"A good f*cking play"

THE ASK opened this past weekend and it’s a hit. I could not be more proud my genius friends Matt and Jessi, of our incredible actors Colleen and Betsy, and my brilliant co-producer Natalie. Alongside our crack stage management team of Curly Karen Schleifer & Daren A.C. Carollo, and our amazing designers, we have all come together to make a new play at the time when making new plays is much harder than it should be.

Rave reviews from Vulture (recommended pick!), TimeOut NY (critics pick!), Theater Beyond Broadway, TheaterMania, Exuent, BlogCritics, Manhattan Digest, and DCTheaterArts.

Kent showed up and, as usual, made indelible images.

Come on down to the wild project and join us.

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Just Asking

UPDATE: Casting announcement is live. I told you to hold onto your butts.

Get. Your. Tickets.

(If full-price is steep for you, just drop me a line and I can help.)

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Career swerve alert: I’m co-producing Matt Freeman’s new play. It’s been a while since I’ve worn my producer hat, but THE ASK is such a banger, and the team is so incredible (Jessi! D! Hill!) that I couldn’t stop myself.

Ticket pre-sales are happening now. Once we announce the cast - which: hold on to your butts - prices will go up.

ghost light

January 2021, in the teeth of the second wave, Michael Gardner asked me to come to an empty theater in Brooklyn. There, he set up a 360-degree camera, handed me earbuds, left the room, and hit play on a pre-recorded track.

I performed for two days, he edited the footage for two years. Now, you can come to an empty theater, don a VR headset, and see the show for yourself.

ghost light: a VR theater experience

Sun, 16 April, 2pm to 5pm, 20 minute appointments for one or two people @ crawlspace (168 Stuyvesant ave, Brooklyn)

Email crawlspaceplays@gmail.com for an appointment

screentime

Hey, it’s my new reel, featuring an indie feature and my network TV debut. I’ll be updating it soon with more TV work yet to air, too.

Listen closely

Alone in my apartment, at the shore of a lake, on the highway at dusk, in a spartan guest room - these last three months I've been many places making an audio drama with Matthew Freeman, Jessi D. Hill, and Sean Kenin Elias-Reyes.

Places I’ve Heard Voices is out now in eight 5-minute installments. The story of a woman working through a life-altering loss, it is, in the words of one reviewer, "Funny, familiar, and quietly painful. Then funny again."

I’m immensely proud of this work and would love for you to hear it. Available on Apple Podcasts, Stitcher, Spotify, and the TheaterAccident.org

Suspicious Minds

Northern Stage commissioned Brenda Withers to write a zoom play, tapped Jess Chayes to direct, and I’m lucky enough to be in it. To say I’m excited to be acting in a new play - which is, you know, kinda my whole thing - is to notably understate. I may be alone in my apartment where fully half the livable space has given over to a set and camera and lighting rig that is at best an OSHA violation, but by god am I having the best time.

(Aaaaand, we’re getting fantastic reviews.)

Come see the wry and meta-theatrical fun we’re having. Live every night on zoom through 2 May.

Also, as an object lesson in the unpredictability of a life in the theater, that fact that I booked a play a few days after I wrote the post below is rather unimpeachable.

One more thing: since 2016, I’ve been posting some the pre-show mixes I make for myself. i’m particularly fond of this show’s. Check it out on spotify here.

Diary of a Plague Year

Living without theater is awful. But I’m healthy and I’m solvent, and so I’ve turned my energy and attention to volunteer work, activism, and tending to my communities and my relationships.

Professionally, I’ve been fortunate to collaborate with some cherished artistic partners on whatever zoom theater can be, to work with new teachers, and shoot several commercials.

If you’re able to, please consider donating to these organizations I’ve worked with, or to ones doing similar work where you are.

Columbia County Recovery Kitchen: delivering 500+ meals per week to people dealing with food insecurity

Henry Street Settlement & Abrons Arts Center: comprehensive services to LES and East Village residents and artists

Citizen Action NY: grassroots activism to fight for social, racial, economic and environmental justice

And finally, if you’re reading this, I miss you and can’t wait to be with you again soon.

Things at the worst will cease

As I write this, I have four performances left as Macbeth. To measure myself against this monster of a part has been terrifying. Most nights, I make my final exit sure I have failed. But what I wouldn’t give to have dozens of more chances at it instead of one paltry half-week.

Plus, look at this incredible cast (in Kent Meister’s gorgeous shots):

Enter the Centaurs

I’ve been back at New Dramatists again this year for PLAYTIME, perhaps my favorite two weeks of theater-making ever. MJ Kaufman’s brilliant new piece was a workout - ask me about my one-armed pushups! - but who could complain in a room this amazing?

Yeah, that’s Hatlo, me, Esco Jouléy, Jess Barbagallo, MJ, Níkẹ Uche Kadri, Futaba Shioda, and Libby King. I MEAN LOOK AT THESE HUMANS!

I'm Hip

I’m old enough to have watched LGBTQIA rights go from joke to dream to fight to fact. But working on Merril Mushroom’s pioneering play BAR DYKES has given me an entirely new perspective on the lives of pre-Stonewall working class lesbians. Plus it’s funny and sexy and moving,

Come on down to The Flea before 3 August to see us.

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Photos by Mikiodo.

I'M (not) SORRY

A few years back, I went to a screening in New York of a film called EQUITY. It was set in the world of high finance and featured a female-led team in front of and behind the camera. I thought it was so aces - and after working for almost a decade at a private equity firm, a hedge fund, and a private investment office, also so accurate - that after the talkback I found the writer and awkwardly fangirled at her.

Fast forward to last month, and I’m in an audition room with that same writer, trying to be cool. (•_•)

Friends I guess it worked, because I’m playing SILO in the world premiere of Amy Fox’s new play I’M SORRY at the Ensemble Studio Theater this month. Hilarious powerhouse Morgan Gould directed, and I’m playing alongside Tim Barker, Kim Brockington, Mariah Lee, and old indie theater friend Jason Liebman. Come see us!

A two-week Conversation

I’m spending two weeks in one of my favorite buildings in the world, workshopping Matt Freeman’s treacherous new play The Conversation. New Dramatists’ annual PLAYTIME pairs five resident (or alumni) playwrights with any and all the resources they need to create new work. Thrilled to be in the room with Mick O’Brien, Jax Jackson, Paul Neibanck, Maybe Burke, and Jessi D. Hill.

Back to Beech Creek

What a thrill to return to a role and show I hold so close to my heart. TheatreWorks Silicon Valley put on a FUN HOME made equally with sharp edges and huge heart. I loved every minute of it.

I can see all of Pennsylvania.

(Photo by Kevin Berne.)

FUN HOME

FUN HOME closed yesterday after a blockbuster sold-out run; we were the most successful show in Vermont Stage's history. I had the honor of performing for Alison Bechdel, Beth Malone, Gabby Pizzolo, and Madeleine Kunin, among thousands of others. 

Press was wonderful ("a huge success" and "inspired reverie of heartbreak and elation") and included this video essay filmed during rehearsal. 

I am immensely proud of the show that this incredible Vermont Stage cast, orchestra, and crew made together. I wish we could have run it twice as long. 

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NYIT Outstanding Actress win!

Last night at the NYIT Awards, I won the 2017 Outstanding Actress in a Leading Role award for my work as Masha in Three Sisters. I couldn't be there, but I was lucky enough to have my best friend and co-nominee Sarah Lippmann accept on my behalf. 

Clip of the big moment is below. (Fun coincidence: presenter David Pittu directed me in the show that got me my Equity card over a decade ago.)

NYIT Outstanding Actress Award nomination

I am thrilled to announce that I'm a nominee for Outstanding Actress in a Leading Role in the NYIT Awards for my work last March in Maggie's Cino's production of Three Sisters at The Brick.

I share a nomination in that category with the astounding Sarah K. Lippmann. Ivanna Cullinan's beautiful work as Olga was recognized in the Featured Actress category. The entire production was nominated for Best Revival of a play. What an honor.

Here's a brief interview with a few of us.

With Derrick Peterson.Photo by Hunter Canning.

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Partial Three Sisters cast portrait. Photo by Kent Meister.

Masha, Masha, Masha

Writer/Director/Genius Maggie Cino has gone all Moscow Arts Theater on her long-time dream of directing Three Sisters, casting a group of friends and colleagues who bring years of personal history to bear on this incredible play. I'm honored/terrified to be playing Masha. We open 23 March for 7 brief performances. 

Come see.

TB SHEETS workshop & show

I've been a bit obsessed with Buran Theatre since I saw their production of House of Fitzcaraldo at the Brick back in 2012. (And I lost it entirely over Magic Bullets at Incubator Arts in 2014.) It gives me all the feels to announce that I'm working with them now, developing and performing TB SHEETS in workshop at ART/NY on 6 November and onstage May 2017 at ART/NY's brand new theater complex in midtown. Details on tickets soon.

In the meantime, look at this poster! Artist David Pym is creating a series of images for the piece and I'm delighted to be featured on the very first. 

That Which Isn't opens 11 August

When Dave DelGrosso and I got to do a reading of the first act of That Which Isn't back in January 2013, I remember telling myself to enjoy every second of it, because plays this good come along so rarely. More than three years later, I cannot believe how lucky I am that Dave and I, joined by Mick O'Brien, get to perform the world premiere of this incredible piece. 

You should come see it. Then you can say you saw it when. 

That Which Isn't
at The Brick Theater
August 11-20th, 2016

Tickets 

Written by Matthew Freeman. Directed by Kyle Ancowitz
Stage Manager: Jodi Witherell
Set Designer: Kerry Lee Chipman
Featuring David DelGrosso*, Mick O'Brien*, and Moira Stone*

*Appearing courtesy of Actors' Equity Association

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Me & Dave

Good Boys & True opens tonight!

Getting my hairgel ready for tonight's opening night of GOOD BOYS AND TRUE. Retro Productions has revived Roberto Aguirre-Sacasa's excellent play about privilege, sex, class, and power. Come see what has, and has not, changed about rape culture since 1988. Also, this blouse.

Getting my Patrick Nagel on, courtesy of Kyle Connolly.