Flyer - THE SUITCASE UNDER THE BED

PRODUCING ARTISTIC DIRECTOR

by Teresa Deevy Four Short Plays One Remarkable Evening

Directed by Jonathan Bank

JULY 21 – SEPT 23, 2017

Four Short Plays One Remarkable Evening

by Teresa Deevy

THE SUITCASE UNDER THE BED

MintTheater.org

Theatre Row 410 West 42nd St, between 9th & 10th

Administrative Office 330 West 42nd St, Ste 1210 NY, NY 10036

“One of the most undeservedly neglected and significant Irish playwrights of the 20th century” - The Irish Times

non - profit u . s . postage

pa i d

New York, NY Pe r m i t N o . 7 5 2 8

JONATHAN BANK

with:

Ellen Adair Gina Costigan Sarah Nicole Deaver Cynthia Mace Aidan Redmond SETS Vicki R. Davis COSTUMES Andrea Varga Colin Ryan LIGHTS Zach Blane SOUND Jane Shaw A.J. Shively ILLUSTRATION Stefano Imbert Theatre Row

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The Beckett Theatre | 410 West 42nd St

THIS PRODUCTION IS SUPPORTED IN PART BY: The New York State Council on the Arts with the support of Governor Andrew Cuomo and the New York State Legislature.

By public funds from the New York City Department of Cultural Affairs in partnership with the City Council.

THE SUITCASE UNDER THE BED by Teresa Deevy Four Short Plays - One Remarkable Evening

"Deevy's dialogue is practically minimalist, but in very few words an entire culture is revealed, and the mysteries of the human heart explored." The New Yorker, 2013

"Of all the lost names unearthed by the Mint Theatre Company, surely the most significant has been the rediscovery of the Irish playwright Teresa Deevy." Lighting & Sound America Teresa Deevy had six plays produced by the Abbey Theatre between 1930 and 1936, and then the Abbey turned its back on her, effectively ending her career as an Abbey playwright. “I must just make an opening elsewhere,” she wrote to a friend, and then began to write for the radio—a remarkable turn of events, given that she was completely deaf. She lost her hearing due to an illness in her late teens and was never able to hear her beautifully-crafted dialogue spoken.

Brilliant Irish playwright Teresa Deevy’s suitcase is jam-packed and ready for a trip filled with romance, mystery and surprise. Deevy’s characters “demand high adventure and emancipation of the spirit. She presents a blending of romance, reality and fantasy that has its roots in life.” (Irish Times, 1948)

In 2010, Mint Theater Company re-introduced author Teresa Deevy to the world with our acclaimed production of the play the Abbey turned down, Wife to James Whelan, followed

by Temporal Powers in 2011 and Katie Roche in 2013.

Join us on a journey that is sure to satisfy. 4 short plays packed with 1 wedding, 3 marriage proposals and 2 break-ups—all in 1 remarkable evening. 3 World Premieres featuring 7 shape-shifting actors playing 22 characters.

Mint has received worldwide recognition for our effort to restore Teresa Deevy to her proper place in the canon of Irish dramatic literature. Fintan O’Toole, one of Ireland’s leading public intellectuals and drama critics, acknowledged the importance of both Deevy and Mint’s exploration of her work in the pages of the Irish Times in 2013:

THE KING OF SPAIN’S DAUGHTER “Annie Kinsella was born with romance in her soul,” the Irish Independent wrote when The King of Spain’s Daughter premiered at the Abbey in 1935. “To her, life was the splendid glowing vision of a poet…yet she lived among peasants who saw her romanticism as wildness and folly, and merely called her liar when the splendor of her imagination gave the semblance of reality to her dreams.”

“One of the best known and most highly esteemed of Teresa Deevy’s plays. And rightly so.

For Annie Kinsella…is one of the author’s most striking creations.” (Irish Writing, 1948) STRANGE BIRTH (World Premiere) Sara Meade works at a small rooming house where she observes with determined detachment the heartache of each resident; a caution against falling in love herself. Suddenly the day’s post brings a letter that challenges her resolve.

“Shows the author in full mastery of her powers.” (Irish Writing, 1948)

Deevy was the great white hope of the Abbey in the mid-1930s. Katie Roche was included alongside the staples of O’Casey and Synge on the Abbey’s tour of the US in 1937.

And then she was simply dropped, suddenly and without explanation. Deevy’s next play, Holiday House, was accepted by the Abbey but then shelved, and she was never told why.

That breach has never been properly repaired. The Abbey has twice staged Katie Roche in recent decades... But there has been no coherent exploration of Deevy’s work as a whole by any Irish company. Instead, the Mint Theater in New York, which specialises in rediscovering lost work, has engaged in what it calls the Teresa Deevy Project.

This summer, Mint will resume our Teresa Deevy Project with The Suitcase Under the Bed, so named for the location where Deevy’s writing was stored for decades, prior to Mint’s Artistic Director Jonathan Bank’s arrival at the Deevy family home in Waterford in 2010.

ORDER YOUR TICKETS TODAY!

HOLIDAY HOUSE (World Premiere) It’s August at the seaside and the family is arriving for the summer holiday. Derek expects to be the center of attention, the one thing they all have in common. There will be Doris to whom he was once engaged, Jil to whom he is now married, and his brother Neil, now married to Doris.

ONLINE: TELECHARGEOFFERS.COM PHONE: 212-947-8844 IN PERSON: 410 WEST 42ND ST NOON-8PM, MON-SUN PERFORMANCES: Tue-Sat at 7:30pm Sat & Sun at 2:00pm Wed Matinee: 8/23, 9/06 & 9/20 at 2:00pm

IN THE CELLAR OF MY FRIEND (World Premiere) Belle believes that she and Barney came to an understanding last night, but she arrives at his home this morning to a great surprise and a new understanding. A hint of mysticism adds to the mystery of this haunting play.

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