The American Century Theater presents The American Century Theater presents About The American Century Theater The American Century Theater was founded in 1994. We are a professional nonprofit theater company dedicated to presenting great, important, and worthy American plays of the twentieth century—what Henry Luce called “the American Century.” The company’s mission is one of rediscovery, enlightenment, and September 17–October 16, 2010 perspective, not nostalgia or preservation. Americans must not lose the extraordinary vision and wisdom of past playwrights, nor can we afford to surrender the moorings to our shared cultural heritage. Gunston Theater II Our mission is also driven by a conviction that communities need 2700 South Lang Street, Arlington VA theater, and theater needs audiences. To those ends, this company is committed to producing plays that challenge and move all Americans, Director Producer Stage Manager of all ages, origins, and points of view. In particular, we strive to create William Aitken Rip Claassen David Olmsted theatrical experiences that entire families can watch, enjoy, and discuss long afterward. Technical Director/ Lighting Design Scenic Design Steven L. Barker Jameson Shroyer Board of Directors Sound Design Costume Design Properties Design Chair Wendy Kenney Ian Armstrong Rip Claassen Anndi Daleske Vice-Chair Ann Marie Plubell Treasurer Kimberly Ginn Scene synopsis Board David T. Austern, Richard Barton, An Orthodox Synagogue in Mineola, Long Island Elizabeth Borgen, Rebecca Christy, Vivian Kallen, Jack Marshall, Act 1 Before the Morning Prayers Kevin McIntyre, Kim-Scott Miller Staff Act 2 Scene 1, The Morning Prayers Scene 2, Before the Afternoon Prayers Jack Marshall CEO and Artistic Director Jason M. Beagle Bill Gordon Act 3 The Exorcism Rip Claassen Rhonda Hill Brian Crane Steven Scott Mazzola There will be two intermissions. Ellen Dempsey David Olmsted There will be cigarette smoking onstage. Kate Dorrell Ginny Tarris Tom Fuller Please—Silence and stow cell phones and other distracting devices. The use of recording equipment and taking of photographs during the performance are strictly prohibited. Become a fan of The American Century Theater on Facebook. Keep up with shows, auditions, volunteer opportunities, podcasts, videos, and more. www.AmericanCentury.org Produced by special arrangement with Samuel French, Inc. Cast, in order of appearance Hirschman (the Cabalist) . Craig Miller Sexton . Joe Cronin Schlissel . Ron Sarro The Tenth Man (1959) by Paddy Chayefsky Zitorsky . Mick Tinder Eugene O’Neill, Arthur Miller, and Tennessee Williams are the consensus Alper . Stephen Rourke Big Three of American 20th-century stage drama, but a different triumvirate Foreman . Richard Fiske of dramatists deserve credit—or perhaps the blame—for pointing the way Evelyn Foreman . Kari Ginsburg to the future. Their names are Rod Serling, Reginald Rose, and Paddy Arthur Brooks . Steven Quartell Chayefsky, and they were the first great writers to take their imaginations to the new medium of television. What is often referred to today as the Golden Harris . James Svatko Age of Television could just as accurately be called the Serling, Rose, and Rabbi . Matthew Meixler Chayefsky Era. Kessler Boys . Brendan Haley and Jim Callery The three men wrote small, cramped, intimate stories that took place in Policeman . Bill Gordon locker rooms and jury rooms, two-room apartments, bedrooms, kitchens, and jail cells. Their brand of drama was made for close-ups, and it bred a new Production staff style of acting far removed from the grand flourishes of the Barrymores and Director . William Aitken Tallulah Bankhead. It called for new kinds of stars, too—actors who looked Producer . .. Rip Claassen and behaved like real people, not movie stars. The three had some things in Stage Manager . David Olmsted common. All were fierce liberals and heralds of social justice, wary of power and corruption, enemies of bigotry in all of its forms, and believers in the Assistant Stage Manager . Jim Callery power of truth and courage. They were also different, especially in style: Technical Director/Scenic Design/Master Carpenter . Jameson Shroyer Rose, the master of unremarkable, spare language that seemed like it could Lighting Design . Steven L. Barker have been overheard in any office or household; Serling, a poetic master Lighting Assistants . Ashley Swiger and Barbara Maltseva of metaphor and irony; and Chayefsky, the most versatile of them all. He Sound Design . Ian Armstrong specialized in passionate, soaring monologues, often delivered by characters Costume Design . Rip Claassen who were angry and frustrated. The most cynical and audacious of the three, he was also the most sentimental: Paddy believed in love, but he was also wary Wardrobe Assistant . Jessica Branch of it. He was also wary, unlike Rose and Serling, of idealism. Properties Design/Scenic Painting . Anndi Daleske Most of all, however, Paddy Chayefsky could really write. He could pack Sound Board Operator . Grant Marshall so much color and controversy in his dialogue that he sometimes ignored Production Assistant . Kyler Schmitz character: everyone he created was, in some way, Paddy, and sounded like it. Master Electrician . AnnMarie Castrigno His facility with words sometimes resulted in too much of a good thing, but it Program Design and Cover Art . Michael Sherman was always fun listening. Production Photography . Dennis Deloria Rose (Twelve Angry Men), Serling (Requiem for a Heavyweight), and Archivist . Kim-Scott Miller Chayefsky (with Marty) each finished the Golden Age of Television having contributed one iconic live TV drama. Then Chayefsky took a different path. Unlike Reginald Rose, who continued to concentrate on television work to the end of his career (though he lived to see his teleplay of Twelve Special thanks to— Angry Men become a stage standard), and Serling, who dabbled in films and Jackie Altman Peg Lorenz theater but whose greatest successes were on the small screen, Chayefsky Backstage, Inc. Marianne Milian eventually decided that his words and aspirations needed a larger palette. Don Barton Stephenie Overman After his adapted teleplay of Marty became an Academy Award–winning Sterling Playmakers movie, he concentrated on writing for the screen, with an occasional foray Charlotte tCleary into playwriting. Alone among the Golden Age trio, he had a successful Israeli Accents, Rockville, Maryland Steve Taylor Broadway hit—two of them in fact: The Middle of the Night (1956), which Martha Karl Patricia Tinder Northern Virginia Community College/Loudon CST 251 Students continued was an adaptation of one of his teleplays, and The Tenth Man. Chayefsky also Company), Alexa Vere de Vere in As Bees in Honey Drown (Trumpet Vine surpassed Serling and Rose by authoring three classic movie scripts—for The Theatre Company), Chloe in Arcadia (Rep Stage), Jill Mason in Equus (Heritage Goddess, Hospital, and Network. He was just hitting his artistic stride, some Theatre Company), and Robert in Hidden in this Picture (Syracuse Stage). She feel, when he was cut down by cancer at the age of 58. has performed with Fallen Angels Productions, The Center Company, Round House, Arena Stage, Shakespeare Theatre, Adventure Theatre, Venus Theatre, The best 21st-century writers now follow Paddy and Reginald and Rod’s and eight seasons with the Washington National Opera. Kari’s non-theatre example to where money and fame are: television. It is hard to counter the credits include g14 productions’ Reservation, Cox Communications 20/10 argument that the best dramatic writers today write for TV, not the stage. The commercials, as well as projects for UPN20, WILL Interactive, AAAS, Caryatid Tenth Man gives us a wistful glimpse of what might have been if Chayefsky, and Films, Prudential, and The Washington Warthogs and Homicide. maybe Serling and Rose, too, had set out to create a new Golden Age of Theater, rather than giving most of their best work to other media. Bill Gordon (Policeman) last appeared with The American Century Theater as Phil McCabe in the concert reading of Babes in Arms. Previous TACT roles Alas, it was not to be. include Hoffy in Stalag 17, “Jingle Bill” Gordon in An American Century —Jack Marshall, Artistic Director Christmas (for which he also designed and ran sound), Von Konigswald in Happy Birthday, Wanda June, and The Cabbie and Lt. Buchevski in Cops. Other TACT sound design credits include The Titans and Life With Father. Other local stage credits include Boo in Spooky Action Theatre’s production of The Marriage of Bette and Boo. Bill produces TACT’s “Before the Curtain Is Raised” podcast series and podcast programs for the American Shakespeare Paul Danaceau, originally cast as Foreman, rehearsed with the cast for Center in Staunton, Virginia. several weeks before he was stricken with serious illness. He had been looking Brendan Haley (Older Kessler Boy) was Production Intern on The American forward to playing the role Jacob Ben-Ami, the father of a longtime family Century Theater production of Seascape. He is a recent graduate of Virginia friend, originated in the 1959 New York production of The Tenth Man. Our Tech’s Theatre Arts and Cinema program. thoughts, prayers, and best wishes go out to Paul and his family. Matthew Meixler (Rabbi) last appeared with The American Century —The Tenth Man cast and production staff and Theater as the SS Guard and McCarthy in Stalag 17. A graduate of New The American Century Theater family York University’s Tisch School of the Arts, he studied first in the Meisner Extension, then in the Classical Studio, and appeared as Trinculo in The Jim Callery (Younger Kessler Boy) See Production Staff. Tempest, Gloucester in King Lear, and the Old Shepherd in The Winter’s Tale. Matt is an original member of the New York Neo-Classical Ensemble, where Joe Cronin (Sexton) appeared with The American Century Theater as Father he appeared as Arviragus in Cymbeline and as Francis Flute in A Midsummer in Life With Father, MacBird in MacBird!, Looseleaf in Happy Birthday, Night’s Dream.