Mint Theater Company
Susan and God Jonathan Bank, Artistic Director presents
by Rachel Crothers with
Scenic Design
Opal Alladin, Jennifer Blood Matthieu Cornillon, Alex Cranmer Timothy Deenihan, Katie Firth Leslie Hendrix, Anthony Newfield, Al Sapienza, Jordan Simmons
Nathan Heverin
Lighting Design
Josh Bradford
Prop Design
Clint Ramos
Casting
Sara Kmack
Dramaturg
Sound Design
Jane Shaw
Production Stage Manager
Judi Guralnick
Assistant Stage Manager
Costume Design
Jennifer Grutza
Stuart Howard, Amy Schecter & Paul Hardt
Heather J. Violanti
Press Representation
David Gersten & Associates
General Manager
Sherri Kotimsky
Directed by
Jonathan Bank Mint Theater gratefully acknowledges public support from the National Endowment for the Arts, the New York City Department of Cultural Affairs and the New York State Council on the Arts, a State agency. Production design support provided by The Edith Lutyens and Norman Bel Geddes Foundation.
BY
R A C HE L C R O T H E R S DIRECTED BY
J O N AT H A N B A N K
Mint Theater Company
Susan and God by Rachel Crothers
IRENE BURROUGHS MICHAEL O’HARA CHARLOTTE MARLEY HUTCHINS STUBBS LEONORA STUBBS CLYDE ROCHESTER SUSAN TREXEL BARRIE TREXEL BLOSSOM TREXEL LEEDS
CAST in order of appearance
Opal Alladin Al Sapienza Katie Firth Anthony Newfield Jordan Simmons Alex Cranmer Leslie Hendrix Timothy Deenihan Jennifer Blood Matthieu Cornillon
Act One, Scene 1: Irene’s house in the country Late afternoon, a Saturday in June Scene 2: After dinner, the same day intermission Act Two, Scene 1: Seven o’clock the following morning Scene 2: Ten o’clock the same morning, Sunday intermission Act Three, Scene 1: Susan’s house in the country, three months later Scene 2: Two days later, in the evening
Susan and God is presented by special arrangement with Samuel French, Inc. SPECIAL THANKS
Lighting equipment provided by the Technical Upgrade Project of the Alliance of Resident Theatres/New York through the generous support of the New York City Council and the City of New York Department of Cultural Affairs. Actors’ Equity Association was founded in 1913. It is the labor union representing over 40,000 American actors and stage managers working in the professional theatre. For 89 years, Equity has negotiated minimum wages and working conditions, administered contracts, and enforced the provisions of its various agreements with theatrical employers across the country. The Director is a member of the Society of Stage Directors and Choreographers, an independent national labor union.
Jonathan Bank Sherri Kotimsky Ted Altschuler Toni Anita Hull
Board of Trustees Geoffrey Chinn, President Elsa A. Solender, Secretary Sari Anthony Jonathan Bank Linda Calandra Carol Chinn Jon Clark
Artistic Director General Manager Associate Director Box Office Manager Toehl Harding Eleanor Reissa Tina Rieger Gary Schonwald M. Elisabeth Swerz Kate Weingarten
“When it comes to the library,” our 2001 Obie citation states, “there’s no theater more adventurous.”
In 2002 the Mint was awarded a special Drama Desk Award for “unearthing, presenting and preserving forgotten plays of merit.” MINT THEATER COMPANY commits to bringing new vitality to neglected plays. We excavate buried theatrical treasures; reclaiming them for our time through research, dramaturgy, production, publication and a variety of enrichment programs; and we advocate for their ongoing life in theaters across the world. Mint has a keen interest in timeless but timely plays that make us feel and think about the moral quality of our lives and the world in which we live. Our aim is to use the engaging power of the theater to excite, provoke, influence and inspire audiences and artists alike. 311 West 43rd St. suite 307 New York, NY 10036 www.minttheater.org Box Office: (212) 315-0231
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AUGUST 3rd – 26th, 2006; 8:00 PM All tickets: $25.00; Order online at www.screwtapeletters.us or call 212-868-4444 Theatre 3 (Mint Theatre); 311 W. 43rd St., Suite 307, New York, NY 10036 Written by C.S. Lewis; Adapted for stage by Nigel Forde; License obtained by the C.S. Lewis Company England; Directed by Ralph A. Irizarry Cast: Steve Wargo, Maria Bellantoni*, Kevin O’Bryan, Erin Holmes, Jason Yachanin*, David Esteve, Holly Hurley, Sheila Simmons, Paul Parker, David Arthur Bachrach*, Joseph Melendez*, Ralph A. Irizarry Lighting Designer: Steve Wargo; Sound Designer: Chris Tavalare; PR: Nicole Curran; Assistant Stage Manager: Steve Wargo Set Designer: Kevin O’Bryan; Photography: JCNewYork
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RACHEL CROTHERS (1878-1958) was born in Bloomington, Illinois. When her mother embarked on a medical career, Crothers was sent to live with an aunt in Massachusetts. She learned early about the struggle to balance a career with family life. The lesson would prove a recurrent theme in her plays.
In 1896, Crothers moved to New York. After one term as a student at Stanhope and Wheatcroft School of Acting, she was hired as a teacher. She began to write and direct her own plays. When Nora (1903), a one-act about a widowed actress's battle to keep her son, debuted at the school, one critic predicted “a new dramatic author may have arrived.”
Nora imitates the work of Ibsen and Strindberg, but Crothers gradually grew confident enough to recast the “problem play” in a distinctly American idiom. A Man’s World (1910), heralded as “the first great American play,” followed a young woman’s struggle to establish an artistic career while raising an adopted son.
During World War I, she wrote “gladness plays”-sentimental comedies with melodramatic overtones. One of these, A Little Journey (1918), was nominated for the Pulitzer. Her postwar output abandoned sentimentality in favor of realism and social issues. Nice People (1921) examined the flapper phenomenon and provided Tallulah Bankhead and Katherine Cornell with their first important roles.
Crothers’ plays revolve around the everyday challenges facing women-getting a job, becoming independent, raising a family. She sympathized with various women's movements, but never allied herself with them. She was criticized for being apolitical, she was called old-fashioned-but she managed to survive thirty-one years on Broadway.
Toward the end of her life, Crothers focused on charity work. During War World II, she helped found the American Theater Wing and contributed to its relief work overseas. Crothers died in her sleep at her Connecticut home on July 5, 1958.
...where the silly is celebrated and the simple is beautiful... “A real delight! Rooney recreates the zany, family-friendly spirit of 50’s comedians like Red Skelton with a dazzling mix of physical clowning and heartwarming silliness.” -Backstage
“Innovative, creative and downright funny, yet at the same time endearing in its simplicity. People of all ages will enjoy this performance!” -BlogCritics.org CREATED AND CONCEIVED BY: Lucas Caleb Rooney & Orlando Pabotoy DIRECTED BY: Orlando Pabotoy
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By Rachel Crothers
Whence Came Susan?
I am asked to “confess”, and sign my name to it. It was this way:
Even in the friendly, peaceful hills of Connecticut the far-off rumblings of the wicked world are sometimes faintly heard. A Summer ago private fights were raging in various places on the earth, inviting all who would to come in and do as much killing as they pleased, although no war had been declared.
Not only was “Death in the Afternoon” stalking the earth, but death in the morning and evening and night, on the land, in the sea and in the air. Death for so many and varied good reasons - “I must have this and you must give up that. I am right and you are wrong. Let us kill each other for our ideas.” At home and afar there seemed more hate in the world than ever before, more disappointment in ourselves and in the men we have chosen to lead us, more crumbling of ideals and faith, more capitulation of good to evil. *
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At a time when there seems to be more reason for goodness and brotherly love to prevail, when it seems it should be more easy to be kind and honest and love one's neighbor, with more bath tubs and motor cars and free schools than the world has ever seen before and with surely a more universal intelligence, however slight it may be - in spite of all this, and a few other things, I began to hear in the peaceful hills deep, tired sighs from the tired discouraged world reluctantly beginning to ask: “Is civilization a failure? Has none of the goodness and rightness which has struggled through eons of time, has none of it been worthwhile, has none of it conquered? Is it all going down in a crash, beaten by hate and greed and horror?” When-out of the blue and into my house-came a radiant lady prattling brilliantly, entertainingly and ceaselessly about God, who seemed to be a very real person and her very dear and intimate friend. She talked about love and kindness and sin and how it helps to confess our sins aloud to other sinners and share with them the comfort and stimulation of being frank and open and clean about it all. And what fun it is to be good and love everybody, and how nice it is to call every one by his first name and how this helps to wipe out class feelings, and how Lord This and Lady That were such intimate friends with their gardeners and chauffeurs on their vast estates and how happy and cheerful it makes one, and how this new thing is tearing down old frozen dogma and making people not ashamed to be good-and how it can and will stop war. *
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It seemed to me I had heard these things before, both in and out of the Bible and in every cult and creed known to man, helping him to find God, though not so entertainingly and intimately said, not so right-in-the-middle-of-the parlor-edly. But the lady didn't seem to think I had ever heard them at all and while she was pouring it all out at me so radiantly the play was born.
Susan came along-not the lady, but Susan, foolish and wise, selfish and generous, utterly spoiled by her own diabolical charm, with no thought in life except what is going to be most pleasant for Susan. Somebody in the play says, “What's Susan's trouble?” and some one answers, “Too much charm. Life has never disciplined her at all.”
It occurred to me that Susan, coming upon this chic new shining brotherhood filled with titles and gardeners and great thinkers - “My dears, you never saw such thinking” - it occurred to me there was a play in Susan and her discovery of God. *
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It seemed to me that in this sick world, heartbroken over its own failures, that side by side with more universal horror than the world has ever known, there is a more universal hunger and reaching out for a spiritual healing, a wider search for the Infinite Truth that can answer our fumbling questions and help us to go on believing in Goodness-in God.
Never in my wildest moments would it occur to me to try to tell anybody about God, but I thought in Susan's foolishness, prattling in a new way about old troubles which she wanted to drive into other people, but in no way expected to have them driven into herself, if when they, like a boomerang, came back at her, she would find they were actually true and that happiness comes from giving, not taking, from suffering and service. *
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I thought there was a play in this and so I wrote it. And it’s very pleasant indeed to find now that Susan has been good-naturedly accepted as I meant her and that women are saying, "We're all Susans."
Personally I believe all that Susan says, though not quite as she says it and I'm with her when she declares, “It's the only thing on earth that will stop war,” but I am afraid her “bright and shining army which can't be stopped, and is marching gloriously on” will have to march very fast indeed now and recruit many soldiers or it will be overtaken by the hideous one which is on our heels.
And aren’t we foolish and lazy that we don't make goodness rule the world-instead of evil! I think perhaps that what Susan and Lady Wiggam’s army is trying to do-rouse the inert rank and file of us into the realization of the dynamic power of goodness, trying to get it to us that we could rule the world with Good-if we would. New York Times Nov 7, 1937
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OPAL ALLADIN (Irene Burroughs) Broadway/New York: On Golden Pond (Broadway), Miss Julie (Cherry Lane), Two Noble Kinsmen (The Public Theater), Marco Polo Sings A Solo (Signature Theater). Regional Theater: King Stag, breath, boom (Yale Repertory Theater), Wit (Pittsburgh Public Theater), Twelfth Night (The Guthrie), Home (Actors Theatre of Louisville), The Trojan Women, As You Like It, Antony & Cleopatra, and Henry VI (The Shakespeare Theater of DC). Recent film/TV credits include the acclaimed movie "United 93" portraying CeeCee Lyles, "Jellysmoke" - winner of the LA Film Festival, "Brown Sugar", "Law & Order: CI", "Hack", "Law & Order: SVU", "Law & Order", "Cosby", "One Life to Live", and "Guiding Light". Opal is a graduate of the Juilliard School, Group 25.
JENNIFER BLOOD (Blossom Trexel) was last seen as Phoebe in Full Bloom with the Vital Theater Company. Around town she has worked a lot with the Prospect Theater Company on a variety of new musicals, including The Flood, Dido and Aenaes and Hamlet Sings! Last spring she played Tania in the American premiere of Falling Petals with the Production Company. Out of town, favorite roles include Katie in Swingtime Canteen, Rita in Prelude to a Kiss, and Angie in Breaking Legs. Jen is so glad to be here working on this lovely play. For Jake, as always.
MATTHIEU CORNILLON (Leeds) is thrilled to be a part of this production. A graduate of The Acting Studio, Inc. and founding member of Fool's Pearls Productions, he most recently played Lancelet in Avalon. Previously, for his portrayal of Laertes in Hamlet, he received the 2005 Jean Dalrymple Award for Best Supporting Shakespearean Actor. He has also appeared in Edward the Second (Gaveston), Loose Knit (Miles), Mad Forest (Mihai), The Winter's Tale (Cleomenes), Asian Shade (Tom), Greenwood, Unidentified, and The Long Goodbye on the New York stage, and in more than half a dozen short films. Matthieu also has extensive production experience, where he has specialized in sound design. He served as assistant director on Losing Ground, an original play by Bryan Wizemann, and directed Desdemona, a play
about a handkerchief. Thanks go to Jonathan Bank and the cast and crew of Susan and God, and to Amy and his family for their constant love and support.
ALEX CRANMER (Clyde Rochester) TheatreNew York: Mr. Marmalade, Roundabout; Spin Moves, SPF. Regional: The Burning Deck, La Jolla Playhouse; Street Scene, Once in a Lifetime, Philadelphia Here I Come, Williamstown Theatre Festival; K2, Arena Stage; The Studio Theatre, Washington Shakespeare Company, Olney Theatre Center, Potomac Theatre Project, The Depot, and others. Film- "Flying Scissors", "In Men We Trust", "Hearts in Atlantis". TV- "Law & Order: SVU", "Parco PI", "Without a Trace", "Third Watch". Training- MFA from UCSD. Thanks Nicolosi & Co, G & C. alexcranmer.com.
TIMOTHY DEENIHAN (Barrie Trexel) Though born in Pittsburgh, Tim has spent nearly his entire professional career living and working in the UK and Ireland. After finishing his training at the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art in London, Tim took the role of David in the Time Out London Critic’s Choice production of Absolution. He went on to play Levin in Anna Karenina, Babbybobby in The Cripple of Inishmaan, Dobbin in Vanity Fair, Austin in True West, and Jerry in Pinter’s classic Betrayal. Along with guest roles in series such as "Hornblower" and "Doctors", Tim received a Best Actor nomination for his part as Darren Roebuck in the Channel Four series "Brookside". His film credits include "Batman Begins" and the forthcoming Paul Verhoeven feature, "Zwartboek" ("Black Book"). As a writer, Tim has been commissioned by the BBC’s flagship hospital drama, Holby City, while his photography has been projected onto the side of the Anglican Cathedral in Liverpool. Susan & God marks Tim’s first New York appearance.
KATIE FIRTH (Charlotte Marley) last appeared at the Mint in Far and Wide, adapted and directed by Jonathan Bank. Other New York credits include The Hiding Place, Atlantic Theatre Company; Humble Boy, Manhattan Theater Club; Only the End of the World, The Quiet Room and Stephen Belber's solo play, Finally, all with
Company Charniére; Museum, Keen Company; Golden Prospects; The Winters Tale; The Wild Duck; Three Sisters; Stonewall:Night Variations (directed by Tina Landau); Ivona - Princess of Burgundia; Don Juan Comes Back from the War; and A Woman Alone. Regional: Placement, The Black Dahlia, (LA Weekly Oustanding Performance nomination); Day of the Kings, Alliance Theater; Romeo and Juliet and Twelfth Night, New Jersey Shakespeare Festival; Picnic, Actors Theatre of Louisville, (directed by Anne Bogart); Persephone, Mettawee Theatre Co; and the Williamstown Theatre Festival. She is a frequent participant in workshops at New York Theatre Workshop, Manhattan Theatre Club, Theatre for a New Audience, Atlantic Theater Company, HERE, Via Theatre and The Directors Company. Film & TV appearances include: "Law & Order", "Honey", 'Guiding Light' and BBC's 'Grange Hill'. Ms. Firth is also a narrator for Recorded Books.
LESLIE HENDRIX (Susan Trexel) For the last 14 years, Ms. Hendrix has appeared as the everdry Medical Examiner Rodgers on NBC TV's "Law & Order," "L&O Criminal Intent," "L&O SVU," and "L&O Trial by Jury." She made her Broadway debut when she stepped in for Jessica Lange in A Streetcar Named Desire (with Alec Baldwin, Amy Madigan, and James Gandolfini); she later understudied Kathleen Turner as Yvonne in Indiscretions, playing opposite Eileen Atkins, Roger Rees, Jude Law, and Cynthia Nixon. Other B'way appearances include The Music Man (directed by Susan Stroman), and most recently Hollywood Arms (directed by Hal Prince, written Carol Burnett). Off B'way includes The Cover of Life at The American Place (Pete Masterson directing) and The Cider House Rules at the Atlantic Theatre Co. (Tom Hulce directing). She has worked at regional theatres across the country, playing leading roles including Maggie the Cat, Miss Adelaide, Kate the Shrew, and Anna Christie. She appeared on NPR radio's "Selected Shorts" and is occasionally seen on "All My Children" as Judge Hannah Lampert. Her movie credits consist of a very brief appearance in "Sweet Home Alabama," and as the Bearded Lady in "Went to Coney Island On A Mission From God...Be Back By Five."
ANTHONY NEWFIELD (Hutchins Stubbs) Broadway: Tartuffe (with Brian Bedford; Joe Dowling, director); other New York credits include: God Bless You, Mr. Rosewater, The Bad Infinity, The Grapes of Wrath, Lady Windermere's Fan. Ireland: The Normal Heart (Ned Weeks, Project Arts Centre), Tom and Viv (T. S. Eliot, Project Arts Centre and National Tour), Peer Gynt (Gate Theatre, Patrick Mason, director). Russia: The Grapes of Wrath (Jim Casy, Moscow Arts Theatre). Regional credits include The Play About the Baby (Florida Studio Theatre); The Father, Best Kept Secret (Berkshire Theatre Festival); Death Defying Acts, The Hostage (Coconut Grove); Arcadia (Huntington); Antony and Cleopatra, Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde (Alliance Theatre); Bent (Carbonell Award), The Royal Family, Les Liaisons Dangereuses, (Caldwell Theatre); How I Learned to Drive, Gross Indecency (Hippodrome Theatre). Film and TV credits include "Diagnosis Murder," "All My Children," "One Life to Live;" "Farewell, Miss Fortune"; "Dogwood". He worked with Anna Deavere Smith at her Institute on the Arts and Civic Dialogue at Harvard University. His article about his experiences in Russia, "After the Orchard," appeared in American Theatre magazine.
AL SAPIENZA (Michael O’Hara) After graduating NYU he began his professional career on Broadway playing Ringo Starr in Beatlemania at the Winter Garden Theatre. Next was Got Tu Go Disco at the Minskoff. He then headed out to Los Angeles where he was a founding member of The Alliance Repertory Company where he performed in or directed over 30 original productions or West Coast premieres which garnered twelve Drama Logue Awards and eight Theatre League Awards. He also starred in The Tragic and Horrible Life of the Singing Nun at the Coast Playhouse directed by Charles Randolph Wright, the world premiere of Ladies Room written and directed by Kim Freedman at the Tiffany Theatre, the West Coast Premiere of Are You Now Or have You Ever Been at the Back Alley and most recently Wild Mushrooms at the Arc Light Theatre in New York. TV audiences best know him as Mikey Palmice, Uncle Junior's Hit Man and Consigliore who had the dubious distinction of being the first series regular to get
"whacked" in the first season finale of The Sopranos by taking that fateful jog! He also played Paul Koplan in "24", and can presently be seen as Philly Falzone in Prison Break. He will be starring as Mayor Frank Panzerelli in the upcoming series "Brotherhood' coming to Showtime in July. Guest Starring appearances include "Law And Order", "The OC", "Judging Amy", "CSI", "CSI Miami", "Navy NCIS", "JAG", "NYPD Blue", and "Charmed". Films include: "Pretty Woman", "Frankie and Johnny", "Under Siege 2", "Free Willy 2", "Bomb The System", "Capone's Boys", "The Hollywood Sign", and "Cellular".
JORDAN SIMMONS (Leonora Stubbs) has appeared in: The Importance Of Being Earnest (Gwendolyn, both at The Pittsburgh Public and at Barrington Stage Company), The Cardiac Shadow (PS 122), Lend Me A Tenor (Portland Stage Company), An Ideal Husband (Sonnet Rep), Much Ado About Nothing (Hartford Stage/The Shakespeare Theatre DC), Puddin’Head Wilson, Othello, and The Taming Of The Shrew (The Acting Company), A Midsummer Night’s Dream (Titania, Roanoke Island Summer Festival), and Bold Girls (Women's Expressive Theater) amongst others. Favorite role ever: Martha in Who’s Afraid Of Virginia Woolf ? TV: "Law And Order". She is a member of Moson Productions and is a graduate of the North Carolina School of the Arts.
NATHAN HEVERIN (Scenic Designer) has previously designed scenery for the Mint productions of Soldier’s Wife and The Voice of the Turtle. Other recent designs include A Stone Carver (Passage); In the Matter of J. Robert Oppenheimer, Children of a Lesser God, The Breadwinner, Outward Bound (Drama Desk Nom.), The Hasty Heart, The Journals of Mihail Sebastian, Good Morning Bill, The Voice of the Turtle, and The Good Thief (Keen Company); Sin: A Cardinal Deposed (New Group), Arrangements (Atlantic 453), All My Sons (Two River), Sixteen Wounded and Going Native (Long Wharf Theatre); Hannah and Martin (Epic Theatre Center). Nathan’s design for The Good Thief was selected for inclusion in the 2003 Prague Quadrennial. Nathan is also an accomplished pottery artist and pastry chef. Visiting professor/designer: SUNY/New Paltz, Univ. of
Conn., Dartmouth College. BFA- Florida State/ MFA- NYU.
CLINT RAMOS (Costume Designer): Mint: Soldier's Wife. Recent New York credits: Relativity (Ensemble Studio Theater), Little Willy (Set & Costumes, Rude Mechanicals), Trial By Water (Set & Costumes, Ma-Yi Theater), Revenger's Tragedy (Red Bull Theater), The Adventures of Barrio Girl (Set & Costumes,SPF), And God Created Great Whales (Foundry Theater, Culture Project), Santa Concepcion (Set & Costumes, Public Theater), References To Salvador Dali Make Me Hot (Public Theater), Whole Sky (DTW), Strings Attached (Duke Theater), Caucasian Chalk Circle (Set & Costumes, Vineyard) and others. Regional: American Repertory Theater, Commonwealth Shakespeare Company, Speakeasy Stage, Clarice Smith Performing Arts Center, Center Stage Baltimore, MOCA and others. International: ASEAN Opera, Fokoperan and Noorlaand Oper (Stockholm), Rijksteatern, Ballet Stuttgarter, De Nederlandse Opera (Amsterdam).Upcoming: Taming of The Shrew (Commonwealth Shakespeare), Angels in America, The Opera (Opera Boston). Film : Production Design for Bleach (Sundance 98), Widow Wang (Sundance '99), Kim Chi, Double Happiness, The Lost Item, Psychopathia Sexualis. Television : Production Design for MTV, A&E, VH1, Nickelodeon, Oxygen, Lifetime, History Channel and others. Awards: New York Theater Workshop Design Fellowship, Gary Kalkin Memorial Award, I.R.N.E. award nominations '03 and '04. MFA from NYU in Design for Stage and Film. JOSH BRADFORD (Lighting Designer) is pleased to be returning to the Mint, having previously designed Soldier’s Wife and Far and Wide. Other recent designs include All My Sons for Two River Theater, The Bald Soprano and The Lesson, Arrangements and The Hiding Place for the Atlantic Theater, and Sin: A Cardinal Deposed and A Likely Story for The New Group, and In the Matter of J. Robert Oppenheimer, Children of a Lesser God, The Breadwinner, Outward Bound, Pyretown, The Hasty Heart and Pullman Car Hiawatha for Keen Company. Josh also serves as the Resident Lighting Designer for the Eugene O'Neill Theater Center's
Playwrights and Cabaret Conferences. He began studying design at Middlebury College and holds an MFA from NYU's Tisch School of the Arts. WWW.joshbradford.com
JANE SHAW (Sound Design) At the Mint: Lonely Way, Ivanov (Jonathan Bank), Walking Down Broadway (Stephen Williford), No Time for Comedy (Kent Paul). Designs include: Susan Marshall's Cloudless, Sleeping Beauty and Other Stories; Big Dance Theater's Plan B, Antigone, A Simple Heart, Another Telepathic Thing, Shunkin, and Mac Wellman's Girl Gone; The Pearl Theatre's Gentleman Dancing Master and Mary Stuart; Synapse Productions' Silence and Machinal; and Syncopation at Capital Rep in Albany. Her designs have toured from Shanghai to Muenster, Charleston to Los Angeles. Ms. Shaw held positions at NYU Tisch and Jacob's Pillow Dance Festival, and is a graduate of the Yale School of Drama. She received a Meet the Composer Grant, 2006 for Hecuba at the Pearl Theater, and is a recipient of the NEA/TCG Career Development Program, 2005 – 2007.
JUDI GURALNICK (Prop Designer) is the Prop Shop Supervisor for the Conservatory of Theater Arts and Film at Purchase College , and freelances in the NY and Connecticut areas. She spent five years as Prop Designer at the Walnut Street Theatre in Philadelphia, and many summers at Maine State Music Theater. Some favorite props she has created: an abstract head of Ezra Pound for the show Treason at Perry Street Theatre, carousel animals for a production of Joseph…, a macramé ass's head for A Midsummer's Night Dream and a lamb for Winter's Tale. Judi has also designed sets for small theaters from Maine to Washington, DC and in Israel. She was part of the Arad Arts Project in Israel, where she had a one-woman exhibition of her drawings, sculpture and macramé hangings. She is glad to be back at the Mint Theater.
JENNIFER GRUTZA (Production Stage Manager) Jenn was most recently Production Stage Manager for Elliot, A Soldier's Fugue with Page 73 Productions at the Culture Project. OffBroadway: The Cherry Orchard, The Bald Soprano & The Lesson, The Hiding Place (Atlantic Theatre Company), Mr. Fox: A
Rumination (Signature Theatre Company), Cavedweller, Nocturne (NYTW), Julius Caesar (TFANA), Two Noble Kinsmen (NYSF). Tour: Turn of the Screw, Two Gentlemen of Verona (TAC). Regional: Julius Caesar (STNJ), Sight Unseen (DeerTrees Festival), Ain't Misbehavin', Diosa (Hartford Stage), Flag Day, The Rose of Corazon (CATF), Greylock Theatre Project (Williamstown Theatre Festival), Ten Unknowns (Huntington Theatre), Lobby Hero (Lyric Stage), Exposed, The Crazy Girl, Diosa, Boys & Girls (NYSAF), Oil City Symphony (Cape Playhouse), Indiscretions, The Three Penny Opera (Wilma Theatre) and several productions with ART including Animals & Plants, Full Circle and Antigone.
SARA KMACK (Assistant Stage Manager). Past credits include: Hoodoo Love (Cherry Lane Theatre Mentor Program), The Magnificent Hour - e.t.c… (NY Fringe), Delirium and pierced! - ghostLight Productions (Edinburgh Fringe), Drip - ATTIC People (Edinburgh Fringe). Education/Training: Centre College, Actors Theatre of Louisville.
HEATHER J. VIOLANTI (Dramaturg) is delighted to be doing her first show at the Mint. Previous credits include Valiant (Unofficial New York Yale Cabaret) and Massacre at Paris (Blood N Thunder Theatre Company, U.K.). She served as new play development dramaturg for two Arts Council of England grant projects, After Troy by Maureen McManus and Septimus Severus by Beverly Andrews. She has a B.A. from the College of Notre Dame of Maryland and an M.F.A. in Dramaturgy and Dramatic Criticism from Yale School of Drama.
STUART HOWARD, AMY SCHECTER & PAUL HARDT (Casting) have cast hundreds of shows over the past 25 years. Among their favorites are: Broadway: Gypsy (Tyne Daly), Chicago (Bebe Neuwirth, Ann Reinking), Sly Fox (Richard Dreyfuss), Fortune's Fool (Alan Bates, Frank Langella) & the original La Cage Aux Folles. Off Broadway: I Love You, You're Perfect, Now Change & The Normal Heart. At the Mint: The Skin Game, Walking Down Broadway and Soldier's Wife.
DAVID GERSTEN & ASSOCIATES (Press Representatives) is proud to continue our relationship with Mint. DGA currently represents the off-Broadway hits Altar Boyz (NYC and National Tour) and The Awesome 80s Prom (NYC, Baltimore, Minneapolis, Chicago). Other current clients include New World Stages (the Clinton entertainment complex formerly known as Dodger Stages), Stage Holdings Group, Ensemble Studio Theatre, The Lucille Lortel Foundation, and The League of Off-Broadway Theatres & Producers' annual Lortel Awards (10th year!), which David also writes and co-produces. David serves on the Board of Governors of ATPAM, the Association of Theatrical Press Agents & Managers. Upcoming: The Irish Curse and Jewsical –the Chosen Musical
TED ALTSCHULER (Associate Director) Directing: operas: at New York City Opera, Santa Fe Opera, Rode Hoode (Amsterdam), and Juilliard where he taught for nine years Plays include: the long-running, award-winning Virginia (Cloud 42, Chicago), On the Verge, The Road to the Graveyard, Hot Fudge, Icarus's Mother, Play with Repeats and The Glass Menagerie. Former Artistic Director of Clavis Theater Ensemble, Milwaukee. Recent projects include: an opera of Poe's A Tell Tale Heart, Georgia O'Keefe x Catherine Rogers, and the American Premiere of Glyn Maxwell’s Broken Journey with Phoenix Theatre Ensemble. Upcoming productions include For the Living and the Dead, created from the poems of Tomas Transtroemer.
SHERRI KOTIMSKY (General Manager) Produced for Naked Angels: Meshugah, Tape, Shyster, Omnium Gatherum, Fear: The Issues Project and several seasons of workshops and readings. As Naked Angels Managing Director, managed Hesh and Snakebit. Also produced Only the End of the World and Blood Orange. Most recently Theatre Manager for the Michael Schimmel Center for the Arts at Pace University, home to National Actors Theatre, Tribeca Film and Theatre Festivals, River to River Festival and the Carol Tambor Awards 2005 productions, amongst many others.
JONATHAN BANK (Artistic Director) Bank has been the artistic director of Mint since 1996 where he has unearthed and produced more than two dozen lost or neglected plays. Bank adapted and directed Arthur Schnitzler's Far and Wide and The Lonely Way which he also cotranslated (with Margaret Schaefer). These two plays were published in a volume entitled Arthur Schnitzler Reclaimed which Bank edited. He is also the editor of Worthy But Neglected: Plays of the Mint Theater Company which includes his adaptations of Thomas Wolfe's Welcome to Our City and Edith Wharton's The House of Mirth, both of which he directed, along with five other Mint rediscoveries. Bank also directed The Truth about Blayds and Mr. Pim Passes By both by A.A. Milne and performed in rotating repertory with a single group of actors under the title Milne at the Mint. Other directing credits include critically acclaimed productions of Ivanov and Othello for the National Asian American Theater Company, John Brown's Body, The Double Bass and Three Days of Rain for the Miniature Theater of Chester and Candida and Mr. Pim Passes By for the Peterborough Players. This spring Bank taught directing in the graduate program of The New School for Drama. He earned his M.F.A. from Case Western Reserve University in his hometown of Cleveland, OH.
Staff for Susan and God Technical Director Assistant Stage Manager Hair, Wig and Makeup Design Associate Costume Designer Assistant Props Designer Assistant Lighting Designer Wardrobe Supervisor Board Operator Run Crew / Mint Summer Intern Piano Captain Carpenters Electricians Painters
House Manager Box Office Associates
Evan Schlossberg Sara Kmack Seth Bodie Suzanne Chesney Lilly Clements Steve Sakowski Hunter Kaczorowski Angela Wall Emily Fleming Matthieu Cornillon Justin Hollinger, Nick Lazzaro, Brian Williams Philippe Bachy, John Frankenberg Dave Polato, Jesse Wilson Vanessa Mrovich, Phillipe Belhache Aaron Glenn Mann Jean-Marie Catlett, Janel Cooke Thomas Luczak
The Producers would like to thank the following:
American Repertory Theater, Playwrights Horizons, New York Theater Workshop, Ensemble Studio Theater, Tiia Torchia, and Nadine of Odds Costume Rentals Wigs Provided by Wigboys Ricola Natural Herb Cough Drops - Courtesy of Ricola USA, Inc
Something old, something new....
Mint is auctioning off the wicker furniture and the baby grand piano from the set of Susan and God. Place your bid on the clipboards in the lobby, or on our website (reserves apply). Winners will be announced at the end of the run. Items will be available for pick up on August 1st. Good luck!