Scott Alan Evans Artistic & Executive Director Nora Chester & Greg McFadden Associate Artistic Directors VOLUME 23 No. 1 the actors company theatre SUMMER 2015 COMPANY NEWS SUMMER HAPPENINGS TACT closed out its 2014/15 season with a bang this spring with a socko-boffo Gala at TOUGH the glorious University Club on May 11th hon- oring our very own CYNTHIA HARRIS, one CHOICES of TACT’s founding members and a former long-time Artistic Director of the company (see page 6). That stunning event was fol- SNEAK A PEEK AT OUR lowed up by TACT’s winning the BEST REVIV- AL award from the Off-Broadway Alliance for our recent production of Abundance by Beth 2015/16 SEASON Henley. JENN THOMPSON, one of TACTs co-Artistic Hard Love & Widowers’ Houses Directors for the past four years, has announced that she is stepping down from ACT’s 2015/16 season will negotiate America. Hard Love premiered at the Haifa her AD post, but will remain a very active part of the TACT artistic family. She says: some very tough choices as we bring Municipal Theatre in Israel in 2003 and has “I am beyond honored to have been given Tyou two plays that delve into the very been seen in Rome, Berlin, Toronto, Johan- the opportunity to serve and beyond proud notion of choice, free will, faith, assumption, nesburg, and Cape Town, and in this country to have played a small role in helping to and morality. Though told from diametri- in Atlanta, Boston, Chicago, Dallas, Durham, establish TACT as one of New York’s most cally opposed viewpoints and from two far- and Phoenix. TACT’s production of Hard Love highly regarded theatre companies.” SCOTT flung eras, each of these masterful works will mark its Off-Broadway premiere. the remaining Founding ALAN EVANS, bring you face to face with life-changing Artistic Director, will continue on with the Hard Love will be directed by TACT Artistic & and life-defining moments of choice where support of long-time company members, Executive Director, Scott Alan Evans. Perfor- future lives hangs in the balance. If that’s not NORA CHESTER and GREG MCFADDEN mances begin September 29rd and will run dramatic, we don’t know what is. in the newly appointed roles of Associate through October 31, 2015. Artistic Directors. TACT heats things up in September with In the spring, TACT is teaming up with our TACT continues to grow in many ways: the the searing Hard Love, by the controversial dearest sister company, Gingold Theatrical Board of Directors welcomes new member and awarding winning Israeli playwright, and Treasurer TERI SCOTT, who comes to us Group, fearlessly lead by international Shaw Motti Lerner. Set in the Ultra-orthodox Mea from Barclay’s, and the company welcomes expert and long-time TACT company mem- She’arim district in Jerusalem, Hard Love, is its new Managing Director, JONATHAN WE- ber David Staller, to reimagine one of George the fiercely romantic and passionate sto- BER, who was formerly at Theater for the Bernard Shaw’s most prescient and timely ry of Hannah and Zvi, a divorced couple plays, Widowers’ Houses. whose lives are thrown back together when the teen-aged children from their second Young gentleman doctor Harry Trench and marriages start to become romantically in- his companion William Cokane are touring volved. The enormous divide between the the continent when Harry meets a lovely faithful and the non-believing is attempted young woman, Blanche Sartorious, daughter to be bridged by the power of an undying of a wealthy London landowner. Blanche and earthly love. Which will win out? How will Harry’s admiration is mutual and their hap- they navigate this greatest of all divides? py union seems assured, until the unsavory source of the Sartorius fortune comes to light. Motti Lerner is an internationally recognized playwright and screenwriter whose plays First performed in 1892 and published in 1893, have been produced throughout Europe, Widower’s Houses reveals, as only Shaw Australia, Africa, the Middle East and North Tracy Christensen, Jenn Thompson, Scott Alan Evans, Kelly McAndrew & Todd Lawson accept the OBA award CONTINUES ON PAGE 2 for BEST REVIVAL. CONTINUES ON PAGE 4 HARD LOVE : 2 WIDOWERS’ HOUSES: 3 COMPANY NEWS: 4-5 SALON SERIES: 6 SEPTEMBER/ MAINSTAGE TACT can, the enormous pressures a capitalist and OCTOBER patriarchal society places on its young, and how those pressures can force one to make some very difficult choices. As withHard Love, those choices often square off between one’s beliefs with one’s loves – creating a dramatic tension, and in the case of Widowers’ Houses, a heightened hilarity – that we think everyone can relate to. HARD LOVE TACT’s Spring production in collaboration with GTG, of Widowers’ Houses will be directed by by Motti Lerner David Staller. Performances begin March 1st and will run through April 2nd, 2016. With TACT’s new season, you’ll discover two Directed by SCOTT ALAN EVANS plays on the Mainstage that will have you thinking, gasping, empathizing, loving, and PREVIEWS PERFORMANCE SCHEDULE laughing. In fact, the toughest choice of all th th Sept 29 to Oct 10 , 2015 Tuesday 7:00PM NEW TIME may be deciding which play you like the best. OPENS Wednesday-Thursday 7:30PM And, don’t forget, Subscribing Members to Sunday, October 11th Friday, Saturday 8:00PM Saturday, Sunday* 2:00PM TACT also enjoy four more plays in our Salon PERFORMANCES THROUGH Series, this season looking at Four Centuries of October 31st, 2015 *TALK-BACKS with the cast following Comedy! See page 6 for more details and look every Sunday Matinee. Special matinee Wednesday, October 28th for our seasonal brochure coming your way at the end of the summer. ABOUT THE AUTHOR: MOTTI LERNER SPECIAL PROGRAM MOTTI LERNER is an internationally recognized award winning playwright and screenwriter. Born in Israel in 1949, Mr. Lerner studied theatre at the Hebrew Univer- sity and began his career in the theatre in 1977 when he TACT SOCIAL founding the Maduga Experimental Theater as part of The Jerusalem Theater. Initially a director and drama- eared towards early-career theatre pro- turge, he began writing plays and screenplays in earnest Gfessionals and young theatre enthusiasts, in 1984. TACT SOCIAL offers a web-only ticket dis- His plays include: Kastner (1985 Meskin Award for Best count to Mainstage productions, accessible Play Award); Pangs of the Messiah (2008 Helen Hayes Award nomination for the Best by following @TACTnyc on social media plat- Play); Paula; and Pollard, all produced by the Cameri Theatre of Tel Aviv; Exile in Jeru- forms. salem and Passing The Love of Women at Habima National Theatre; Autumn at the Beit Lessin Theatre; and Hard Love at the Municipal Theatre in Haifa. His play The Murder On a Thursday evening during the run of our of Isaac, about the assassination of Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin, was produced at the Mainstage productions, you’ll be invited to par- Heilbron Theatre in Germany (1999) and had its American premiere in Centerstage The- ticipate in a post-show Talk-Back with mem- atre in Baltimore (2006). He has written screenplays for: Loves in Betania; The Kastner bers of the Acting company. Then, we take the Trial (1994 Best TV Drama); Bus Number 300; Egoz; The Silence of the Sirens (2003 party to a local watering hole, where the next Best TV Feature Film); Altalena; and Spring 1941 with Joseph Fiennes and Claire Hig- generation of the theatre industry can kick gins. His work for television also includes multiple episodes for the series The Institute back, network, and socialize with each other. and A Battle in Jerusalem. In 1994 he won the Prime Minister’s of Israel Award for his creative work. To book your place for this special program, His plays have been produced in the Germany, Switzerland, Italy, Austria, South Africa call at the Lauren TACT office. 212/645- and Australia. In this country his plays have been see at the Public Theatre, New York; 8228 Centerstage Theatre, Baltimore, Williamstown Theatre Festival, MA; Jewish Ensemble Theatre, Detroit; La Mama Theatre, New York, Theatre J, Washington DC; Theatre Or, Durham; Victory Gardens, Chicago; JTS, Atlanta; Jewish Theatre of Arizona; Jewish The- atre, Toronto; Golden Thread Theatre, San Francisco; Silk Road Theatre Project, Chica- go; Cleveland Playhouse, Cleveland; Untitled Theatre, New York; LATC, Los Angeles. Our 2015/16 season is made possible, in part, by public funds from the New Motti teaches playwriting at the Kibbutz College in Tel Aviv. His book According To, on York State Council on the Arts, a State Chekhov’s writing method, was published in 2011. agency. 2015/16 SEASON 2 newTACTics 2015 NEW PLAY newTACTics Talk-Back for THE ART OF BAD MEN. Pictured Kate Middleton, Michael Schantz, Russell Posner, Scott Alan Evans, Vincent FESTIVAL Delaney, Adam McNutley, Matt Decapua, Caitlin Morris & Lauren Miller ewTACTics celebrated its 5th and The Art of Bad Men by Vincent Delaney, anniversary this season, and what the first-ever playwright to collaborate with nbetter way to fete this milestone for newTACTics. our new play development program than The festival featured performances from with the four remarkable works in our TACT Acting Company members Jeremy 2015 newTACTics New Play Festival? Each Beck, Jeffrey C. Hawkins, Brandon Jones, week in June, we rehearsed and presented Ted Koch, and Dana Smith-Croll, as well as a brand new play for an eager crowd of returning Guest Artists Matthew DeCapua, theatre-lovers to enjoy. Nearly 700 people Kate Middleton, Russell Posner, and Michael attended this summer’s sold-out readings Schantz. Several Guest Artists made their and participated in our post-performance TACT debut this summer: Helen Cespedes, talk-backs, and their feedback was as Michael Cyril Creighton, Lateefah Holder, insightful and valuable as ever.