An inspiring performance promoting mental wellness and resiliency in collaboration with Student Affairs, with meaningful support from the University of
Duncan Macmillan By
with Jonny Donahoe
North Carolina at Chapel Hill.
JANUARY 10 - 16, 2024 CURRENT ArtSpace + Studio Joan H. Gillings Center for Dramatic Art | playmakersrep.org | 919.962.7529
PLAYMAKERS PRESENTS
Every Brilliant Thing By Duncan Macmillan with Jonny Donahoe Directed by Tom Quaintance Scenic Designer
Costume Designer
McKay Coble
Matthew Mallard
Original Sound Designer
Associate Director
Steven Allegretto
Jeff Aguiar
For this Production Lauren Reinhartsen, Properties Supervisor Emma Madison and Rebecca Xhajanka, Props Artisans Alice Knight and Kathryn Robinson, Stage Managers
EVERY BRILLIANT THING was first produced by Paines Plough and Pentabus Theatre, on 28 June 2013 at Ludlow Fringe Festival. The play had its North American premiere at Barrow Street Theatre, New York, on 6 December 2014, where it was presented by Barrow Street Theatre and Jean Doumanian Productions. The video or audio recording of this performance by any means is strictly prohibited.
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The Professional Theatre of the Department of Dramatic Art Kathryn Hunter-Williams, Chair Vivienne Benesch, Producing Artistic Director Produced in association with the College of Arts and Sciences The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
ARTIST BIOS Hayley Cartee Hayley
PlayMakers: Company member in their third year of UNC’s Professional Actor Training Program. Much Ado About Nothing, Hamlet, Emma, The Skin of Our Teeth. The Tempest (PlayMakers Mobile). Den of Thieves, A Doll’s House, Part 2 (PlayMakers/DDA Ground Floor). A Durham native, Hayley almost made her PlayMakers debut when her mother went into labor in the Paul Green Theatre in the mid-90s. New York: All’s Well that Ends Well, The Tempest. University: Titus Andronicus, Othello, Julius Caesar, Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Dead. Education: NYUTisch School of the Arts; Royal Academy of Dramatic Art. HayleyCartee.com
Matthew Donahue Matthew
PlayMakers: Company member in their first year of UNC’s Professional Actor Training Program with the Department of Dramatic Art. Much Ado About Nothing. Stupid F**king Bird (PlayMakers/DDA Ground Floor). Regional: The Fox; Peter and the Starcatcher (The Commonweal Theatre Co.); Gypsy, Oklahoma! (The Prizery). University: The Three Musketeers, The Mystery of Edwin Drood, Hands on a Hardbody, et al. (ECU/Loessin Playhouse). Education: BFA Acting, East Carolina University. @mattddonahu
Saleemah Sharpe Saleemah
PlayMakers: Company member in their third year of UNC’s Professional Actor Training Program. Much Ado About Nothing, Clyde's, The Legend of Georgia McBride, Hamlet, Blues for an Alabama Sky, The Skin of Our Teeth. The Tempest (PlayMakers Mobile). The Mountaintop, Den of Thieves, A Doll's House, Part 2, Gloria (PlayMakers/UNC Ground Floor). New York: King Lear (NY Classical). Regional: Dontrell, Who Kissed the Sea (Rhinoleap Production NC). University: As You Like It (Stella Adler Studio of Acting); King Lear, Soon Again Not Yet, Sopita (Royal Social Distance Company); Sins of the Father (Eden Theater Company); Significant Other (The Theatre Project); The Block (Lakai Dance Theatre); Ubu Roi, Straight Outta Kansas, Antigone (Montclair State University). Film: To The Moon (Atlantic Pictures, Short Film), The Girl With the Eyes (Independent film), Remission Accomplished (Student film). TV: “iCarly” (Nickelodeon), “The Electric Company” (PBS Kids). Education: Montclair State University B.A. Theatre Studies & a double-minor in Myth Studies & 3 Business.
Sanjana Taskar Sanjana
PlayMakers: Company member in their third year of UNC’s Professional Actor Training Program. Much Ado About Nothing, Hamlet, Emma, A Wrinkle in Time, The Skin of Our Teeth, Much Ado About Nothing. Circle Back, Den of Thieves, Gloria (PlayMakers Ground Floor). Regional: You’re A Good Man Charlie Brown, Othello, RENT (Scranton Shakespeare Festival); White Pearl (Studio Theatre); Little Women (Virginia Theatre Festival); Three Women Walk Into Bar (Charm City Theatre Festival). Education/Other: B.F.A. Acting, B.A. Sociology; University of Maryland, Baltimore County. Assistant Faculty member for Theatrical Intimacy Education (TIE).
Tom Quaintance Director
PlayMakers: An Enemy of the People, Nicholas Nickleby (co-directed with Joseph Haj), Shipwrecked!, The Little Prince. Summer Youth Conservatory: Sweeney Todd, The Mystery of Edwin Drood, A Midsummer Night’s Dream, The Music Man, Oliver!. Regionally, Tom is the Producing Artistic Director of Virginia Stage Company, where his directing credits include Henry V, Matilda the Musical, Pride and Prejudice among others. He directed Twelfth Night at the Guthrie Theatre, and many productions with Cape Fear Regional Theatre during his five years as Artistic Director, including Downrange: Voices from the Homefront, a play based on interviews with military spouses from Fort Bragg. As the founder of FreightTrain Shakespeare in Los Angeles, he earned a DramaLogue Award for Pericles. Other LA credits range from King Lear to The Devil With Boobs. Tom is a graduate of Wesleyan University with a BA in Theatre and Economics, and the UC San Diego MFA directing program.
McKay Coble Scenic Designer
PlayMakers: Company member for over 30 years. Misery, Hamlet, The Skin of Our Teeth, Everybody, Bewilderness, Sherwood, Leaving Eden, Dot, My Fair Lady, Peter and the Starcatcher, An Enemy of the People, The Tempest / Metamorphoses, It’s a Wonderful Life, Red, Noises Off, The Parchman Hour, Big River, Nicholas Nickleby, Amadeus, The Little Prince, The Illusion, Cyrano, Not About Heroes, Playboy of the Western World, A Streetcar Named Desire, The Nutcracker, and many others. Broadway: Production Coordinator, Barbara Matera, Ltd.; La Cage Aux Folles, Big River, Sunday in the Park with George, Singin’ in the Rain, Merlin, Private Lives. Regional: Alley Theatre, Clarence Brown Theatre, Guthrie Theater, Hartford
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Stage, Utah Shakespearean Festival, Virginia Stage Company. Film: The Cotton Club, Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom, Ghostbusters, Silkwood, Places in the Heart. Member of United Scenic Artists Local 829; NYC.
Matthew Mallard Costume Designer
PlayMakers: The Drowsy Chaperone (Summer Youth Conservatory). Regional Costume Work: Murder on the Orient Express (Delaware Rep, with Fabio Toblini); Twelfth Night, Cinderella, Miracle Worker, Fly (Alabama Shakespeare Festival, with Pamela Scofield and Toni Leslie James); A Moon for the Misbegotten with Audra McDonald, Paradise Blue, Unknown Soldier (Williamstown Theatre Festival with Jane Greenwood and Clint Ramos). Illinois Shakespeare Festival, Janeic Opera Company at Brevard Music Center, Atlanta Opera, Synchronicity Theatre, Westport Country Playhouse, Geva Theatre. Other: White Out Lung Cancer Fashion Show co-designer with Jordan Jaked Carrier to benefit lung cancer research: Raleigh, NC. Education: MFA in Costume Design and Technology from the University of Georgia (Much Ado About Nothing, Doubt), BA in English and Professional Writing from the University of North Alabama (Amadeus, A Streetcar Named Desire, The Diviners).
Steven Allegretto
Original Music Designer
PlayMakers: Debut. Regional: Fiddler on the Roof, The Hobbit, Henry V (Virginia Stage Company); The Secret Garden, Catch Me If You Can, Chicago (Virginia Musical Theatre); Into The Woods, Urinetown (Governor’s School for the Arts); A Chorus Line, Putnam County Spelling Bee (College of William & Mary). Education: Full Sail University (Recording Arts, 2008).
Jeff Aguiar
Associate Director
Jeff Aguiar is the Director of Engagement and Education with PlayMakers Repertory Company. Local directing credits include Switchyard Theatre Company; OdysseyStage and the 10x10 Festival; Community Theatre of Greensboro; Greensboro Children’s Theatre; Open Space Café/Triad Pride Performing Arts; and Southwest Guilford High School. As a PhD candidate in Conflict Analysis and Resolution, his work and research focuses on group facilitation, arts-based approaches to peacebuilding, and critical community development. In addition to working in the rehearsal room, Jeff co-managed the university wide collaborations and support programming framing Every Brilliant Thing as a Student Affairs mental health and wellness initiative.
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PlayMakers is... “One of America’s Best Regional Theatres” (American Theatre
Magazine), PlayMakers Repertory Company is North Carolina’s premier professional theatre company, proudly in residence on the dynamic campus of the University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill. The professional company was founded in 1976, growing out of a storied 100-year tradition of playmaking at Carolina. At the very heart of the PlayMakers experience is one of the nation’s last remaining resident theatre companies, made up of accomplished performers, directors, designers, artisans, and technicians, and supported by exceptional graduate students in UNC’s Department of Dramatic Art. Our company works side by side with guest artists from all over the world and our alumni include Pulitzer Prize, Tony®, Emmy®, and Grammy Award® winners.
Creating Tomorrow’s Classics, Today
Producing Artistic Director Vivienne Benesch is continuing PlayMakers’ tradition of producing vibrantly reimagined classics, large-scale musical theatre, and significant contemporary work, but is also broadening the company’s reach to become a home for new play development and a true hub of social and civic discourse in the region. Her first seven seasons have already given life to twelve important new American plays.
A Hub of Engagement
PlayMakers seeks to provoke thought, stimulate discussion, and push the boundaries of the theatrical form in everything we do. Whether through our intimate @PLAY series, our mainstage offerings or our virtual line-up, we look for opportunities for direct, dynamic engagement between audiences, artists, and thinkers. We also offer a host of unique engagement opportunities designed to enrich our audience’s experience of the live arts.
Theatre for the People
PlayMakers Mobile is an initiative that seeks to contribute positively to the civic and social life of our region by taking world-class theatre out of our building and into the community. We create a streamlined production of a play and take it to schools, transitional housing facilities, and long-term treatment facilities around the Greater Triangle area. And best of all, it’s all free of charge.
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WHO WE ARE
Leaving Eden, 2018. Photo by HuthPhoto
Passing the Torch PlayMakers’ award-winning Summer Youth Conservatory is the only professionally supported training program of its kind in the region. The Theatre Quest program provides camps to area middle school and high school students, while the Theatre Intensive and TheatreTech programs allow Triangle high schoolers to apprentice directly with professional directors, choreographers, musical directors, and technicians, culminating in a professional quality production on the PlayMakers mainstage for the whole community to enjoy.
Eliminating Barriers
With a commitment to eliminating barriers for attendance, PlayMakers offers All Access performances for our patrons living with disabilities. We also offer accessible $20 tickets for all performances and ticket prices are reduced to just $10 for UNC students. For more information, please contact prcboxoffice@ unc.edu.
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UP NEXT JANUARY 31 – FEBRUARY 18, 2024
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A luxurious train ride comes to a halt when a passenger is found dead. With a murderer on the loose, the passengers of the Orient Express must band together before the body count goes up. All aboard for this fast-paced adapted by Ken Ludwig ride inspired by Agatha Christie’s classic based on the novel by Agatha Christie novel. APRIL 10 – 28, 2024 A World Premiere
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Learn more about our season with the QR code.
Alyssa and Homer are in a marriage that’s hit a glitch. And it’s all due to the massively engrossing online game that’s wreaking havoc on the lives of couples everywhere. When she puts together a support group for other women in a similar situation, the game enters a new level where all’s fair in love and war. Bekah Brunstetter’s (NBC’s This is Us) hilarious and heartfelt world premiere brings technology and community together in the most unexpected ways.