 2008, (Stage Manager) has worked on and Crazy. A San Francisco native, has distinguished itself as one of the many regional theater projects and Levin attended A.C.T. performances as nation’s most robust and innovative productions, including the 2016 New a student while Livingston developed new play programs. To date, the Binger Strands Festival, John, On Beckett, her passion for theater at her hometown Center has supported the work of Chester Bailey, Let There Be Love, and Cleveland Play House. A former more than 50 commissioned artists Ah, Wilderness! at A.C.T.; Measure for advertising copywriter, Livingston is and underwritten the world premieres Measure and The Liar at Santa Cruz Immediate Past Chair of the A.C.T. Board and subsequent productions of 27 new Shakespeare; As You Like It, Othello, of Trustees and serves on the dean’s American plays and musicals at Yale Twelfth Night, and Lady Windermere’s advisory board at the College of Fine Rep and theaters across the country. Fan at California Shakespeare Theater; Arts at Boston University. Levin serves The Tony Award–winning play, Indecent, Cyrano and 2 Pianos 4 Hands at on the boards of the San Francisco created by playwright Paula Vogel and TheatreWorks; The Big Meal, Game On, Symphony, the Asian Art Museum, and director Rebecca Taichman, which was Next Fall, , A Christmas the San Francisco Film Society (which commissioned and first produced by Carol (2011 and 2012), and Spring his father founded). Both Livingston and Yale Rep in 2015, was recently broadcast Awakening at San Jose Repertory Levin serve on the Council of Advocates on PBS’s Great Performances. Theatre; The Laramie Project: 10 Years of Boston Arts Academy and on the Later and the world premiere of Bonnie Advisory Board of the National Museum TARA RUBIN CASTING STAFF  & Clyde at La Jolla Playhouse; and the of Women in the Arts in Washington, DC. Lindsay Levine, C.S.A.; Laura Schutzel, Shakespeare Festival 2011, How the C.S.A.; Kaitlin Shaw, C.S.A.; Merri Grinch Stole Christmas! (2010), and JOHN LITTLE AND HEATHER Sugarman, C.S.A.; Eric Woodall, The Mystery of Irma Vep at The Old STALLINGS LITTLE (Executive C.S.A.; Claire Burke; Felicia Rudolph Globe. Holland holds an MFA in stage Producers) have produced A Thousand management from UC San Diego. Splendid Suns, The Last Five Years, Indian SPECIAL THANKS Ink, Venus in Fur, and Endgame and Play Ralph Chipman CHRISTINA HOGAN* (Assistant at A.C.T. Heather is a CPA-turned-writer Hanna Diamond Chipman Stage Manager) returns to A.C.T. who worked in investment banking and Yura Kordonsky after working on Hamlet, Monstress, as the chief financial officer of a company and Love and Information. Her other that manages the affairs of professional The videotaping or making of electronic theater credits include The Baltimore athletes. A frequent adventure traveler, or other audio and/or visual recordings Waltz, runboyrun, And I and Silence, she writes travel stories as well as fiction. of this production or distributing Hir, Arlington, Every Five Minutes, She is the author of Click City (the recordings on any medium, including The Happy Ones, Terminus, Se Llama novel and fiction serial seen in the San the internet, is strictly prohibited, a Cristina, and Any Given Day (Magic Francisco Chronicle) and the novel False violation of the author’s rights and Theatre); It Can’t Happen Here (Berkeley Alarm. Her short fiction has appeared actionable under United States copyright Repertory Theatre); Skeleton Crew and in ZYZZYVA. Heather joined the A.C.T. law. For more information, please visit: The Wolves (Marin Theatre Company); Board of Trustees in 2011. John previously www.samuelfrench.com/whitepaper. A Raisin in the Sun, Blithe Spirit, Much served on the Asian Art Museum board Ado about Nothing, The Verona Project, of trustees. He is an entrepreneur and and The Pastures of Heaven (California inventor and enjoys adventure travel, Shakespeare Theater); and very still & skiing, tennis, and photography. hard to see (A.C.T. Master of Fine Arts Program). Hogan has a BA in theater arts YALE REPERTORY THEATRE, from Saint Mary’s College of California. the internationally celebrated professional theatre in residence at Yale School of Drama since 1966, has championed playwrights including Christopher Durang, August Wilson, Suzan-Lori Parks, Sarah Ruhl, Amy Herzog, and many others. Thirteen

415.749.2228 29 PRESENTS THEATER TOURS FOR 2018 BROADWAY IN NEW YORK CITY

Experience the bright lights of Broadway (and !)

JUN 12–18, 2018

THE OREGON SHAKESPEARE FESTIVAL

Explore quaint and charming Ashland at the Oregon Shakespeare Festival

JUL 11–16, 2018

LONDON THEATER TOUR

Discover the cultural legacy of London, plus a trip to the real-life Downton Abbey

OCT 15–21, 2018

ALL THEATER TOURS ARE LED BY A.C.T. ARTISTIC STAFF AND INCLUDE: • Tickets to world-class productions • Receptions and cocktail hours • Luxury accommodations • Complimentary breakfast each morning in our hotel • Discussions with guest artists • Sightseeing excursions and walking tours • Welcome and farewell dinners • Travel companions who love theater

For more information, visit act-sf.org/theatertours or contact Caitlin A. Quinn at [email protected] or 415.439.2436. INSIDE A.C.T. PHOTO BY SIMONE FINNEY BY PHOTO FROM GENERATION TO GENERATION MEET A.C.T. PRODUCER ANNE SHONK

BY TAYLOR STEINBECK

When Anne Shonk was young, her mother introduced her to the theater. Her family couldn’t afford to see many shows, but the productions they did attend—such as the San Francisco opening night. I also love sitting in the booth with the stage premiere of Evita with Patti LuPone and Mandy Patinkin—had manager and hearing the show called from beginning to end. a huge impact on Shonk. Now, she is a mother herself, and That’s a special treat. shares her lifelong passion for the stage with her daughter. She and Michelle have been A.C.T. subscribers for almost 15 years, What is your favorite A.C.T. memory? and attend everything from mainstage rehearsals to special We were producers for The Unfortunates (2016) and got to events to Conservatory performances. We sat down with know the cast and creatives well. We still keep in touch with a Shonk to find out more about her enthusiasm for A.C.T., and lot of them. One time we attended a rehearsal that didn’t finish why she believes that theater transcends generations. until midnight and the actors were amazed that we were still there. On the closing night of the show, we arrived late, and the What drew you to A.C.T.? ushers squeezed us into the third row. Afterwards, several cast The people, the programming, and The Geary. It’s a wonderful members said, “When we saw you guys come in, we felt like all old theater—I look for every opportunity that I can to sit the family was here,” which was a special feeling. in that jewel of a space. Why is it so important that you share this love of theater You’re also on the board of A.C.T.’s Master of Fine Arts with your daughter? Program. What does that mean to you? It’s not just my daughter! When I talk about A.C.T. with other We’re the only M.F.A. Program in the country unaffiliated with people, it’s utterly apparent that it’s something I care about. a university, and we’re both highly regarded and well-ranked. People comment all the time, “You’re really passionate about I’ve been on the board for four years, and it’s been great that, aren’t you?” The arts are extremely important—it matters getting to know the M.F.A. actors. Michelle and I try to go to that I pass my passion on to everyone I can. every M.F.A. performance. If you’re at all involved with the theater and you want to see good theater continue, how else can you assure that but by training a new generation? For more information about membership benefits and how you can become a producer of a work on an What do you love most about the producer experience? A.C.T. stage, visit act-sf.org/support or contact A.C.T. The producer level provides the opportunity to attend the Deputy Director of Development Tiffany Redmon at initial “meet and greet” with the playwright, cast, and creative 415.439.2482 or [email protected]. team, and follow the production as it matures in time for

415.749.2228 31 INSIDE A.C.T. VIDEO STILL BY CHRISTINE MILLER CHRISTINE BY VIDEO STILL

As America reverberated with the murmurs of protests and revolution this spring, a rehearsal room off West 26th Street in New York rang with the sounds of Woodstock and the ’60s. For nine days in March, the cast and creatives of A Walk on the Moon, along with A.C.T. staff, were in town for the workshop of this stunning musical premiering at The Geary in June.

Set in a Catskills bungalow colony in the summer of 1969, BY MOON A Walk on the Moon follows the awakening of two women— 31-year-old housewife Pearl and her rebellious daughter, Alison—as they discover themselves and their place in an era of AND BY SUNS musical and cultural revolution. Based on the 1999 film of the same name written by Pamela Gray, the book of this world- A.C.T. CONTINUES TO DEVELOP NEW premiere musical is also written by Gray, with music composed WORK WITH A WALK ON THE MOON by Paul Scott Goodman, and directed by Sheryl Kaller. For the creative trio behind Moon, the workshop offered BY SIMON HODGSON a chance to hear the numbers sung aloud by actors Brigid O’Brien (A.C.T.’s A Little Night Music) and Zak Resnick (A.C.T.’s The Last Five Years) and to work directly with A.C.T.’s artistic team. “The cast and creative team showed me things about this story—a story that is in my DNA—that I hadn’t seen before,” says Gray. “That’s just so exciting for me as a writer.”

For the A.C.T. staff members who traveled to New York for the workshop (including Artistic Director Carey Perloff, Associate Artistic Director Andy Donald, Casting Director Janet Foster, and Production Manager Audrey Hoo), it was an opportunity

32 ACT-SF.ORG to shape the production—sharpening the storytelling, collaborating with the actors, and organizing the complicated logistics of the production—weeks before the Moon cast arrives in San Francisco for rehearsals on May 1.

“Putting on a new musical is a fascinating and challenging process,” says Foster. “It takes years of collaboration. After seeing the Moon workshop, I was thrilled. It’s in really good

shape.” All the A.C.T. staff who went to New York came back ELSPETH SWEATMAN BY PHOTO with the songs humming in their heads.

The March 2018 workshop for Moon is part of A.C.T.’s tradition of investing in new artists and developing new work. Over the last two decades, this includes David Mamet’s adaptation of The Voysey Inheritance (2005), After the War (2007), The Tosca Project (2010), Armistead Maupin’s Tales of the City (2011), Monstress (2015), and last season’s A Thousand Splendid Suns. Adapted from Khaled Hosseini’s novel by playwright Ursula Rani Sarma, Suns was commissioned and developed at A.C.T. over several years before winning critical and audience acclaim in 2017. Over the last 18 months, it’s played in multiple theaters across North America and returns to The Geary for a two-week run in July.

Just like Suns, many of these beloved productions were painstakingly developed in A.C.T.’s studios and the New Strands Festival. Bay Area audiences can get to know a new cohort of upcoming theater artists in this year’s festival, which features work by Marisela Treviño Orta, Susan Soon He Stanton, Tegan and Sara, and Ngozi Anyanwu. Now in its third year, the festival has attracted thousands of local theater OPPOSITE (L to R) Actors Brigid O’Brien, Zak Resnick, and Nick lovers with its multidisciplinary range of readings, master Sacks at the New York workshop of A Walk on the Moon. classes, panel discussions, and works in progress. ABOVE A.C.T. Movement Director Stephen Buescher and M.F.A. Program actor Jennifer Apple (class of ’18) in a 2016 workshop for A Thousand Splendid Suns.

“THE CAST AND CREATIVE TEAM While The Strand has earned a reputation as a Bay Area incubator for new work, Artistic Director Designate Pam SHOWED ME THINGS ABOUT MacKinnon and A.C.T.’s artistic team are also eager to introduce San Francisco audiences to new writers at The THIS STORY—A STORY THAT IS Geary. “If we work on a world premiere like Moon, let’s give it the biggest stage we have,” says Donald. “Not a lot of theaters IN MY DNA—THAT I HADN’T can take that chance and have the stage to do it.” MacKinnon is equally intent on presenting new voices across A.C.T.’s SEEN BEFORE.” stages: “It’s time to dream big,” she says. “I’m excited to fill The Geary and The Strand with bold, surprising stories.” —PAMELA GRAY

To buy tickets for the world premiere of A Walk on the Moon (Jun 6–Jul 1), visit act-sf.org/moon. After wowing audiences at last year’s New Strands Festival, The Great Leap is the latest addition to A.C.T.’s growing list of For tickets for A Thousand Splendid Suns new works, and will be part of our 2018–19 season. Written (Jul 17–29), visit act-sf.org/suns. by rising Bay Area playwright Lauren Yee, the story is loosely based on Yee’s father and focuses on a Chinatown basketball To reserve tickets for 2018’s New Strands Festival star caught up in a college match between teams from San (May 17–20), visit act-sf.org/newstrands. Francisco and Beijing.

415.749.2228 33 INSIDE A.C.T.

RIVKA BOREK “One of the most thrilling JOURNEY ON moments of my training was sharing the stage with two of A CELEBRATION OF OUR my M.F.A. Program teachers, M.F.A. PROGRAM CLASS OF 2018 Anthony Fusco and Domenique Lozano, in Hamlet. To act BY ELSPETH SWEATMAN alongside your teachers is surreal—a cross-generational occurrence that doesn’t happen often. To go from a student to feeling like a true At this time every year, a bittersweet air pervades A.C.T.’s collaborator with professional actors and director Carey 30 Grant offices as we prepare to say goodbye to our Perloff was incredibly fortifying.” Master of Fine Arts Program graduating class. For three years, our stages, studios, and hallways have been filled with the infectious energy, passion, and dedication of JUSTIN GENNA these 12 artists. They have met every challenge, from “I have learned from my fellow acting in productions of Love and a Bottle (2016) and actors that being generous and Clickshare (2017) to writing and directing Sky Festival humble is a must. And when you performances to working with Bay Area communities as go onstage, know that everything Citizen Artists to bringing festive cheer in this season’s you need, you already have. It’s Christmas Carol. As they look ahead to forging their own right there; you just have to reach path as theater-makers, we caught up with some of them out and grab it.” to discover what they’ve learned.

34 ACT-SF.ORG LEFT A.C.T.’s M.F.A. Program class of 2018 (L to R): Peter Fanone, Rivka Borek, Vincent J. Randazzo, Justin Genna, Kadeem Ali Harris, Adrianna Mitchell, Lily Narbonne, Oliver Shirley, Beatriz Miranda, Leonard A. Thomas, Jennifer Apple, and Justin Edward Keim.

PHOTO BY KEVIN BERNE BY PHOTO BELOW Headshots by Lauren Toub.

CONGRATULATIONS, M.F.A. PROGRAM CLASS OF 2018! WE CAN’T WAIT TO SEE WHAT YOU ACCOMPLISH NEXT.

For more information about A.C.T.’s Master of Fine Arts Program, visit act-sf.org/mfa.

JUSTIN EDWARD KEIM BEATRIZ MIRANDA “I came into this program thinking that “Our training is so professional. acting was just like walking up to a coat With the help of our mentors rack and putting on certain coats for and coaches, we get to explore certain characters. In our very first class our bodies and minds in such with [acting professor] Melissa Smith, a playful way that I sometimes she said, ‘The character comes from forget it is work. Having been a inside you. You are the character.’ It part of a mainstage production was a revelation. All the incredible teachers and mentors have this year, I have tangible evidence of the great training taught me to be okay with being vulnerable, to share a piece of I have received in the M.F.A. Program.” myself with the audience.”

OLIVER SHIRLEY LEONARD A. THOMAS “A.C.T. has instilled in me a confidence that I “I have been exposed to so many will carry with me for the rest of my career. things—mainstage productions, The production staff, stage managers, master classes, Sky Festival technical staff, and my amazing classmates productions—and allowed have taught me by example how to conduct to grow and stretch myself myself in an artistically satisfying and creatively, personally, artistically. professional manner.” I have learned how to be an artist and how to continue growing into a better performer and human being.”

415.749.2228 35 INSIDE A.C.T.

A.C.T. CELEBRATES CAREY A LOOK BACK AT THE 2018 SEASON GALA BY A.C.T. PUBLICATIONS STAFF

3 6 ACT-SF.ORG ALL PHOTOS BY DREW ALTIZER BY ALL PHOTOS

For one night in April, the stars came out to celebrate Artistic Director Carey Perloff. A.C.T. artistic luminaries united with trustees, friends, and family at the Four Seasons Hotel to toast (and roast) the artistic director at our 2018 Season Gala. In the process, they broke all records, not only raising $1.2 million OPPOSITE for our actor training and Education & Community Programs, A.C.T. Artistic Director Carey Perloff. but also establishing the Carey Perloff Classics Fund, ensuring THIS PAGE (CLOCKWISE FROM TOP LEFT) future productions from that canon for generations to come. M.F.A. students Adrianna Mitchell, Kimberly Hollkamp, Emma Van Lare, Carlos O. Andrickson, Edward Neville Ewell, and A.C.T. alum Anika Noni Rose; Perloff and Tom Stoppard; Dotted among the tables at the elegant, black-tie event were BD Wong; Tracy Chapman, Anya Gurholt, and Perloff. dozens of recognizable faces, including singer-songwriter Tracy Chapman, renowned actors Marco Barricelli, Anthony Fusco, Brigid O’Brien, Anika Noni Rose, , The event was also a family affair, as husband Anthony Giles, Shona Tucker, and BD Wong, as well as Sir Tom Stoppard, the daughter Lexie Perloff-Giles, and son Nick Perloff-Giles took Oscar-winning playwright and Perloff’s longtime collaborator, the stage to acknowledge an unparalleled artist, director, who surprised her with a breakfast-time visit to her home. playwright, and mother. After the tributes, guests kicked back to an electronic set from Nick Perloff-Giles (aka DJ Wingtip). In an evening of love and laughter, Stoppard was just one of the artists presenting tributes to Perloff. “Carey possesses Many thanks to event co-chairs Priscilla Geeslin and Nancy an appetite for theater no one else can claim,” he said, “and Livingston, to the guest artists and M.F.A. Program actors a complete engagement with the art and theory of theater.” who performed so beautifully, to A.C.T.’s generous board Gregory Wallace, the actor and former A.C.T. company members, to the hardworking gala committee, and to all the member, paid tribute via video and recalled working with theater lovers who supported this year’s gala. It was joyful, Perloff on The Tosca Project (2010): “She’s like a tsunami,” he celebratory, funny, and irreverent—a fitting send-off to a much said, “but in a good way!” loved leader.

415.749.2228 37 FRANNIE FLEISHHACKER, CO-CHAIR • ROBINA RICCITIELLO, CO-CHAIR We are privileged to recognize Producers Circle members’ generosity during the March 1, 2017, to March 1, 2018, period. For information about Producers Circle membership, please contact Tiffany Redmon at 415.439.2482 or [email protected].

*An Evening at Elsinore event sponsor/lead supporter †A Dickens of a Holiday event sponsor/lead supporter w Lead Gala Supporter

SEASON PRESENTERS

JEROME L. AND FRED M. LEVIN AND MARY AND STEVEN SWIG THAO N. DODSONw NANCY LIVINGSTON*w Steven has served on A.C.T.’s Jerry is president of Parnassus Nancy is the immediate past chair of board since 1986 and is cofounder Investments and serves on the boards A.C.T.’s Board of Trustees. She serves of Presidio Graduate School. Mary of San Francisco Opera and A.C.T. Thao on the boards at the College of Fine is on the Women’s Leadership and Jerry have established scholarships Arts at Boston University and the Board of Harvard University’s John for music education at the San Francisco National Council for the American F. Kennedy School of Government. Symphony, undergraduate education at Theatre. Fred serves on the boards They serve on the boards of the UC Berkeley, and high school education of the SF Symphony, the Asian Art Solar Electric Light Fund and the for 125 girls in Vietnam. Museum, and the SF Film Society. Americans for Cures Foundation.

PRISCILLA AND KEITH GEESLIN†w TONI REMBE AND ARTHUR ROCK JEFF AND LAURIE UBBEN Priscilla is a vice chair of A.C.T.’s Past chair of A.C.T.’s Board of Jeff is a founder of ValueAct Capital Board of Trustees and chairs the Trustees, Toni is a retired partner at and a director of 21st Century Fox Development Committee. She serves Pillsbury Winthrop Shaw Pittman. Inc. and Willis Towers Watson PLC. on the boards of SF General Hospital Arthur was one of America’s first He serves on the boards of Duke Foundation, the SF Symphony, Grace venture capitalists. Along with other University, Northwestern University, Cathedral, and NARAL Pro-Choice community endeavors, they are and the E. O. Wilson Biodiversity America. A principal of Francisco cofounders of the Arthur and Toni Foundation. Laurie founded San Partners, Keith is the president of Rembe Rock Center for Corporate Francisco’s Bird School of Music. SF Opera’s board of trustees. Governance at Stanford Law School.

COMPANY SPONSORS EXECUTIVE PRODUCERS Diane B. Wilsey*w Mary and Gene Metz Ray and Dagmar Dolby Family Fund*w Lesley Ann Clement and Karl Lukaszewiczw Nola Yee Clay Foundation - West Frannie Fleishhackerw Bill Draperw Donald J. and Toni Ratner Miller* Kevin and Celeste Ford Sakana Foundationw Ɨ PRODUCERS Rich Rava and Elisa Neipp Mr. and Mrs. Gordon P. Getty Jo S. Hurley* Paul Asente and Ron Jenks Elsa and Neil Pering Jeri Lynn and Jeffrey W. Johnson*† Christopher and Leslie Johnson Nancy and Joachim Bechtle Merrill Randol Sherwin Burt and Deedee McMurtry* John Little and Heather Stallings Little Lloyd and Janet Cluff Robina Riccitiello†w Barbara Ravizza and John S. Osterweis Janet V. Lustgarten Ɨ Carlotta and Robert Dathe* David and Carla Riemer* Patti and Rusty Rueffw Nion McEvoy and Leslie Berriman Concepción and Irwin Federman Sally and Toby Rosenblatt* Jack and Susy Wadsworthw Kenneth and Gisele Miller Linda Jo Fitz* Dr. Caroline Emmett and Dr. Russell Rydel Barry Williams and Lalita Tademy† Lori Halverson Schryer†wƗ Kirke and Nancy Sawyer Hasson*w Abby and Gene Schnair*w Kay Yun and Andre Neumann-Loreck*†w Mr. and Mrs. Charles R. Schwab Stephen and Diane Heiman* Kathleen Scutchfield Susan A. Van Wagner Dianne and Ron Hoge* Ɨ Anne and Michelle Shonk* Barbara and Stephan Vermut† The Marymor Family Fund Cherie Sorokin Aaron Vermut and Don and Judy McCubbin Valli Benesch and Bob Tandler Adriana López Vermut† Mr. and Mrs. J. A. McQuown

DIANNE HOGE, CO-CHAIR • NOLA YEE, CO-CHAIR

We are privileged to recognize these members’ generosity during the March 1, 2017, to March 1, 2018, period. For information about Directors Circle membership, please contact Tiffany Redmon at 415.439.2482 or [email protected].

*An Evening at Elsinore event sponsor/lead supporter †A Dickens of a Holiday event sponsor/lead supporter w Lead Gala Supporter

ASSOCIATE PRODUCERS Barb and Gary Erickson Betty Hoener Tim Mott and Pegan Brooke Paul Angelo Nancy and Jerry Falk Luba Kipnis and David Russel* Paula and John Murphy Mrs. Barbara Bakar Mr. Rodney Ferguson and Mr. Joel Krauska and Ms. Patricia Fox Terry and Jan Opdendyk Kenneth Berryman Ms. Kathleen Egan Linda Kurtz* The Bernard Osher Foundation Dr. Barbara L. Bessey Vicki and David Fleishhacker Marcia and Jim Levy Norman and Janet Pease Ben and Noel Bouck Tom Frankel Jennifer S. Lindsay Mr. and Mrs. Tom Perkins* Linda K. Brewer Mr. and Mrs. Thomas A. Gallagher Helen M. Marcus, in memory of Marjorie Perloff Linda Joanne Brown Dr. and Mrs. Richard E. Geist David Williamson Ms. Saga Perry and Gayle and Steve Brugler Arnie and Shelly Glassberg* Drs. Michael and Jane Marmor Mr. Frederick Perry James and Julia Davidson Glasser Family Fund Christine and Stan Mattison Barbara Phillips Carol Dollinger Dr. Allan P. Gold and Mr. Alan C. Ferrara Mr. and Mrs. Robert McGrathw John Riccitiello The New Ark Fund Marcia and John Goldman Milton Mosk and Thomas Foutch Rick and Anne Riley Marcia and Geoffrey Green

38 ACT-SF.ORG Dr. James Robinson and Mr. Don O’Neal Anne and Gerald Down Emilie and Douglas Ogden Ms. Kathy Kohrman Peter Pastreich and Jamie Whittington Ms. Kathleen Dumas Ms. Barbara Oleksiw Susan Roos Mr. Adam Pederson Philip and Judy Erdberg Janet and Clyde Ostler Paul and Julie Seipp Ms. Carey Perloff and Mr. Anthony Giles Charles and Susan Fadley Janine Paver and Eric Brown Rick and Cindy Simons Mr. and Mrs. William Pitcher Joseph Fanone Gordon Radley Lee and Carolyn Snowberg Mr. and Mrs. John A. Reitan Mr. Alexander L. Fetter and Sandi and Mark Randall Mr. Laurence L. Spitters Matt and Yvonne Rogers Ms. Lynn Bunim Mr. and Mrs. Jacob Ratinoff Emmett and Marion Stanton Gary Rubenstein and Nancy Matthews Laura Frey and Erico Gomes Joseph E. and Julie Ratner*†Ɨ Dr. Martin and Elizabeth Terplan Scott and Janis Sachtjen Lynda Fu Albert and Roxanne Richards Fund John and Sandra Thompson The Somekh Family Foundation Ms. Kathleen Gallivan Jeff and Karen Richardson Patrick S. Thompson* Matthew and Lisa Sonsini Sameer Gandhi and Monica Lopez Gary and Joyce Rifkind Mrs. Katherine G. Wallin and Mr. Richard Spaete Marilee K. Gardner Victoria and Daniel Rivas Mr. Homer Wallin Laura and Gregory Spivy Ɨ William Garland and Michael Mooney Ms. Shelagh Rohlen Katherine Welch Diana L. Starcher Mr. Michael R. Genesereth Marieke Rothschild Mr. and Mrs. Bruce White Vera and Harold Stein Susan and Dennis Gilardi Ms. Irene Rothschild Beverly and Loring Wyllie Roselyne C. Swig Ms. Ann M. Griffiths Ms. Dace Rutland Pasha and Laney Thornton Raymond and Gale L. Grinsell Ms. Monica Salusky and BENEFACTOR Doug Tilden James Haire and Timothy Cole Mr. John Sutherland Lisa and John Pritzker Family Fund Jane and Bernard von Bothmer Ɨ Mr. and Mrs. Richard Halliday Betty and Jack Schafer Joy and Ellis Wallenberg, Vera and David Hartford Kent and Nancy Clancy PLAYWRIGHTS Milton Meyer Foundation Mr. and Mrs. David M. Hartley Mr. and Mrs. John Shankel Anonymous Ms. Allie Weissman Ms. Kendra Hartnett and Robert Santilli Mr. James Shay and Mr. Steven Correll Ray and Jackie Apple Barbara and Chris Westover Kent Harvey Mr. Earl G. Singer Mr. Eugene Barcone Carlie Wilmans Mrs. Deirdre Henderson Richard and Jerry Smallwood Sara and Wm. Anderson Barnes Fund Mr. and Mrs. Roger Wu Mr. and Mrs. Henry Paul Hensley Ms. Judith O. Smith The Tournesol Project Mr. and Mrs. Jerre Hitz Mr. and Mrs. Robert S. Spears David V. Beery and Norman Abramson* DIRECTORS Ms. Marcia Hooper Steven and Chris Spencer Donna L. Beres and Terry Dahl Anonymous (3) Bannus and Cecily Hudson Mr. Paul Spiegel Roger and Helen Bohl Mr. Howard J. Adams Rob Hulteng Lillis and Max Stern Ms. Donna Bohling and Martha and Michael Adler Robert Humphrey & Diane Amend Vibeke Strand, MD and Jack Loftis, PhD Mr. Douglas Kalish Bruce and Betty Alberts Robert and Riki Intner Richard and Michele Stratton Mr. Mitchell Bolen and Lynn Altshuler and Stanley D. Herzstein Harold and Lyn Isbell Mr. Jay Streets Mr. John Christner Mr. and Mrs. Harold P. Anderson Phil and Edina Jennison Dawna Stroeh Mr. Mark Casagranda Sharon L. Anderson Stephanie and Owen Jensen Mr. M. H. Suelzle Dolly Chammas Ms. Kay Auciello Sy Kaufman and Kerstin Edgerton Susan Terris Daniel E. Cohn and Lynn Brinton Jeanne and William Barulich Ms. Pamela L. Kershner Nancy Thompson and Andy Kerr Madeline and Myrkle Deaton Jane Bernstein and Robert Ellis Miss Angèle Khachadour Mrs. Helena Troy Wasp Richard DeNatale and Craig Latker David and Rosalind Bloom Ms. Nancy L. Kittle John R. Upton Jr. and Ms. Roberta Denning Peter Blume Mr. R. Samuel Klatchko Janet Sassoon-Upton William H. Donner Foundation John Boland and James Carroll Mr. Brian Kliment Larry Vales Sue and Ed Fish Christopher and Debora Booth Harold L. Wyman Foundation Arnie and Gail Wagner Mr. and Mrs. Patrick F. Flannery Brenda and Roger Borovoy Thomas and Barbara Lasinski Mr. and Mrs. James Wagstaffe Dr. and Mrs. Fred N. Fritsch Nicholas and Janice Brathwaite Dr. Lois Levine Mundie Ms. Margaret Warton and Mrs. Susan Fuller Benjamin Bratt and Talisa Soto Mr. Michael Levy and Mr. Steve Benting Dr. A. Goldschlager Jean L. Brenner Mr. Michael Golden Louise Wattrus Barbara Grasseschi and Tony Crabb Mrs. Libi Cape Ms. Helen S. Lewis Ms. Carol Watts Mr. Bill Gregory Denis Carrade and Jeanne Fadelli Sue Yung Li and Dale K. Ikeda Ms. Patricia Tomlinson and Kaatri and Doug Grigg Steven and Karin Chase Ron and Mary Loar Mr. Bennet Weintraub Rose Hagan and Mark Lemley Susan and Ralph G. Coan, Jr. Ms. Gayla Lorthridge Irv Weissman and Family Chris and Holly Hollenbeck Rebecca Coleman Richard N. Hill and Nancy Lundeen Ms. Beth Weissman Alex Ingersoll and Martin Tannenbaum Ɨ Mr. and Mrs. David Crane John B. McCallister Marie and Daniel Welch Alan and Cricket Jones Mr. and Mrs. Ricky J. Curotto Elisabeth and Daniel McKinnon Dr. and Mrs. Andrew Wiesenthal Paola and Richard Kulp Robert and Judith DeFranco Sue and Ken Merrill Mr. and Mrs. David Wilcox Melanie and Peter Maier — Ingrid M. Deiwiks Mr. and Mrs. Roger Miles Kenneth and Sharon Wilson John Brockway Huntington Reid and Peggy Dennis J. Sanford Miller and Vinie Zhang Miller Foundation William Dewey Mr. and Mrs. Merrill E. Newman Mr. Byron R. Meyer Mrs. Julie D. Dickson Ms. Mary D. Niemiller Mr. Daniel Murphy Art and JoAnne Dlott Mrs. Margaret O’Drain Barbara O’Connor Bonnie and Rick Dlott

415.749.2228 39 ALAN JONES, CHAIR We are privileged to recognize Friends of A.C.T. members’ generosity during the March 1, 2017, to March 1, 2018, period. Space limitations prevent us from listing all those who have generously supported the Annual Fund. For information about Friends of A.C.T. membership, please contact Hillary Bray at 415.439.2353 or [email protected].

*An Evening at Elsinore event sponsor/lead supporter †A Dickens of a Holiday event sponsor/lead supporter

PATRON Mr. and Mrs. David Sargent* David Hawkanson Mr. Jim Sciuto Anonymous (2) Andrew and Marva Seidl Lenore Heffernan Ms. Karen Scussel and Mr. Curt Riffle Mr. Michael Bassi and Ms. Christy Styer Ms. Ruth A. Short Mr. John Heisse and Catharine Shirley Mr. and Mrs. Paul Berg Kristine Soorian and Bryce Ikeda Ms. Karin Scholz-Grace Dr. Elliot and Mrs. Kathy Shubin Fred and Nancy Bjork Ms. Valerie Sopher Ms. Dixie Hersh Donna and Michael Sicilian Jaime Caban and Rob Mitchell Dr. Gary Stein and Jana Stein Ms. Sandra Hess Ms. Patricia Sims Teresa Clark Joe Tally and Dan Strauss Edward L. Howes, MD Mr. Mark Small Mr. Byde Clawson and Mr. Douglass J. Warner Anne and Ed Jamieson Bert and LeAnne Steinberg Dr. Patricia Conolly Ms. Meredith J. Watts Dr. and Mrs. John E. Jansheski Jeffrey Stern, M.D. Jean and Mike Couch Mr. David S. Wood and Ms. Carolyn Jayne Ian E. Stockdale Ms. Karen T. Crommie Ms. Kathleen Garrison Allan and Rebecca Jergesen Mr. and Mrs. Monroe Strickberger Ron Dickel Mr. and Mrs. Roy B. Woolsey Mr. and Mrs. Norman L. Johnson Mr. Jason Surles Elizabeth Eaton Christina Yu Mrs. Zeeva Kardos Marvin Tanigawa Michael Kalkstein and Susan English The Arthur and Charlotte Zitrin Louise Karr Maggie Thompson Leif and Sharon Erickson Foundation Jody Kelley Wypych Melita Wade Thorpe Dr. Angela Sowa and Michael Kim Robert Tufts Dr. Dennis B. Facchino SUSTAINERS Mr. and Mrs. Kevin Klotter Ms. Leslie Tyler Mr. and Mrs. Richard Fowler Anonymous (4) Harold and Leslie Kruth Leon Van Steen Elizabeth and Paul Fraley Mr. Paul Anderson Edward and Miriam Landesman Mr. and Mrs. Ronald G. VandenBerghe Ms. Susan Free Ms. Patricia Wilde Anderson Carlene Laughlin Mr. Richard West Alan and Susan Fritz Dick Barker Harriet Lawrie Mr. Robert Weston Ms. Margaret J. Grover Mr. David N. Barnard Mrs. Judith T. Leahy Timothy Wu Kathy Hart Mr. William Barnard Mrs. Gary Letson Marilyn and Irvin Yalom Mr. John F. Heil Ms. Pamela Barnes Barry and Ellen Levine Nancy and Kell Yang Leni and Doug Herst Robert H. Beadle Kathleen Anderson and Jeff Lipkin Ms. Emerald Yeh James and Helen Hobbs Mr. Daniel R. Bedford Ms. Linda Lonay Jacqueline L. Young Tracy Brown and Greg Holland David and Michele Benjamin Christiana and Sandy Macfarlane Mr. and Mrs. Philip Zimbardo Jeffrey and Loretta Kaskey Richard and Katherine Berman Mr. and Mrs. William Manheim Ed and Peggy Kavounas Mr. John Blankenship and Robert McCleskey George and Janet King Ms. Linda Carter Karen and John McGuinn Eileen Landauer and Mark Michael Mr. Noel Blos Trudy and Gary Moore Jennifer Langan Carol M. Bowen and Sharon and Jeffrey Morris Mr. Richard Lee and Christopher R. Bowen Mr. Ronald Morrison Ms. Patricia Taylor Lee Mr. Roland E. Brandel Jon Nakamura Julius Leiman-Carbia Martin and Geri Brownstein Jeanne Newman Julia Lobel Mr. and Mrs. Bernard Butcher Nancy and Bill Newmeyer Mr. and Mrs. Robert W. Logan Ms. Jean Cardoza Ms. Nancy F. Noe Mr. and Mrs. Alexander Long Glenn Chapman Ms. Joanna Officier and Mr. Ralph Tiegel Jeff and Susanne Lyons Ms. Linda R. Clem Barbara Paschke and Mr. and Mrs. Bruce A. Mann Mr. Edward Conger David Volpendesta John G. McGehee Ms. Renate Coombs Mr. David J. Pasta Amelia Lis Mr. Copley E. Crosby Richard and Donna Perkins Dr. Margaret R. McLean James Cuthbertson Ms. M. N. Plant Jeffrey and Elizabeth Minick Jill and Stephen Davis Ms. Joyce Ratner Craig and Kathy Moody Kelly and Olive DePonte Ms. Danielle Rebischung Thomas and Lydia Moran Edward and Della Dobranski Maryalice Reinmuller John and Betsy Munz Ms. Joanne Dunn Mr. and Mrs. Charles Rino Jane and Bill Neilson Marilynne Elverson Mr. and Mrs. Richard Rogers Ms. Lisa Nolan Mr. Robert G. Evans Marguerite Romanello Margo and Roy Ogus M. Daniel and Carla Flamm Deborah Romer and William Tucker LeRoy Ortopan Mrs. Dorothy A. Flanagan Mr. L. Kyle Rowley Ann Paras Karen and Stuart Gansky Ms. Diane Rudden Caitlin A. Quinn and Peter C. Garenani John L. Garfinkle John Ruskin Ms. Diane Raile Frederick and Leslie Gaylord Mr. Joshua Rutberg Helen Hilton Raiser David and Betty Gibson Louise Adler Sampson Mr. Orrin W. Robinson, III Kathleen and Paul Goldman Sonja Schmid Barbara and Saul Rockman Dr. James and Suzette Hessler David Schnur Ms. Mary Ellen Rossi Mr. Kim Harris and Bennet Marks Mr. James J. Scillian

40 ACT-SF.ORG JO S. HURLEY, CHAIR A.C.T. gratefully acknowledges the Prospero Society members listed below, who have made an investment in the future of A.C.T. by providing for the theater in their estate plans.

**Deceased

Providing a Legacy for A.C.T.

GIFTS DESIGNATED TO Marilee K. Gardner Burt and Deedee McMurtry GIFTS RECEIVED BY AMERICAN CONSERVATORY John L. Garfinkle Dr. Mary S. and F. Eugene Metz AMERICAN CONSERVATORY THEATER Michele Garside J. Sanford Miller and THEATER Anonymous (8) Dr. Allan P. Gold and Vinie Zhang Miller The Estate of Barbara Beard Anthony J. Alfidi Mr. Alan C. Ferrara Milton Mosk and Tom Foutch The Estate of John Bissinger Judith and David Anderson Arnold and Nina Goldschlager Bill** and Pennie Needham The Estate of Ronald Casassa Kay Auciello Carol Goodman and Anthony Gane Walter A. Nelson-Rees and The Estate of Rosemary Cozzo Ms. Nancy Axelrod JeNeal Granieri and James Coran The Estate of Nancy Croley M. L. Baird, in memory of Alfred F. McDonnell Michael Peter Nguyen The Estate of Leonie Darwin Travis and Marion Baird William Gregory Dante Noto The Estate of Mary Jane Detwiler Therese L. Baker-Degler James Haire and Timothy Cole Sheldeen Osborne The Estate of Olga Diora Ms. Teveia Rose Barnes and Richard and Lois Halliday Elsa and Neil Pering The Estate of Mortimer Fleishhacker Mr. Alan Sankin Terilyn Hanko Marcia and Robert Popper The Estate of Mary Gamburg Eugene Barcone Mr. Richard H. Harding Kellie Yvonne Raines The Estate of Rudolf Glauser Robert H. Beadle Kent Harvey Anne and Bertram Raphael The Estate of Phillip E. Goddard Susan B. Beer Betty Hoener Jacob and Maria Elena Ratinoff The Estate of Mrs. Lester G. Hamilton David Beery and Norman Abramson R. W. and T. M. Horrigan Mary L. Renner The Estate of Sue Hamister J. Michael and Leon Berry-Lawhorn Jo S. Hurley Ellen Richard The Estate of Howard R. Hollinger Dr. Barbara L. Bessey and Barry Lee Johnson Jillian C. Robinson The Estate of William S. Howe, Jr. Dr. Kevin J. Gilmartin** Paul and Carol Kameny Susan Roos The Estate of Thomas H. Maryanski Lucia Brandon Dr. and Mrs. Stewart Karlinsky Andrea Rouah The Estate of Michael L. Mellor Mr. Arthur H. Bredenbeck and Nelda Kilguss David Rovno, MD The Estate of Bruce Tyson Mitchell Mr. Michael Kilpatrick Ms. Heather M. Kitchen Paul and Renae Sandberg The Estate of Gail Oakley Linda K. Brewer Mr. Jonathan Kitchen and Harold Segelstad The Estate of Dennis Edward Parker Agnes Chen Brown Ms. Nina Hatvany F. Stanley Seifried The Estate of Rose Penn Martin and Geraldine Brownstein John and Karen Kopac Reis Ruth Short The Estate of Shepard P. Pollack Gayle and Steve Brugler Catherine Kuss and Danilo Purlia Dr. Eliot and Mrs. Kathy Shubin The Estate of Margaret Purvine Christine Bunn and William Risseeuw Mr. Patrick Lamey Andrew Smith and Brian Savard The Estate of Gerald B. Rosenstein Bruce Carlton and Richard McCall** Philip C. Lang Cherie Sorokin The Estate of Charles Sassoon Florence Cepeda and Earl Frick Mindy Lechman Alan L.** and Ruth Stein The Estate of Olivia Thebus Paula Champagne and David Watson Marcia Lowell Leonhardt Mr. and Mrs. Bert Steinberg The Estate of Ayn and Brian Thorne Mr. and Mrs. Steven B. Chase Marcia and Jim Levy Jane and Jay Taber The Estate of Sylvia Coe Tolk Lesley Ann Clement Ines R. Lewandowitz** Mr. Marvin Tanigawa The Estate of Elizabeth Wallace Lloyd and Janet Cluff Jennifer Lindsay Martin Tannenbaum and Alex Ingersoll† The Estate of Frances Webb Patricia Corrigan Nancy Livingston and Fred M. Levin Nancy Thompson and Andy Kerr The Estate of William Zoller Susan and Jack Cortis Dot Lofstrom and Robin C. Johnson Phyllis and Dayton Torrence Ms. Joan Danforth Ms. Paulette Long Michael E. Tully FOR MORE INFORMATION Richard T. Davis-Lowell Dr. Steve Lovejoy and Ms. Nadine Walas ABOUT PROSPERO SOCIETY Sharon Dickson Dr. Thane Kreiner Marla Meridoyne Walcott Jerome L. and Thao N. Dodson Melanie and Peter Maier Katherine G. Wallin MEMBERSHIP Drs. Peter and Ludmila Eggleton Jasmine Stirling Malaga and David Weber and Ruth Goldstine Linda Jo Fitz Michael William Malaga Paul D. Weintraub and TIFFANY REDMON, Frannie Fleishhacker Mr. Jeffrey Malloy Raymond J. Szczesny DEPUTY DIRECTOR OF Michael and Sharon Marron Beth Weissman Kevin and Celeste Ford DEVELOPMENT Mr. and Mrs. Richard L. Fowler Mr. John B. McCallister Tim M. Whalen Alan and Susan Fritz John McGehee Mr. Barry Lawson Williams 415.439.2482 [email protected]

The following members of the A.C.T. community made gifts in memory and in honor of friends, Memorial & Tribute Gifts colleagues, and family members of $100 or more during the March 1, 2017, to March 1, 2018, period.

Anne and Ed Jamieson In Honor of Nancy Livingston Jane Shurtleff In Memory of John Chapot Ms. Carey Perloff and Mr. Anthony Giles In Honor of Nancy Livingston Ms. Kathleen Gallivan In Memory of Jack Gallivan Helen Hilton Raiser In Honor of Nancy Livingston Mr. David J. Pasta In Memory of Gloria Guth Anat Pilovsky In Honor of Janet Lustgarten Richard M. and Susan L. Kaplan In Memory of Richard M. Kaplan Ms. Roberta Denning In Honor of Carey Perloff Dr. Margaret R. McLean In Memory of Teresa and Phillip McLean Dorothy Saxe In Honor of Carey Perloff Richard and Victoria Larson In Memory of Dennis Powers Roselyne C. Swig In Honor of Carey Perloff Ms. Peggy Kivel In Memory of Eva Ramos The Kellners & The Bunises In Honor of David A. Riemer Wendy, David, Marisa and Jared Robinow In Memory of Barbara Rosenbloom Sue and Ken Merrill In Honor of Patti and Rusty Rueff Philip Huff In Memory of Mrs. Barbara Rosenblum Jon and Betsy Nakamura In Honor of Craig Slaight Rosenblum - Silverman - Sutton, SF Inc. In Memory of Mrs. Barbara Rosenblum Jon Nakamura In Honor of Craig Slaight Susan Terris In Memory of Barbara Rosenblum Eric and Susan Nitzberg In Honor of Craig Slaight Judy and Robert Aptekar In Memory of Alan Stein Helene Roos In Honor of Craig Slaight Fred M. Levin and Nancy Livingston, The Shenson Foundation, Julia and Vladimir Zagatsky In Honor of Gideon and Cheryl Sorokin In Memory of Alan Stein Lisa Lindenbaum In Honor of Adriana Vermut Susan Terris In Memory of Alan Stein Susan and John Weiss In Memory of Alan Stein Ms. Jamie Ney In Memory of Ann Adams Ms. Joy Eaton In Memory of Todd Wees Anonymous In Memory of Ruth Asawa Helen M. Marcus In Memory of David Williamson Marilee K. Gardner In Memory of Winnie Biocini, Joey Chait, Joe Greenbach, and Roland Lampert

415.749.2228 41 INVEST IN THE FUTURE OF THEATER

BECOME A FRIEND OF A.C.T. TODAY!

For a full listing of member benefits, visit ACT-SF.ORG/MEMBERSHIPS or contact A.C.T.’s Development Department at 415.439.2353.

Corporate Partners Circle

The Corporate Partners Circle comprises businesses that support the artistic mission of A.C.T., including A.C.T.’s investment in the next generation of theater artists and audiences, and its vibrant educational and community outreach programs. Corporate Partners Circle members receive extraordinary entertainment and networking opportunities, unique access to renowned actors and artists, premium complimentary tickets, and targeted brand recognition. For information about how to become a Corporate Partner, please contact Caitlin A. Quinn at 415.439.2436 or [email protected].

LEAD EDUCATION OFFICIAL HOTEL PRESENTING PRESENTING PARTNERS PERFORMANCE STAGE PARTNERS SPONSORw SPONSOR HOST ($25,000–$49,999) PARTNERS ($5,000–$9,999) Hotel G Bank of America Foundation ($10,000–$24,999) Burr Pilger Mayer, Inc. City National Bank BNY Mellon Wealth S&P Global Theatre Forward Management Schoenberg Family Ascent Bank of the West Law Group Farella Braun + Martel Perkins Coie LLP SEASON SPONSORw OFFICIAL AIRLINE PRESENTING Pillsbury Winthrop Shaw SPONSOR Pittman LLP

w Lead Gala Supporter

Foundations and Government Agencies

The following foundations and government agencies provide vital support for A.C.T. For more information, please contact Nicole Chalas at 415.439.2337 or [email protected].

$100,000 AND ABOVE $50,000–$99,999 $25,000–$49,999 $10,000–$24,999 $5,000–$9,999 Jewels of Charity, Inc. The Bernard Osher Anonymous The Kenneth Rainin Davis/Dauray Family Fund Doris Duke Charitable Foundation The Kimball Foundation Foundation Edna M. Reichmuth Foundation Department of Children, The Harold and Mimi Laird Norton Family Educational Fund of San Francisco Grants Youth & Their Families Steinberg Trust Foundation The San Francisco for the Arts The Edgerton Foundation MAP Fund The Sato Foundation Foundation The William Randolph Hearst The Koret Foundation Saint Francis Foundation The Stanley S. Langendorf Foundation National Endowment for San Francisco’s Office of Foundation The William and Flora the Arts Economic and Workforce Wallis Foundation Hewlett Foundation Development The Zellerbach Family The Virginia B. Toulmin Foundation Foundation Walter and Elise Haas Fund

42 ACT-SF.ORG Theatre Forward Current Funders List as of January 2017

Theatre Forward advances American theater and its communities by providing funding and other resources to the country’s leading nonprofit theaters. Theatre Forward and its theaters are most grateful to the following funders:

THEATRE EXECUTIVES PACESETTERS DONORS Kevin & Anne Driscoll *Theatre Forward Fund for ($50,000+) ($15,000–$24,999) ($10,000–$14,999) John R. Dutt*▴ New American Theatre AT&T▴ American Express* Paula A. Dominick*▴ Bruce R. and Tracey Ewing*▴ †Includes in-kind support ▴ Bank of America* Bloomberg Dorsey & Whitney Foundation Jessica Farr* ▴Educating through Theatre Support James S. & Lynne Turley*▴ Cisco Systems, Inc.* Epiq Systems* Mason & Kim Granger*▴ The Schloss Family The Estée Lauder Karen A. & Kevin W. Kennedy Brian J. Harkins*▴ Theatre Forward supporters are former Foundation▴ Companies Inc. Foundation Gregory S. Hurst*▴ supporters of National Corporate Theatre Fund and Impact Creativity. ▴ Howard and Janet Kagan▴ EY* Lisa Orberg For a complete list of funders, visit ▴ BENEFACTORS Alan & Jennifer Freedman*▴ Presidio* Joseph F. Kirk* theatreforward.org. ($25,000–$49,999) Frank & Bonnie Orlowski*▴ Thomas C. Quick* Mary Kitchen and Jon Orszag Buford Alexander and Marsh & McLennan RBC Wealth Management▴ Anthony and Diane Lembke, Pamela Farr*▴ Companies, Inc. Daniel A. Simkowitz*▴ in honor of Brian J Harkins, BNY Mellon National Endowment for S&P Global board member Steven & Joy Bunson*▴ the Arts▴ TD Charitable Foundation▴ John R. Mathena*▴ Citi Pfizer, Inc. Isabelle Winkles*▴ Jonathan Maurer and DeWitt Stern* Southwest Airlines▴† Gretchen Shugart*▴ Goldman, Sachs & Co. Theatermania/Gretchen SUPPORTERS Dina Merrill & Ted Hartley* MetLife Shugart*▴ ($2,500–$9,999) Newmark Holdings* Morgan Stanley George S. Smith, Jr.*▴ Mitchell J. Auslander*▴ Sills Cummis & Gross P.C.* Wells Fargo*▴ UBS Sue Ann Collins John Thomopoulos*▴ Willkie Farr & Gallagher LLP* Disney/ABC Television Group* Evelyn Mack Truitt* Dorfman and Kaish Family Leslie C. & Regina Quick Foundation, Inc.▴ Charitable Trust Dramatists Play Service, Inc.*

Gifts in Kind

A.C.T. thanks the following donors for their generous contributions of goods and services.

4imprint Emergency BBQ Company Piedmont Piano Company Adrienne Miller First Crush Restaurant Premium Port Wines, Inc. Blackbird Vineyards and Wine Bar Rust & Flourish Florals Chateau St. Jean Inspiration Vineyards Tout Sweet Pâtisserie Chris and Holly Hollenbeck Joe Tally and Dan Strauss Clift Hotel Krista Coupar CyberTools for Libraries The Marker Hotel diptyque Moleskine

Corporations Matching Annual Fund Gifts

As A.C.T. is both a cultural and an educational institution, many employers will match individual employee contributions to the theater. The following corporate matching gift programs honor their employees’ support of A.C.T., multiplying the impact of those contributions.

Acxiom Corporation BlackRock GE Foundation Macy’s, Inc. The Clorox Company Adobe Systems Inc. Charles Schwab Google Merrill Lynch & Co. Foundation Apple, Inc. Chevron Hewlett-Packard Foundation, Inc. The James Irvine Foundation Applied Materials Chubb & Son IBM International Foundation Northwestern Mutual The Morrison & Foerster AT&T Foundation Dell Direct Giving Campaign JPMorgan Chase Foundation Foundation Bank of America Dodge & Cox Johnson & Johnson Family Pacific Gas and Electric TPG Capital, L.P. Bank of America Foundation Ericsson, Inc. of Companies Arthur Rock Verizon Bank of New York Mellon Federated Department Stores Levi Strauss Foundation Salesforce Visa International Community Partnership The Gap Lockheed Martin Corporation State Farm Companies John Wiley and Sons, Inc. Foundation

415.749.2228 43 A.C.T. STAFF

CAREY PERLOFF PAM MACKINNON PETER PASTREICH MELISSA SMITH Artistic Director Artistic Director Designate Executive Director Conservatory Director

James Haire Costume Shop Ticket Services M.F.A. Program Core Faculty Producing Director Emeritus Jessie Amoroso, Costume Director Ian Fullmer, Director of Ticket Services Christine Adaire, Head of Voice Callie Floor, Rentals Manager Mark C. Peters, Subscriptions Manager Stephen Buescher, Head of Movement, Director Resident Artists Keely Weiman, Build Manager/Draper David Engelmann, Head Treasurer Domenique Lozano, Acting, Director Anthony Fusco, Domenique Lozano Jef Valentine, Inventory Manager Elizabeth Halperin, Assistant Head Treasurer Michael Paller, Director of Humanities, Director Maria Montoya, Head Stitcher Anthony Miller, Group Sales Lisa Anne Porter, Co-Head of Voice and Dialects Associate Artists Kelly Koehn, Accessories & Crafts Artisan Scott Tignor, Stephanie Arora, Jack Sharrar, PhD, Theater History Marco Barricelli, Olympia Dukakis, Giles Subscriptions Coordinators Havergal, Bill Irwin, Steven Anthony Jones, Chanterelle Grover, First Hand Melissa Smith, Head of Acting, Director Andy Alabran, Liam Blaney, Richard Claar, Andrew Polk, Tom Stoppard, Gregory Wallace, Victoria Mortimer, Costume Administrator Peter Davey, Leontyne Mbele-Mbong, Alex Timberlake Wertenbaker Tessanella DeFrisco, Bree Dills, Costume Fellows M.F.A. Program Adjunct Faculty Mechanic, Katharine Torres, Treasurers Milissa Carey, Singing, Director Playwrights Wig Shop Andy Donald, Arts Leadership Front of House Pamela Gray, Qui Nguyen, Suzan-Lori Parks, Lindsay Saier, Wig Master Julie Douglas, Improv Kevin Nelson, Theater Manager Carey Perloff and Paul Walsh, Harold Pinter, Melissa Kallstrom, Wig Supervisor Lauren English, Business of Acting David Whitman, House Manager William Shakespeare, Simon Stephens, Daniel Feyer, Music Director, Accompanist Bess Wohl Megan Murray, Genevieve Pabon, Tuesday Ray, Janet Foster, Audition, Showcase STAGE STAFF Associate House Managers Giles Havergal, Director, Acting Directors The Geary: Oliver Sutton, Security Miguel Ongpin, Head Carpenter Gregory Hoffman, Combat Hal Brooks, Jaime Castañeda, Rachel Chavkin, Ramsey Abouremeleh, Monica Amitin, Shannon Liz Diamond, Sheryl Kaller, Domenique Lozano, Suzanna Bailey, Head Sound Amitin, Forrest Choy, Bernadette Fons, Jasmin Hoo, Citizen Artistry Carey Perloff Mark Pugh, Head Properties Kadeem Harris, Anthony Hernandez, Svetlana Mark Jackson, Devised Theater Daniel Swalec, Head Electrician Karasyova, Caleb Lewis, Susan Monson, Haley Darryl Jones, Acting Choreographers Colin Wade, Flyman Nielsen, Trever Pearson, Scott Phillips, Pete Sean Kana, Singing Pickens, Miki Richmond, Travis Rowland, Tracey Val Caniparoli, Josh Prince Mary Montijo, Wardrobe Supervisor W. D. Keith, On-Camera Acting Sylvester, Leonard Thomas, Cevie Toure, Robyn Diane Cornelius, Assistant Wardrobe Supervisor Philip Charles MacKenzie, On-Camera Acting Composers/Orchestrators Williams, Bartenders Loren Lewis, Joe Nelson, Stage Door Monitors Heidi Marshall, On-Camera Acting David Coulter, Shammy Dee, Susan Allen, Rodney Anderson, Branden Seana McKenna, Acting Paul Scott Goodman Bowman, Serena Broussard, Danica Burt, Jose The Strand: Camello, Barbara Casey, Wendy Chang, Niyjale Caymichael Patten, Audition Patsy McCormack, Strand Master Technician Music Directors Cummings, Kathy Dere, John Doll, Larry Emms, Carey Perloff, Arts Leadership Sarah Jacquez, Strand Sound Engineer Doris Flamm, Claire Gerndt, Louisa Githuka, Kari Prindl, Alexander Technique Daniel Feyer, Greg Kenna Carol Grace, Blue Kesler, Ryszard Koprowski, Stacey Printz, Dance ADMINISTRATION Sharon Lee, Sadie Li, Joe MacDonald, Maria Designers Markoff, Val Mason, Sam Mesinger, Edvida Tiffany Redmon, Fundraising John Arnone, Nina Ball, Brian Sidney Coralyn Bond, Executive Assistant Moore, Kathy Napoleone, Mary O’Connell, Lindsay Saier, Stage Makeup and Board Liaison Bembridge, Riccardo Hernandez, Laura Brandie Pilapil, Mark Saladino, Steve Salzman, Ken Savage, Director Jellinek, Alexander V. Nichols, David Israel Walter Schoonmaker, Stephanie Somersille, Elyse Shafarman, Alexander Technique Reynoso, Donyale Werle, Scenic Human Resources Michael Sousa, Melissa Stern, Dale Whitmill, Raissa Simpson, Dance Jessie Amoroso, Beaver Bauer, Linda Cho, Kate Stewart, Interim Human Resources Director Lorraine Williams, June Yee, Ushers Liz Tenuto, Dance Candice Donnelly, Tilly Grimes, Meg Neville, David Israel Reynoso, Costumes General Management The Strand Cafe Lisa Townsend, Director, Choreographer Robert Hand, James F. Ingalls, Wen-Ling Liao, Louisa Balch, General Manager Rafael Monge, Cafe Manager James Wagner, Business of Acting Mike Inwood, Alexander V. Nichols, Nancy Amy Dalba, Associate General Manager LaRina Hazel, Raj Paul Pannu, Baristas Schertler, Robert Wierzel, Yi Zhao, Lighting Sabra Jaffe, Company Manager Studio A.C.T. Mark Jackson, Program Director Brendan Aanes, Stowe Nelson, Jake Rodriguez, Mia Carey, General/Company EDUCATION & COMMUNITY Leon Rothenberg, Darron L West, Sound Management Fellow PROGRAMS Liz Anderson, Filmmaking Tal Yarden, Chris Lundahl, Video Heidi Carlsen, Voice Elizabeth Brodersen, Director of Education Finance Matt Chapman, Movement & Community Programs Coaches Lawrence Yuan, Director of Finance Julie Douglas, Mask, Clown, and Movement Jasmin Hoo, Associate Director of Education Christine Adaire, Lisa Anne Porter, Sharon Boyce, Accounting Manager & Community Programs Francie Epsen-Devlin, Musical Theater Voice and Text May Chin, Matt Jones, Ryan Jones, Vincent Amelio, Workshops & Events Manager Paul Finocchiaro, Acting Stephen Buescher, Movement Finance Associates Vanessa Ramos, Residencies Coordinator W. D. Keith, On-Camera Acting Jonathan Rider, Danielle O’Dea, Fights Stephanie Wilborn, Drew Khalouf, Speech and Diction Daniel Feyer, Music Information Technology Community Programs Coordinator Jessica Kitchens, Acting Thomas Morgan, Director Elizabeth Halperin, Student Matinees Kari Prindl, Alexander Technique ARTISTIC Joone Pajar, Network Administrator Lealani Drew Manuta, Mark Rafael, Acting Andy Donald, Associate Artistic Director Operations Education Programs Fellow Katie Rubin, Acting, Stand-Up Michael Paller, Dramaturg Nailah Harper-Malveaux, Jamie McGraw, Associate Manager, Facilities Naomi Sanchez, Musical Theater Janet Foster, Director of Casting and Community Producing Fellow Operation and Security Jonathan Spector, Introduction to Playwriting Artistic Associate Jeffrey Warren, Assistant Facilities Manager Laura Wayth, Acting Allie Moss, Artistic Associate YOUNG CONSERVATORY Leopoldo Benavente, Facilities Crew Member Ken Savage, Associate Producer Jill MacLean, Craig Slaight Director of Curtis Carr, Jr., Theo Sims, Jesse Nightchase, Conservatory Accompanists Nora Zahn, Artistic Fellow the Young Conservatory Security Lynden James Bair, Daniel Feyer, Christopher Emily Hanna, Young Conservatory & Studio Jaime Morales, Geary Cleaning Foreman Hewitt, Paul McCurdy, Thaddeus Pinkston, PRODUCTION A.C.T. Coordinator Naomi Sanchez Jamal Alsaidi, Jeaneth Alvarado, Lidia Godinez, , Acting Audrey Hoo, Production Manager Geary Cleaning Crew Andy Alabran Robert Hand, Associate Production Manager Cristina Anselmo, Acting Library Staff , Head Librarian Jack Horton, Associate Production Manager Development Molly Bell, Musical Theater Joseph Tally G. David Anderson, Theresa Bell, Laurie Chris Lundahl, Design and Production Associate Caitlin A. Quinn, Director of Development Danielle Conover, Physical Theater Bernstein, Helen Jean Bowie, Bruce Carlton, Tiffany Redmon, Nancy Gold, Physical Character, Acting Michelle Symons, Assistant Production Manager Barbara Cohrssen, William Goldstein, Pat Hunter, Deputy Director of Development Dan Griffith, Movement Haley Miller, Conservatory Design and Connie Ikert, Ashok Katdare, Martha Kessler, Production Associate Nicole Chalas, Director of Grants and Jane Hammett, Musical Theater Nelda Kilguss, Barbara Kornstein, Analise Leiva, Sean Key-Ketter, Conservatory Design and Foundation Relations Emily Hanna, Acting Ines Lewandowitz, Patricia O’Connell, Roy Production Coordinator Jody Price, Director of Special Events W. D. Keith, Director Ortopan, Maida Paxton, Connie Pelkey, Christine Maggie Manzano, Conservatory Production and Hillary Bray, Donor Relations and Domenique Lozano, Director, Acting Peterson, Dana Rees, Roger Silver, Jane Taber, Stage Management Coordinator Memberships Manager Susan Torres, Joyce Weisman, Jean Wilcox, Christine Mattison, Dance, Choreographer Spencer Jorgensen, Production Fellow Renée Gholikely, Development Research and Marie Wood, Library Volunteers Lauren Rosi, Musical Theater Prospect Manager Vivian Sam, Musical Theater, Dance Stage Management Stephanie Swide, A.C.T. thanks the physicians and staff of the Josh Schell, Acting Elisa Guthertz, Head Stage Manager Development Operations Manager Centers for Sports Medicine, Saint Francis Valerie Weak, Acting Matt DiCarlo, Elisa Guthertz, Deirdre Rose Emily Remsen, Special Events Associate Memorial Hospital, for their care of the A.C.T. Holland, Marcy Victoria Reed, James Steele, Jordan Nickels, Development Assistant Krista Wigle, Musical Theater company: Dr. Victor Prieto, Dr. Hoylond Hong, Karen Szpaller, Stage Managers Erica Love, Development Coordinator Dr. Susan Lewis, Don Kemp, P.A., and Chris Corpus, Clinic Supervisor. Dani Bae, Christina Hogan, Christina Elizabeth Rachel Stuart, Development Fellow CONSERVATORY Larson, Megan McClintock, Leslie M. Radin, Christopher Herold, Director of Summer Accreditation Marcy Victoria Reed, Assistant Stage Managers Marketing & Public Relations Training Congress A.C.T. is accredited by the Accrediting Hal Day, Production Assistant Christine Miller, Acting Director of Marketing Jack Sharrar, PhD, Director of Academic Affairs Commission for Senior Colleges and Miranda Erin Campbell, Erin Sweeney, Bri Kimberly Rhee, Senior Graphic Designer Jerry Lopez, Director of Financial Aid Universities of the Western Association Owens, Stage Management Fellows Simon Hodgson, Publications Manager Dan Kolodny, Manager, Conservatory Operations of Schools and Colleges (WASC), 985 Simone Finney, Digital Content Manager & Professional Development Training Atlantic Avenue, Suite 100, Alameda, Prop Shop Kevin Kopjak/Charles Zukow Associates, Emily Hanna, Young Conservatory & Studio CA 94501, 510.748.9001, an institutional , Supervisor Ryan L. Parham Public Relations Counsel A.C.T. Coordinator accrediting body recognized by the , Assistant Council on Postsecondary Accreditation Abo Greenwald Beryl Baker, Digital Content Associate Matt Jones, Bursar/Payroll Administrator and the U.S. Department of Education. Diana Freeberg, Marketing Associate Ilyssa Ernsteen, Olga Korolev, Conservatory Fellows Stefanie Shoemaker, Graphic Designer Elspeth Sweatman, Publications Associate Miranda Ashland, Marketing Fellow Taylor Steinbeck, Publications Fellow Tabriana Willard, Graphics Fellow 44 ACT-SF.ORG A.C.T. PROFILES

CAREY PERLOFF (Artistic Director) Mary Stuart, ’Tis Pity She’s a Whore, The Tosca Café, The is celebrating her 25th season as artistic Voysey Inheritance, Scorched, and Underneath the Lintel. director of A.C.T., where she has Perloff is also an award-winning playwright. Her recent overseen a huge growth in the quality play Kinship premiered at the Théâtre de Paris in 2014; and scope of A.C.T.’s work, helped to Higher won the 2011 Blanche and Irving Laurie Foundation rebuild the earthquake-damaged Geary Theatre Visions Fund Award; and Luminescence Dating Theater and the new Strand Theater in premiered in New York at The Ensemble Studio Theatre. Central Market, and has forged Perloff’s book, Beautiful Chaos: A Life in the Theater collaborations between A.C.T. and theaters across the United (City Lights Press), was selected as San Francisco States and Canada. Known for innovative productions of Public Library’s One City One Book read for 2016. classics and championing new writing and new forms of Before joining A.C.T., Perloff was artistic director of theater, Perloff has directed classical plays from around the Classic Stage Company in New York, where she directed the world, 10 plays by Tom Stoppard (including the American premiere of Ezra Pound’s Elektra, the American premiere premieres of and , also at of Pinter’s Mountain Language, and many classic works. Roundabout Theatre Company, and two productions of Named a Chevalier de l’Ordre des Arts et des Lettres by Arcadia), and many productions by favorite contemporary the French government, Perloff received a BA Phi Beta writers such as Samuel Beckett, Harold Pinter, José Rivera, Kappa in classics and comparative literature from Stanford and Philip Kan Gotanda. Favorite productions include Hecuba, University and was a Fulbright Fellow at Oxford.

PETER PASTREICH (Executive six years as managing director of the Mississippi River Director) joined A.C.T. after a 50-year Festival. In addition, Pastreich has done management career in arts management. He spent 21 consulting for the Berlin Philharmonic, Southbank Centre in years as executive director of the San London, Detroit Symphony, Louisville Orchestra, Milwaukee Francisco Symphony, a period that Symphony, Philadelphia Orchestra, and Sydney Symphony included the tenures of music directors Orchestra in Australia. He has also served as mediator in Edo De Waart, Herbert Blomstedt, and orchestra and opera union negotiations in Detroit, Louisville, Michael Tilson Thomas, and during which Milwaukee, Phoenix, Sacramento, Seattle, and San Antonio. the orchestra increased its endowment from $12 million to $120 Born in Brooklyn, New York, in 1938, Pastreich received million. Pastreich was the chief administrator responsible for a BA in English literature from Yale University in 1959. In the construction of Davies Symphony Hall in San Francisco, 1999, he was made a Chevalier de l’Ordre des Arts et des and for its acoustical renovation. Lettres by the French government and was named an Before coming to San Francisco, he spent 12 years as honorary member of the International Alliance of Theatrical executive director of the Saint Louis Symphony Orchestra and Stage Employees by Local 16 of the Stagehands Union.

MELISSA SMITH (Conservatory the Bay Area. Prior to assuming leadership of the Director, Head of Acting) has served as Conservatory, Smith was the director of the Program in Conservatory director and head of acting Theater and Dance at Princeton University, where she also in the Master of Fine Arts Program at taught introductory, intermediate, and advanced acting. She A.C.T. since 1995. During that time, she has taught acting classes to students of all ages in various has overseen the expansion of the M.F.A. colleges, high schools, and studios around the continental Program from a two- to a three-year United States, at the Mid-Pacific Institute in Hawaii, New York course of study and the further University’s La Pietra campus in Florence, and the Teatro di integration of the M.F.A. Program faculty and student body Pisa in San Miniato, Italy. She is featured in Acting Teachers of with A.C.T.’s artistic wing, while also teaching and directing in America: A Vital Tradition. Also a professional actor, she has the M.F.A. Program, Summer Training Congress, and Studio performed regionally at the Hangar Theatre, A.C.T., the A.C.T. She also successfully launched the San Francisco California Shakespeare Festival, Berkeley Repertory Theatre; Semester, a semester-long intensive designed to deepen in New York at Primary Stages and Soho Rep.; and in England students’ well of acting experience, broaden their knowledge at the Barbican Centre in London and Birmingham Repertory of dramatic literature, and sharpen their technical skills—all Theatre. Smith holds a BA from Yale College and an MFA while immersing them in the multifaceted cultural landscape of in acting from Yale School of Drama.

415.749.2228 45 F.Y. I .

ADMINISTRATIVE OFFICES REFRESHMENTS AFFILIATIONS Full bar service, sweets, and savory items are A.C.T.’s administrative and conservatory A.C.T. is a constituent of Theatre available one hour before the performance in offices are located at 30 Grant Avenue, San Communications Group, the national Fred’s Columbia Room on the lower level and Francisco, CA 94108, 415.834.3200. On the organization for the nonprofit professional the Sky Bar on the third level. You can avoid web: act-sf.org. theater. A.C.T. is a member of Theatre Bay the long lines at intermission by preordering Area, the Union Square Association, the San food and beverages in the lower- and third- Francisco Chamber of Commerce, and the level bars. Bar drinks are now permitted in BOX OFFICE INFORMATION San Francisco Convention & Visitors Bureau. the theater. A.C.T. BOX OFFICE Visit us at 405 Geary Street at Mason, next to CELL PHONES A.C.T. operates under an agreement the theater, one block west of Union Square; If you carry a pager, beeper, cell phone, or between the League of Resident Theatres or at 1127 Market Street at 7th Street, watch with an alarm, please make sure that and Actors’ Equity Association, the union of across from the UN Plaza. Walk-up hours it is set to the “off” position while you are professional actors and stage managers in are Tuesday–Sunday (noon–curtain) on in the theater. Text messaging during the the United States. performance days, and Monday–Friday performance is very disruptive and not allowed. The Director is a member of the STAGE (noon–6 p.m.) and Saturday–Sunday DIRECTORS AND CHOREOGRAPHERS PERFUMES (noon–4 p.m.) on nonperformance days. SOCIETY, a national theatrical labor union. (For Strand Box Office walk-up hours, please The chemicals found in perfumes, colognes, visit act-sf.org.) Phone hours are Tuesday– and scented aftershave lotions, even in The scenic, costume, lighting, and sound Sunday (10 a.m.–curtain) on performance small amounts, can cause severe physical designers in LORT theaters are represented days, and Monday–Friday (10 a.m.–6 p.m.) reactions in some individuals. As a courtesy to by United Scenic Artists, Local USA-829 of and Saturday–Sunday (10 a.m.–4 p.m.) on fellow patrons, please avoid the use of these the IATSE. nonperformance days. Call 415.749.2228 and products when you attend the theater. use American Express, Visa, or MasterCard; The scenic shop, prop shop, and stage crew or fax your ticket request with credit card EMERGENCY TELEPHONE are represented by Local 16 of the IATSE. information to 415.749.2291. Tickets are also Leave your seat location with those who available 24 hours a day on our website at may need to reach you and have them call 415.439.2317 in an emergency. A.C.T. is supported in part by an award from act-sf.org. All sales are final, and there are no the National Endowment for the Arts. refunds. Only current ticket subscribers and LATECOMERS those who purchase ticket insurance enjoy Performances begin promptly, and late ticket exchange privileges. Packages are A.C.T. is supported in part by a grant from seating is at the house manager’s discretion. Grants for the Arts. available by calling 415.749.2250. A.C.T. gift Latecomers may have to watch the certificates can be purchased in any amount performance on a video monitor in the lobby online, by phone or fax, or in person. until intermission. Latecomers and those who GEARY THEATER EXITS SPECIAL SUBSCRIPTION DISCOUNTS leave the theater during the performance may Full-time students, educators, and be seated in alternate seats (especially if they administrators save up to 50% off season were in the first few rows) and can take their subscriptions with valid ID. Visit act-sf.org/ assigned seats at intermission. educate for details. Seniors (65+) save $40 on LISTENING SYSTEMS 8 plays, $35 on 7 plays, $30 on 6 plays, $25 Headsets designed to provide clear, amplified ORCHESTRA on 5 plays, and $20 on 4 plays. sound anywhere in the auditorium are SINGLE TICKET DISCOUNTS available free of charge in the lobby before Joining our eClub is the best—and sometimes performances. Please turn off your hearing aid only—way to find out about special ticket when using an A.C.T. headset, as it will react to offers. Visit act-sf.org/eclub to sign up. Find the sound system and make a disruptive noise. us on Facebook and Twitter for other great PHOTOGRAPHS AND RECORDINGS of A.C.T. deals. Beginning two hours before curtain, performances are strictly forbidden. a limited number of discounted tickets are available to seniors (65+), educators, RESTROOMS are located in Fred’s Columbia administrators, and full-time students. For Room on the lower lobby level, the Mezzanine matinee performances, all seats are just $20 Lobby, and the Garret on the uppermost for seniors (65+). Valid ID required—limit lobby level. one ticket per ID. Not valid for Premiere Wheelchair Seating is located Orchestra seating. All rush tickets are subject in Fred’s Columbia Room on the MEZZANINE to availability. lower lobby level, the Balcony Lobby, and the Garret on the GROUP DISCOUNTS uppermost lobby level. Groups of 15 or more save up to 35%! For more information, call Anthony Miller A.C.T. is pleased to announce that an Automatic at 415.439.2424. External Defibrillator (AED) is now available in the house management closet in the lobby AT THE THEATER of The Geary. A.C.T.’s Geary Theater is located at 415 Geary Street. The lobby opens one hour before LOST AND FOUND curtain. Bar service and refreshments are If you’ve misplaced an item while you’re available one hour before curtain. The theater still at the theater, please look for it at our opens 30 minutes before curtain. merchandise stand in the lobby. Any items found by ushers or other patrons will be taken ABOUT OUR PLAYS there. If you’ve already left the theater, please BALCONY Copies of Words on Plays, A.C.T.’s in-depth call 415.439.2471 and we’ll be happy to check performance guide, are on sale in the main our lost and found for you. Please be prepared lobby, at the theater bars, at the box office, with the date you attended the performance and online at act-sf.org/wordsonplays. and your seat location.

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