KNOW BEFORE YOU GO JULY 26 – AUGUST 21
Production Sponsors
Emily and Dan Einhorn
PERFORMANCES MAGAZINE P1
KNOW BEFORE YOU GO
We look forward to seeing you at La Jolla Playhouse at your upcoming performance of JUNK: The Golden Age of Debt. Below is some additional information about the production and the venue to enhance your theater-going experience.
PARKING Parking is free for all subscribers. For all others parking is $2 (subject to change), Mon-Fri. Upon arrival to campus, please purchase your parking permit from one of the automated pay stations located next to the information kiosk. Simply park, note your space number, and pay $2 at the pay station. Pay stations accept Visa, MasterCard, American Express or cash ($1 and $5), and do not give change. You will not need to return to your car. Parking is free on the weekends. ACCESSIBILITY A golf cart is available to assist patrons with accessibility issues to and from the parking lot. Please notify Patron Services prior to your performance if you are in need of this service; additionally, you may pull into the five minute parking in front of the theatre, and a friendly La Jolla Playhouse greeter will assist you.
Children under the age of 6 are not permitted in the theatre during performances unless otherwise posted. Unaccompanied minors ages 12 and under are not permitted in the theatre.
P2  PERFORMANCES MAGAZINE
DINING
James’ Place is the Theatre District’s on-site restaurant. Developed by renowned Sushi Master James Holder, the menu includes his signature sushi, as well as delectable dishes created with Prime and Angus cuts of beef, locally and sustainably harvested seafood, along with seasonal dishes. A lighter fare menu is also served at the newly-redesigned sushi/cocktail bar, featuring craft beer and California wines. James’ Place is open daily. For reservations, please call (858) 638-7778. For menu and hours, please visit jamesplacesd.com. We also recommend the following nearby restaurants:
Adobe El Restaurante and Mustangs & Burros at Estancia La Jolla Hotel & Spa 9700 N. Torrey Pines Road La Jolla, CA 92037 estancialajolla.com
Cusp Restaurant and Hiatus Poolside Lounge at Hotel La Jolla 7955 La Jolla Shores Drive La Jolla, CA 92037 cusprestaurant.com
Café la Rue and The Med at La Valencia Hotel 1132 Prospect Street La Jolla, CA 92037 lavalencia.com
Fleming’s Prime Steakhouse & Wine Bar 8970 University Center Lane San Diego, CA 92122 flemingssteakhouse.com
Dolce Pane e Vino 16081 San Dieguito Road Rancho Santa Fe, CA 92067 dolcepaneevino.com
Giuseppe Restaurants & Fine Catering 700 Prospect Street San Diego, CA 92037 giuseppecatering.com
Pamplemousse Grille 514 Via de la Valle, Suite 100 Solana Beach, CA 92075 pgrille.com Piatti 2182 Avenida De La Playa La Jolla, Ca 92037 Phone: 858-454-1589 piatti.com/lajolla Rock Bottom Restaurant & Brewery Playhouse Patrons Get 20% Off 8980 Villa La Jolla Drive La Jolla, CA 92037 rockbottom.com
PERFORMANCES MAGAZINE P3
A MESSAGE FROM THE
ARTISTIC DIRECTOR
MISSION STATEMENT:
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La Jolla Playhouse has received the highest rating from Charity Navigator, the nation’s premier charity evaluator.
La Jolla Playhouse has received La Jolla Playhouse has received the the highest rating from Charity highest rating from Charity Navigator, Navigator, the nation’s premier the nation’s premier charity evaluator. charity evaluator. P4 PERFORMANCES MAGAZINE
© Howard Lipin/U-T San Diego/ZUMA Wire
I began my tenure at La Jolla Playhouse in late 2007, just as the Great Recession was taking hold. It was, as everyone reading this surely remembers, a scary and anxious moment. The explosion of the mortgage bubble reverberated around the world, and our fear was quickly joined by anger at those who had so recklessly rolled the dice with our prosperity and security.
But, as Ayad Akthar reminds us in his world-premiere play JUNK: The Golden Age of Debt, such “corrections” are by no means rare, and our collective fascination with — and drive for — wealth makes us all culpable. JUNK is a work of dramatic fiction inspired by true events; by looking back to the 1980s, Ayad has created an origin myth for today’s financial realities. That was the moment when debt became an asset; when perceived value overtook intrinsic value; when financing consumed manufacturing. Ayad’s play unfolds as something akin to a cut-throat war, with board rooms replacing battlefields. JUNK is not a period piece, however; it looks forward, and invites us to understand the complex new world order we’ve inherited. Our society fetishizes money; the weekly box office reports for movies are news, “affluenza” has become a successful legal defense and one of our presumptive nominees for president has almost literally connected his virility and potency to his supposed business acumen. I am a huge admirer of Ayad Akhtar, and it’s a true pleasure to continue the artistic relationship that started with our world premiere of The Who & The What. Whether he’s writing from the deeply-personal perspective of the cultural collision of America and Islam in the Pulitzer Prize-winning Disgraced and The Who & The What, or tackling the interconnectedness of economies in The Invisible Hand or JUNK, Ayad’s work evinces a restless, wide-ranging and fierce intelligence, coupled with a master dramatist’s keen hand for narrative. This is a homecoming both for Ayad and the fantastic director Doug Hughes, who returns to the Playhouse for the first time since 1994. Together, they’ve created a production that depicts nothing less than a revolutionary moment in our history, which we watch from our current moment of revolution.
CHRISTOPHER ASHLEY
LA JOLLA PLAYHOUSE PRESENTS Michael S. Rosenberg Managing Director
Christopher Ashley Artistic Director
BY
AYAD AKHTAR DIRECTED BY
DOUG HUGHES FEATURING
ANNIKA BORAS*, BENJAMIN BURDICK*, TONY CARLIN*, JOSH COOKE*, ZORA HOWARD ‡, JENNIFER IKEDA*, JASON KRAVITS*, ZAKIYA IMAN MARKLAND*, JEFF MARLOW*, SEAN McINTYRE ‡, DAVID RASCHE*, MATTHEW RAUCH*, ARMANDO RIESCO*, LINUS ROACHE*, HUNTER SPANGLER ‡, HENRY STRAM*, KEITH WALLACE* SCENIC DESIGNER COSTUME DESIGNER LIGHTING DESIGNER ORIGINAL MUSIC & SOUND DESIGN DRAMATURG CASTING STAGE MANAGER ASSISTANT STAGE MANAGER PRODUCTION MANAGER
JOHN LEE BEATTY WILLIAM MELLETTE BEN STANTON MARK BENNETT GABRIEL GREENE CAPARELLIOTIS CASTING CHARLES MEANS* CHANDRA R.M. ANTHENILL* AUDREY HOO
Developed with the support of New York Stage and FIlm and Vassar’s Powerhouse Season Summer 2015 PERFORMANCES MAGAZINE P5
THE CAST (in alphabetical order)
Amy Merkin............................................................................................................Annika Boras Giuseppi Addesso.......................................................................................... Benjamin Burdick Corrigan Wiley/Union Rep/Curt................................................................................. Tony Carlin Robert Merkin........................................................................................................... Josh Cooke Charlene Stewart....................................................................................................Zora Howard Judy Chen............................................................................................................ Jennifer Ikeda Murray Lefkowitz/Chen’s Lawyer..........................................................................Jason Kravits Jacqueline Blount.................................................................................. Zakiya Iman Markland Boris Pronsky............................................................................................................ Jeff Marlow Mark O’Hare/Merkin’s Lawyer/Union Worker ��������������������������������������������������� Sean McIntyre Leo Tresler............................................................................................................. David Rasche Israel Peterman................................................................................................. Matthew Rauch Raúl Rivera....................................................................................................... Armando Riesco Thomas Everson.....................................................................................................Linus Roache Devon Atkins/Waiter........................................................................................Hunter Spangler Maximilien Cizik.......................................................................................................Henry Stram Kevin Walsh.......................................................................................................... Keith Wallace Setting: 1985 - Los Angeles, CA; New York, NY; Reading, PA. JUNK: The Golden Age of Debt will be performed with a 10-minute intermission between Act I and Act II, and a 5-minute pause between Act II and Act III. Author’s Note JUNK: The Golden Age of Debt is a fictionalized account suggested by events in the historical public record. The characters in this play are dramatic concoctions, stitched together — at times — with details pulled from history, but these characters are never anything other than fictions. The purpose is to tell a tale not about some by-gone era, but about the world we inhabit today.
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS This work was developed in part at the Sallie B. Goodman Retreat at McCarter Theatre. Special thanks to Lex Scott Davis and MM La Fleur.
ADDITIONAL ` STAFF Associate Director..........................................Alexander Greenfield Associate Lighting Designer...................................... Amanda Zieve Associate Sound Designer.....................................Chris Luessmann Assistant Scenic Designer.....................................Justin Humphres ‡ Assistant Costume Designer................... Desiree Hatfield-Buckley
* Members of Actors’ Equity Association, the Union of Professional Actors and Stage
Managers in the United States. The theatre operates under an agreement between the League of Resident Theatres and Actors’ Equity Association. This theatre operates under an agreement between the League of Resident Theatres and the Stage Directors and Choreographers Society, an independent national labor union.
P6 PERFORMANCES MAGAZINE
Stage Management Assistant................................. Jessie Medofer ‡ Stage Management Intern.................................................Katie Pyne Rehearsal Production Assistant.................................. Ashley Martin Dramaturgy Assistant............................................ Samantha Matta
This theatre operates under an agreement between the League of Resident Theatres and United Scenic Artists, Local USA-829 of the IATSE. La Jolla Playhouse is a member of the League of Resident Theatres (LORT) and a constituent of Theatre Communications Group (TCG), the national service organization for the nonprofit professional theatre. ‡ UC San Diego M.F.A. Candidates in residence at La Jolla Playhouse.
THE COMPANY ANNIKA BORAS, Amy Merkin La Jolla Playhouse: Debut. Off-Broadway: Chair (Lortel Award nomination), The Broken Heart, Macbeth (TFANA); An Oresteia (Drama League Award nomination), Orlando (CSC); John Patrick Shanley’s The Prodigal Son (MTC). Regional: The Danish Widow (NYS&F); The Importance of Being Earnest starring Lynn Redgrave, The Miracle Worker (Paper Mill Playhouse); Romeo and Juliet (ART). London: Carver directed by William Gaskill (Arcola Theatre). Recent TV: Chicago Fire, The Following, Unforgettable, Lights Out, The Good Wife, Law & Order: SVU, Person of Interest, The Blacklist and Homeland. Upcoming: Baz Luhrmann’s The Get Down. Training: Royal Academy of Dramatic Art. BENJAMIN BURDICK, Giuseppi Addesso is a native of Idaho and graduate of Yale University. La Jolla Playhouse: Blood and Gifts. Regional: The Sunshine Boys (Ahmanson); God of Carnage (The Hippodrome, Gainesville); The Real Thing (ETC, Santa Barbara). LA Theatre: Arcadia; Rock-n-Roll (L.A. Premiere); Light Up the Sky (LA Weekly nomination, Best Actor in a Comedy); Travesties (LA Weekly Winner, Best Actor in a Comedy); Neil LaBute’s Autobahn (west coast premiere). Film: The Stranger, Tattoo: A Love Story (Grand Jury Prize, Florida Film Fest), The Board Room (HBO & Montreal Comedy Festivals). Television: The Soul Man, Arrested Development, Enlightened, CSI, Awake (recurring), The Glades, The Mentalist, Entourage, Conspiracy (series regular), 24, Born Free (series regular). For Jessica, Finn and Digby. TONY CARLIN, Corrigan Wiley/Union Rep/Curt La Jolla Playhouse: Debut. Broadway: Sylvia, All the Way, Snow Geese, The Assembled Parties, The Best Man, Time Stands Still, Lend Me a Tenor, Mary Stuart, Spring Awakening, Pygmalion, Copenhagen, Democracy, Jumpers, Heidi Chronicles and Mamma Mia (original Broadway company). Off-Broadway: Stuff Happens (The Public Theater); Entertaining Mr. Sloane (Laura Pels); Once in a Lifetime (Atlantic Theater). Regional: Apples and Oranges (Alliance Theatre); Rabbit Hole (Hudson Stage); Woman in Mind (Tiffany Theatre). Film: The Bourne Legacy, Nutty Professor, True Colors, Crazy People. Television: The Blacklist, Royal Pains, Star Trek Voyager, Seinfeld (finale), others. JOSH COOKE, Robert Merkin La Jolla Playhouse: Debut. Off-Broadway: The Common Pursuit (Roundabout). Regional: Come Back, Little Sheba (Kirk Douglas/CTG). Television credits include: Longmire, Manhattan, The Middle, Hart of Dixie, Dexter, Better with You. Film credits include: Hail, Caesar!; Finding Joy; I Love You, Man. Education: B.A. in Theater from UCLA. ZORA HOWARD, Charlene Stewart La Jolla Playhouse: Debut. UC San Diego Theatre and Dance: Go. Please. Go.; Movers and Shakers; The Cherry Orchard; Angels in America: Millennium Approaches; Second Skin; Venus; Burial at Thebes. Off-Broadway: Macbeth, Trojan Women, Medea (Classical Theatre of Harlem). Education: M.F.A. from UC San Diego, expected 2017.
JENNIFER IKEDA, Judy Chen La Jolla Playhouse: Debut. Broadway: Top Girls (MTC); Seascape (LCT). Other NY: Revolt.SheSaid.Revolt.Again, Marie Antoinette (Soho Rep); Macbeth, Ping Pong, Titus Andronicus, The Bacchae, Two Noble Kinsmen, As You Like It (Public); Love and Information (NYTW); Charles Frances Chan Jr’s... (NAATCO); Takarazuka!!! (Clubbed Thumb); Hamlet (TFANA). Regional: Seminar (CTG). Film/TV: Killing Hasselhoff (upcoming), Advantageous (Sundance 2015 Special Jury Prize), Elementary, Blindspot, Madam Secretary, Happyish, Person of Interest, Smash, Suits, Fringe, Lipstick Jungle, Law & Order. Other: David Michalek’s Portraits in Dramatic Time (Lincoln Center Festival); Selected Shorts (NPR). B.F.A., Juilliard. @ikedamame JASON KRAVITS, Murray Lefkowitz/Chen’s Lawyer La Jolla Playhouse: Debut. Broadway: Relatively Speaking, The Drowsy Chaperone, Sly Fox. Regional credits include: 42nd Street (The Muny); The Taming of the Shrew and Love’s Labour’s Lost (Shakespeare Theater); Free Will and Wanton Lust and Goodnight Desdamona… (Woolly Mammoth Theatre Company). TV credits include The Practice, The Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt, Madam Secretary, Madoff, Curb Your Enthusiasm, The Blacklist, and Masters of Sex. Film credits include: Casse-tete Chinoise (Chinese Puzzle), The Adjustment Bureau and Morning Glory. Creator/Performer Off the Top! Solo Improvised Cabaret. Company Member, Woolly Mammoth Theater Company. Member of The Actors Center. ZAKIYA IMAN MARKLAND, Jacqueline Blount La Jolla Playhouse: Up Here. UC San Diego: La Bete, The Cherry Orchard, Grapes of Wrath, A Lie of the Mind, Battlecruiser Aristotle, Venus, Burial at Thebes, Second Skin. FIU: RENT, The Last Days of Judas Iscariot, Medea, Swimming in the Shallows, Top Girls, Body and Sold, The Arabian Nights. Education: M.F.A. from UC San Diego; B.F.A. from Florida International University. JEFF MARLOW, Boris Pronsky La Jolla Playhouse: Hollywood, Glengarry Glen Ross, Sideways. Regional: Hamlet, Nothing Sacred (South Coast Repertory); Moonlight and Magnolias, An Empty Plate in the Café du Grand Boeuf, And the Winner Is, The Sleeper (Laguna Playhouse); You Can’t Take It with You (Geffen Playhouse); Handle with Care, Indoor/Outdoor, Around the World in 80 Days (Colony Theatre); The Missing Pages of Lewis Carroll, Medea (Theatre @ Boston Court). As a member of the Reduced Shakespeare Company: tours of the U.S., Europe and Asia in The Complete Works of William Shakespeare (abridged) [revised], The Complete History of America (abridged), Completely Hollywood (abridged). Film: Stevie D, Akeelah and the Bee, The Hebrew Hammer. Television: Heartbeat, Dr. Ken, Angie Tribeca, Brooklyn Nine-Nine, The Player, Mistresses, Rizzoli & Isles, Rake, The Thundermans, NCIS, Grey’s Anatomy, Without a Trace, Pushing Daisies. SEAN McINTYRE, Mark O’Hare/Merkin’s Lawyer/ Union Worker La Jolla Playhouse: Debut. UC San Diego credits: Go. Please. Go. (Jeremy); Movers and Shakers (Jeffrey/Marta); Angels in America (Roy); Hamlet (Claudius); 3 Women in 4 Chairs (Henry); The Cherry Orchard (Yepikhodov). NY Theatre: title role in Thomas Bradshaw’s Job, Agamemnon in Sean Graney’s These Seven Sicknesses, King Saul in Rob Askins’ Bible Tales, Wallace in Olivia Dufault’s Starwatch. Education: M.F.A. candidate from UC San Diego, 2017. B.A. from James Madison University.
PERFORMANCES MAGAZINE P7
THE COMPANY DAVID RASCHE, Leo Tresler La Jolla Playhouse: Debut. Mr. Rasche began his career at Chicago’s famed The Second City cabaret. He has worked frequently Off-Broadway, and was most recently seen on Broadway in Donald Margulies’ The Country House. His film credits include: Burn After Reading, United 93, In the Loop, Just Married and Manhattan. On TV, he played the title role in Sledge Hammer! and has appeared in many episodic shows from Miami Vice to Madam Secretary. This season he can be seen in Veep on HBO and Impastor on TVLand. MATTHEW RAUCH, Israel Peterman La Jolla Playhouse: Debut. Broadway: The Merchant of Venice, Prelude to a Kiss. Off-Broadway: A Particle of Dread, Book of Days (Signature); Kin (Playwrights Horizons); The Winter’s Tale (Shakespeare in the Park); The Revenger’s Tragedy, The Duchess of Malfi - Callaway Award: Best Classical Performance (Red Bull); Still Life (MCC). Regional: title role in Macbeth - Connecticut Critics Circle Award: Best Actor (Hartford Stage). Also Williamstown, Arena Stage, Shakespeare Theater, Long Wharf, many others. Film: The Wolf of Wall Street, Labor Day, The Tale. TV includes: 4 seasons of Banshee, Shades of Blue, Believe, Treme, The Blacklist, The Good Wife, Law & Order. Training: ART Institute at Harvard. ARMANDO RIESCO, Raúl Rivera La Jolla Playhouse: Debut. Off-Broadway: Toast (Public Theater); Happiest Song Plays Last (Lortel Award nomination - Best Lead Actor) and Water by the Spoonful (Second Stage); Sonia Flew (SPF); Four (MTC). Regional: Goodman, Wilma, Lookingglass, Steppenwolf, Victory Gardens, About Face Theater. Film/TV: Adult World, CHE, National Treasure, Garden State, World Trade Center, Fever Pitch, Bella, 25th Hour, The Family, Power, Vinyl, Blue Bloods, and others. Education: B.S.S.P. from Northwestern University. LINUS ROACHE, Thomas Everson La Jolla Playhouse: Debut. Off-Broadway: Middletown (Vineyard); Richard II, Coriolanus (Almeida BAM). UK theatre includes: Titus Andronicus, Julius Caesar, Richard II, The Last Days of Don Juan, King Lear, Uncle Vanya (RSC); Juno and the Paycock (RNT); The Glass Menagerie, Love’s Labour’s Lost, Richard II (Royal Exchange); The Deep Blue Sea (West End). Film: Priest, Wings of a Dove, Siam Sunset, Blind Flight, Pandaemonium (Evening Standard Award), The Chronicles of Riddick, Batman Begins, Find Me Guilty, Before the Rains, Non-Stop. TV: The Gathering Storm (Golden Satellite Award), RFK (Golden Globe nomination), Law & Order, Vikings. HUNTER SPANGLER, Devon Atkins La Jolla Playhouse: Debut. Regional: You Are Here, A Few Good Men (Centre Stage); A Little Night Music, Laughter on the 23rd Floor (The Warehouse Theatre). UC San Diego: Other People/Sin Eaters (WNPF); The Venetian Twins, Rhinoceros, Borealis (WNPF), Hamlet, Golden Boy. Education: Current M.F.A. student at UC San Diego. B.A. from Clemson University. Thanks to family and friends for all their support!
P8 PERFORMANCES MAGAZINE
HENRY STRAM, Maximilien Cizik La Jolla Playhouse: Debut. Broadway: The Elephant Man (also Theatre Royal Haymarket, London), Inherit the Wind, The Crucible, Titanic. Recent Off-Broadway: The School for Scandal (Red Bull); Posterity (Atlantic); Fly by Night (Playwrights Horizons); Antony and Cleopatra (Public Theater and Royal Shakespeare Company, Stratford-onAvon); The Cradle Will Rock (Encores! Off-Center); Charles Ives Take Me Home (Rattlestick). Television: Smash, The Americans, White Collar, Law & Order. Film: Submission, Irrational Man, Cradle Will Rock, The Grey Zone. Mr. Stram is a graduate of the Juilliard School Drama Division and the recipient of an OBIE Award for Sustained Excellence. KEITH A. WALLACE, Kevin Walsh is thrilled to be returning to the Playhouse stage. La Jolla Playhouse: Blueprints to Freedom, The Bitter Game. UC San Diego credits: Death of a Driver, Venus, Golden Boy, In the Crowding Darkness, A Lie of the Mind, Grapes of Wrath. Regional: Dance of the Holy Ghosts, Hoodoo Love, The Last Days of Judas Iscariot, A Comedy of Errors, Hairspray, Passing Strange, The Tempest. Directing credits: The Brothers Size, The Last Days of Judas Iscariot. Education: M.F.A. from UC San Diego. Many thanks to the talented cast and crew! AYAD AKHTAR, Playwright Mr. Akhtar’s The Who & The What had its world premiere at La Jolla Playhouse in 2014 and was developed as part of the Playhouse’s DNA New Work Series. The play later went on to run at LCT3/Lincoln Center Theater. Mr. Akhtar is also a novelist and author of American Dervish, published in over 20 languages worldwide and named a 2012 Best Book of the Year by Kirkus Reviews, Toronto’s Globe and Mail, Shelf Awareness and O, The Oprah Magazine. His play Disgraced won the 2013 Pulitzer Prize for Drama, ran on Broadway at the Lyceum Theatre and is currently the most produced play in the country. In addition to Disgraced, his plays The Who & The What and The Invisible Hand received Off-Broadway runs and are currently being produced around the world. Akhtar was listed as the most produced playwright at the 2015/16 season by American Theatre. As a screenwriter, he was nominated for an Independent Spirit Award for Best Screenplay for The War Within. He has been the recipient of fellowships from MacDowell, Djerassi, the Sundance Institute, Ucross and Yaddo, where he currently serves as a Board Director. He is also a Board Trustee at PEN/America. DOUG HUGHES, Director Mr. Hughes’ recent Broadway productions include The Father (Tony Award nomination, Best Play); Outside Mullingar (Tony nomination, Best Play); The Big Knife; An Enemy of the People; Born Yesterday; Elling; Mrs. Warren’s Profession; Oleanna; the Tony-nominated revival of The Royal Family; A Man for All Seasons; Mauritius; the Tony-nominated revival of Inherit the Wind; A Touch of the Poet; Frozen (Tony Award nominations; Best Director, Best Play) and the Pulitzer Prize- and Tony Award-winning Doubt, for which he won the Tony Award for Best Director. Recent Off-Broadway productions include Incognito, The City of Conversation, Death Takes a Holiday, The Whipping Man, An Experiment with an Air Pump, Flesh and Blood and Defiance. In addition to the Tony, he has been awarded Drama Desk, Outer Critics Circle, Lucille Lortel, Obie and Callaway Awards for his productions. He is a McCarter Theatre/ Sallie B. Goodman Fellow.
PLAYHOUSE LEADERSHIP THE COMPANY JOHN LEE BEATTY, Scenic Designer Broadway: 110 productions including Disgraced, The Nance, Other Desert Cities, Good People, Doubt, The Color Purple, Chicago, The Heiress, Proof, A Delicate Balance, The Sisters Rosensweig, Burn This, Ain’t Misbehavin’, Talley’s Folly, Crimes of the Heart, Fifth of July. Off-Broadway: Substance of Fire, The Whipping Man, A Life in the Theater, Sylvia and many seasons at Manhattan Theatre Club, Circle Rep, Lincoln Center, The Public, City Center Encores!. Awards: Multiple Tony, Obie, Drama Desk and Outer Critics Circle awards, Theater Hall of Fame. Education: Yale School of Drama, Brown University.
CAPARELLIOTIS CASTING, Casting Upcoming Broadway: The Front Page, Les Liaisons Dangereuses, Glass Menagerie, Jitney, The Little Foxes. Recent and select Broadway/OffBroadway: Blackbird, The Father, An Act of God, Prodigal Son, Fish in the Dark, It’s Only a Play, Disgraced, Sex with Strangers, Casa Valentina, Holler If Ya Hear Me, The Trip to Bountiful, Grace, Seminar, Lend Me a Tenor, Fences. Also: MTC, 2nd Stage, Atlantic, LCT3, Ars Nova, Steppenwolf, The Old Globe, Goodman, McCarter and others. Film/ television: American Odyssey (NBC), How to Get Away with Murder pilot (ABC), Ironside pilot (NBC), Steel Magnolias (Sony for Lifetime).
WILLIAM MELLETTE, Costume Designer La Jolla Playhouse: Debut. Other credits and clients include The New York Fringe Festival, Mattel, Thomas the Tank Engine, Billboard Music, Holland America Cruise Line as well as various music videos, fashion shoots and Off-Broadway shows and national tours. Visit www.williammellette.com for more info.
CHARLES MEANS, Stage Manager La Jolla Playhouse: His Girl Friday. Broadway: The Real Thing, Seminar, The Motherf**ker with the Hat, The Pitmen Painters, Next Fall, Oleanna, You’re Welcome America: A Final Night with George W. Bush, Mauritius, The Goat or Who Is Sylvia? and Doubt. National Tour: Doubt. Off-Broadway: The Laramie Project and Wit as well as productions at Manhattan Theatre Club, The Public Theater, New York Theatre Workshop, Roundabout Theatre Company, Center Theatre Group and The Old Globe. TV: HBO telecast of Will Ferrell’s You’re Welcome America. Mr. Means is the head of the stage management program and current chair of the Department of Theatre and Dance here at UC San Diego. http://theatre.ucsd.edu/people/faculty/CharlesMeans
BEN STANTON, Lighting Designer La Jolla Playhouse: Unusual Acts of Devotion. Broadway: Fully Committed, Deaf West’s Spring Awakening (Tony, Drama Desk, Outer Critics Circle Award nominations), Fun Home (Tony nomination), An Enemy of the People, Seminar. Off-Broadway: Incognito (MTC); Dot (Vineyard Theater); The Legend of Georgia McBride (Lortel nomination, MCC); Our Lady of Kibeho (Drama Desk nomination, Signature Theater); The Christians, Marjorie Prime (Playwrights Horizons); The Nether (Lortel nomination, MCC); Angels In America (Hewes nomination, Signature Theater); Murder Ballad (Lortel nomination, MTC/Union Square Theater); Belleville (Lortel nomination, NYTW); Into the Woods (Shakespeare in the Park, Delacorte); The Whipping Man (Lortel Award, Drama Desk nomination, MTC). Regional: Amhanson Theatre, Mark Taper Forum, Kirk Douglas Theatre, The Old Globe, South Coast Rep, Goodman Theatre, Shakespeare Theatre, Hartford Stage, Long Wharf, Dallas Theater Center, Huntington Theatre, Philadelphia Theatre Co., George Street Playhouse, Paper Mill Playhouse, McCarter Theatre, Intiman Theatre, Actors Theatre of Louisville. Concert designs for Bang On A Can All Stars, Beirut, Melanie Martinez, Regina Spektor, Sufjan Stevens, St. Vincent. MARK BENNETT, Original Music & Sound Design La Jolla Playhouse: His Girl Friday, A Midsummer Night’s Dream (Composer - Craig Noel Award), An Iliad (Craig Noel Award), Most Wanted, Dogeaters, Wonderland, The Country, Cloud Tectonics. Broadway (partial listing): Vanya and Sonia and Masha and Spike, Driving Miss Daisy, A Steady Rain, The Coast of Utopia (Drama Desk Award), Golda’s Balcony, Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf?. BAM/The Old Vic: THE BRIDGE PROJECT: The Cherry Orchard, The Winter’s Tale, As You Like It, The Tempest and Richard III. San Diego: Arms and the Man, Pygmalion, Vanya and Sonia and Masha and Spike (The Old Globe). Awards: 1998 OBIE - Sustained Excellence in Sound Design; OBIE - An Iliad; Ovation, Robbie and Garland Awards, twelve Drama Desk Award nominations and three Lucille Lortel Award nominations. GABRIEL GREENE, Dramaturg joined La Jolla Playhouse’s artistic staff in 2007 and currently serves as their Director of New Play Development. In addition to curating and producing the annual DNA New Work Series, he has dramaturged over twenty new plays and musicals for the Playhouse, including Ayad Akhtar’s The Who & The What, The Last Tiger in Haiti, Blueprints to Freedom, Up Here, The Darrell Hammond Project, Kingdom City, El Henry, Yoshimi Battles the Pink Robots, Milk Like Sugar (also Off-Broadway; OBIE Award) and Memphis (also Broadway and London; 4 Tony Awards). Goosebumps Alive, his immersive adaptation of R.L. Stine’s best-selling novels (co-written and directed by Tom Salamon) recently premiered at The Vaults (London). With Alex Levy, he co-created Safe at Home, which was developed as part of the 2016 DNA Seriesand will receive its world premiere at Mixed Blood Theatre in 2017. B.A.: University of Michigan. M.Phil: Trinity College, Dublin. B.F.F.: Mia Fiorella.
CHANDRA R.M. ANTHENILL, Assistant Stage Manager is thrilled to be joining the La Jolla Playhouse family. Her credits as Production Stage Manager include R. Buckminster Fuller: THE HISTORY (and Mystery) OF THE UNIVERSE, Outside Mullingar, The Oldest Boy, Everybody’s Talkin’: The Music of Harry Nilsson, Oedipus El Rey, Honky and A Weekend with Pablo Picasso (San Diego Rep); Sons of the Prophet, True West, Fool for Love, Spring Awakening, A Christmas Carol: A Live Radio Play, Assassins, and Company (Cygnet Theatre). Credits as Assistant Stage Manager: Camp David and The Comedy of Errors (The Old Globe); In the Next Room or the Vibrator Play, The Who’s Tommy, Walter Cronkite Is Dead, Tortilla Curtain, Zoot Suit, A Hammer, A Bell, and A Song to Sing (San Diego Rep); and Dirty Blonde (Cygnet Theatre). Ms. Anthenill is a proud member of Actors’ Equity.
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La Jolla Playhouse PERFORMANCES MAGAZINE P9
PLAYHOUSE LEADERSHIP THE COMPANY CHRISTOPHER ASHLEY, Playhouse Artistic Director has served as La Jolla Playhouse’s Artistic Director since October, 2007. During his tenure, he has helmed the Playhouse’s acclaimed productions of Hollywood, Come From Away, The Darrell Hammond Project, Chasing the Song, His Girl Friday, Glengarry Glen Ross, A Dram of Drummhicit, A Midsummer Night’s Dream, Restoration and the acclaimed musicals Xanadu and Memphis, which won four 2010 Tony Awards including Best Musical. He also spearheaded the Playhouse’s Without Walls (WoW) series and the Resident Theatre Program. Prior to joining the Playhouse, he directed the Broadway productions of Xanadu (Drama Desk nomination), All Shook Up and The Rocky Horror Show (Tony, Drama Desk and Outer Critics Circle Award nominations), as well as the Kennedy Center Sondheim Celebration productions of Sweeney Todd and Merrily We Roll Along. Other New York credits include: Blown Sideways Through Life, Jeffrey (Lucille Lortel and Obie Awards), The Most Fabulous Story Ever Told, Valhalla, Regrets Only, Wonder of the World, Communicating Doors, Bunny Bunny, The Night Hank Williams Died and Fires in the Mirror (Lucille Lortel Award), among others. Mr. Ashley also directed the feature films Jeffrey and Lucky Stiff, as well as the American Playhouse production of Blown Sideways Through Life for PBS. Mr. Ashley is the recipient of the Princess Grace Award, the Drama League Director Fellowship and an NEA/TCG Director Fellowship. DEBBY BUCHHOLZ, General Manager has served as general manager of La Jolla Playhouse since 2002. She is the Secretary of the League of Resident Theaters (LORT) and a member of its Executive Committee. In 2009, she received a San Diego Women Who Mean Business Award from The San Diego Business Journal. Previously she served as Counsel to The John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts and the National Symphony Orchestra in Washington, D.C. She was a faculty member of the Smithsonian Institution’s program on Legal Problems of Museum Administration. Prior to The Kennedy Center, she served as a corporate attorney in New York City and Washington, D.C. She is a graduate of UC San Diego and Harvard Law School. Ms. Buchholz and her husband, noted author and White House economic policy advisor Todd Buchholz, live in Solana Beach and are the proud parents of Victoria, Katherine and Alexia.
MICHAEL S. ROSENBERG, Managing Director has served as the Managing Director of La Jolla Playhouse since April, 2009. Working in partnership with Artistic Director Christopher Ashley, he has developed and produced new work by Ayad Akhtar, Trey Anastasio, Amanda Green, Kirsten Greenidge, Quiara Alegría Hudes, John Leguizamo, Herbert Siguenza, Basil Twist, Doug Wright and The Flaming Lips. Playhouse collaborations have included projects with UC San Diego, Museum of Contemporary Art San Diego, The New Children’s Museum, San Diego Rep, Tectonic Theatre Project, the I.D.E.A. District and the cities of Escondido and Chula Vista. Previously, Mr. Rosenberg was Co-Founder and Executive Director of Drama Dept., a New York non-profit theatre company, where he produced new works by the likes of Douglas Carter Beane, Warren Leight, Isaac Mizrahi, Paul Rudnick and David & Amy Sedaris. His early work included stints at the Kennedy Center and the National Dance Institute. Mr. Rosenberg serves on the Boards of the San Diego Regional Chamber of Commerce, NBC 7 San Diego Community Advisory Board and the Theatre Communications Group, where he is on the Equity, Diversity & Inclusion Committee and chairs the Global Theatre Initiative Community. Follow him on Twitter: @MrMikeRosenberg DES McANUFF, Director Emeritus served as La Jolla Playhouse’s Artistic Director from 1983 through 1994, and from 2001 through April, 2007. Under his leadership, the Playhouse garnered more than 300 awards, including the Tony Award for Outstanding Regional Theatre. Playhouse to Broadway credits: Jersey Boys (four Tony Awards); Billy Crystal’s 700 Sundays (Tony Award); How to Succeed in Business Without Really Trying (five Tony nominations); director and co-author with Pete Townshend on The Who’s Tommy (Tony and Olivier Awards for Best Director) and Big River (seven Tony Awards), among others. Film credits: Quills, The Adventures of Rocky and Bullwinkle, The Iron Giant (9 Animation Society awards) and Cousin Bette. Recipient of the Drama League’s 2006 Julia Hansen Award, Mr. McAnuff served as Artistic Director at Canada’s Stratford Festival from 2007 through 2012. He recently directed the hit productions of Sideways, Yoshimi Battles the Pink Robots and Jesus Christ Superstar at the Playhouse.
James’ Place is the Theatre District’s on-site restaurant. Developed by Sushi Master James Holder, the menu features his signature sushi, delectable dishes created with Prime and Angus cuts of beef, locally and sustainably harvested seafood and other seasonal dishes. Lighter fare is served at the newly-redesigned sushi/cocktail bar, which also offers craft beer and California wines. Please call (858) 638-7778 for reservations.
P10 PERFORMANCES MAGAZINE
Visit JamesPlaceSD.com for more information.
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PERFORMANCES MAGAZINE P11
“NOTHING MAKES MONEY THE WAY MONEY MAKES MONEY” A conversation between playwright Ayad Akhtar and director of new play development Gabriel Greene
GG: JUNK is the second of your plays that deals overtly with the world of finance. How did your fascination with the subject take root?
the consequences of this thrilling buzz of making money that actually leaves us all impoverished in some spiritual way.
GG: In rehearsal today, we talked about the AA: My dad made a deal with me when I idea that wealth now connotes celebrity. moved to New York in my early 20s. He’s a ridiculously successful doctor, and I was readAA: It connotes more than that. It’s ontology. ing poetry. He was like, “We got to put some Wealth is existential, wealth connotes being. One sense in this kid. Staring at paper all the time. doesn’t exist as a citizen in this advanced, late-capCan we get him to stare at different paper?” italist moment without wealth. One has no agency So he said that if I read The Wall Street without wealth. We exist in the grip of a corporate Journal every day, he’d pay my rent. For two financial vise that squeezes everybody. I think years I read The Wall Street Journal every day that the aspect of wealth as a kind of measure of Playwright Ayad Akhtar. Photo by Nina Subin. — I was a dutiful son — and I started getting into celebrity speaks to the way in which wealth is the only economics. It was the beginning of a bull market, so money was everyvalue that we still aspire to. where: the New Yorker was writing about money and at book parties people were talking about money and everyone had their stock portGG: There seems to be something almost Shakespearean — and I folio and everybody was making money. I started to get into this stuff. know you shy away from comparisons to Shakespeare… I think my dad was hoping maybe I’d go into finance or something. I didn’t, but that was my inculcation with all of this stuff, and money and AA: I mean, anybody should. the world of finance has been an important part of my work. GG: But there is something Shakespearean about the way in That’s the background context of writing this play, in a way. I wanted to which finance, power, and masculinity collide in what amounts to a write a play about finance. I feel like we don’t understand how our lives modern-day “war play.” are so completely dominated by finance. We don’t get it. I didn’t want to write a screed against finance; I wanted to write a thrilling story that AA: Those are all interwoven thematic nubs that were at the heart of was going to embed the audience in the process of capital — so that a global transformation that has been underway for a generation and they could feel what it feels like, and why it’s so compelling. And then a half, two generations. In the process, we’re distracted by our chatter at the end of the play they can make up their minds. about identity politics and equality, distracted by these matters of our individual well-being. Our collective well-being has been undermined GG: And how has the play changed as it developed? by this larger movement. I wanted to write about that process in a way that was human and engaging and that was thrilling. And it seemed AA: I had an early draft of the play, which I think effectively embedded to me that Shakespeare was somebody who was able to write about the audience in capital but didn’t necessarily enlist them in the philopower and masculinity and succession in ways that were thrilling, and sophical and social dimensions and consequences of what the process so he became a kind of way of thinking about how to write this play. of capital is doing to our country. Over the last couple of years, Doug Yes, it’s a silly thing to do — to try to write in dialogue with Shakespeare [Hughes] and I have been working toward a vision of how to enlist in that way — but there it is. the audiences’ sympathies in various ways, to make them experience P12 PERFORMANCES MAGAZINE
GG: When you and I first talked about JUNK, you called it an origin myth for the economy that we’ve inherited. AA: That’s exactly right. I’m not really writing about that period; I’m writing about now. I’m using the mythos of that time to address matters of moment today. I do think that fundamental philosophical debates around notions of shareholder rights, equity, and ownership are at the center of our democracy in way that people don’t understand. These are abstract things, but actually they go to the heart of our experience as citizens of this country, or as non-citizens, as it were. I’m trying to show a shift in the ethos, how we changed our feeling. We feel thoughts more than we think them, and I’m trying to show how the feeling/texture of the thought around money changed at a certain moment in our history. And we are living the consequences of that shift. GG: A major component in that shift was junk bonds. They weren’t new to the 1980s, but they became the means to accomplish a completely different, revolutionary end than anybody had thought of before.
summer. Which points to the extent to which capital is an abstraction, actually. Like all things, capital must be returned to the cycle of decay, too. The corrections are unpleasant reminders of that reality. GG: Certain things have inherent value for survival: water, food, housing, clothes. When societies developed, currency emerged as a way to assign worth to that. Now, it feels like currency itself is of value.
AA: When you make things, when you exist within the real world of making and consuming, natural economic growth is at two percent. Capital — through investments — grows at five percent. At a certain point, when you have this process of growth at two percent versus growth at five percent, the path diverges. Capital takes on a top-heavy quality; everything is transformed into a process of finance, usurped by this need for five percent. We no longer make cars to make cars, we make cars to create debts that yield five percent. We no longer sell food to sell food, we sell food because credit cards are used to buy the food, and that credit card debt yields five percent. Nothing makes The cast of JUNK. Photo by Jim Carmody. money the way money makes money.
AA: The play is called JUNK but it’s not about junk bonds. The play is about the moment in American history when our relationship to debt changed. But it didn’t even begin with junk bonds. It began with the Fed raising interest rates to 20% in the late ‘70s/early ‘80s, creating a climate where pursuing yields like that was even possible. The only way to get there was to turn debt into an asset — which is exactly what the treasury department did by letting interest rates run that high. The real innovation of junk bonds in the era of the 1980s under [Michael] Milken was to create possibility. When you have cash, there is possibility. Junk became a means to raise a lot of cash. We see it today in the venture capital realm; if it weren’t for corporate seed money, we wouldn’t have the technological advances that we have. The precursor to that kind of disruptive financial support is junk bonds. GG: And therein lies the central debate. There are those who extol the virtues of debt as a democratizing paradigm shift. It changes who gets a seat at the table — AA: …and who can own a house. GG: And yet, very few would argue that when these bubbles inevitably burst, something went wrong.
This is what’s happened! We’re distracted by identity politics and consumption and the war on terror and the Kardashians, and in the process, the entire world has been sold out from under us. This is what’s happened. I don’t even know how you change it at this point, but the first step has got to be some understanding of what’s really going on. The international mantra has become: do less, make more. And within that context, the only role for labor is to be exploited. Labor can’t compete; it’s caught in the cycle of two percent. GG: While everybody else is operating on four to five percent. AA: Well, the few with ninety percent of the wealth, yes. And that gap continues to get wider and wider, and in the process has eroded any notion of collectivity. When a big-box store such as a Walmart moves into a community, 86 cents of every dollar spent there leaves the community. That puts pressure on local businesses, which, over time, only creates more dependency on the box stores, the chains. Which quickens the process of a community’s impoverishment and the enrichment of those who have no stake in that community. That is the invisible centralization of power that exists at the heart of the corporate fiscal dictatorship. And I hesitate to use the word “dictatorship,” because it’s going to make me sound like a commie. I’m not a communist. But the stakes are really high. GG: And what role can art play?
AA: One of the problems of capitalism is that capital is expected to grow at a steady, constant, unfettered rate. Capital is never subjected to the natural cycle of decay. Money in the bank is expected to grow, ideally at five percent, forever. Well, the reality is everything that grows goes through its seasons: spring, summer, fall and winter. Capital has no fall and no winter; it’s expected to live through an eternal spring and
AA: To me, embedding the audience in the process of capital is not to moralize to them; they should make up their own minds about all of this stuff. But let’s be fully in it emotionally, intellectually, physically, narratively. Let’s be excited, let’s be enthralled and absorbed by it so that we have some felt sense of what this is. PERFORMANCES MAGAZINE P13