Marin Theatre Company presents Bellwether Playbill Thank you to our advertisers: American Conservatory Theater AT&T Athleta Bellam Self Storage and Boxes Berkeley Rep Body Kinetics CellMark Chantecler Catering The Club at Harbor Point The Club Restaurant at McInnis Park Digital Forest Eileen Fisher Image Flow La Ginestra Lark Theater Luxton Optical M&M team Marin IJ Marin Magazine Marin Symphony Osher Marin JCC Perotti and Carrade Piazza D'Angelo Rims & Goggles SF Playhouse Town Center Villa Marin Coming up next at MTC: The Glass Menagerie by Tennessee Williams Directed by Jasson Minadakis Runs November 25 through December 18 Celebrate the centennial of this seminal American playwright's birth with MTC's beautiful reimagining of his first Broadway hit. Part 1: Program World Premiere of Bellwether by Steve Yockey directed by Ryan Rilette Scenic Designer - Giulio Cesare Perrone Lighting Designer - York Kennedy** Costume Designer - Fumiko Bielefeldt** Composer & Sound Designer - Chris Houston Stage Manager - Courtney Ames* Properties Artisan - Seren Helday Casting Director - Meg Pearson Dramaturg - Margot Melcon Featuring: Arwen Anderson,* Jessica Lynn Carroll,* Rachel Harker,* Patrick Jones,* Marissa Keltie, Gabriel Marin,* Liz Sklar,* Mollie Stickney,* Danny Wolohan,* Kathryn Zdan & Rosie Hallett (Understudy) * denotes member, Actors' Equity Association ** denotes member, United Scenic Artists Local 829 Original music (c)2011 Chris Houston Music ASCAP Cover illustration by Mick Wiggins Cast of Characters in speaking order: Maddy - Rachel Harker* Neighbor 4/Reporter 1 - Liz Sklar* Neighbor 2/Reporter 2 - Marissa Keltie Neighbor 3/Reporter 3 - Mollie Stickney* Neighbor 5/Detective 1 - Danny Wolohan* Neighbor 6/Detective 2 - Patrick Jones* Jackie Draft - Arwen Anderson* Alan Draft - Gabriel Marin* The Doll - Kathryn Zdan Amy - Jessica Lynn Carroll* Place: Bellwether, the Draft home Time: Now There will be one 15-minute intermission. Special thanks to Actor's Express, Athleta, California Shakespeare Festival, Sean Daniels, Douglas and Sturgess, Lue Douthit, Scott Edwards, Danielle Levin, Oregon Shakespeare Festival's Black Swan Lab for New Work, Donna Overholt Willis, the Public Theater, Jan Yanehiro & Jim and Brenda Yockey Bedding generously provided by Serena & Lily This production of Bellwether is generously underwritten by the following: MTC PARTNERS Bellebyron Foundation N.J. "Sky" Cooper The William and Flora Hewlett Foundation National Endowment for the Arts Gage Schubert Christopher B. & Jeannie Smith SEASON PARTNER H. Hugh Vincent, MD & Joan Watson VIP PARTNERS Carl & Linden Berry Tracy & Brian Haughton Melanie & Peter Maier Russell Pratt & Janet Brown James & Beth Wintersteen EXECUTIVE PRODUCERS Susan & Russell Holdstein Lori Lerner & Terry Berkemeier Shirley LoubŽ Michael & Kiki Pescatello PATRON EVENT SPONSORS Chantecler Catering Elizabeth Spencer Wines Stacy Scott Catering WITH ADDITIONAL SUPPORT FROM National Endowment for the Arts The William and Flora Hewlett Foundation AT&T Yellow Pages Marin Community Foundation Marin Independent Journal National Endowment for the Arts presents Shakespeare in American Communities The Shubert Foundation, Inc. Taproot Foundation Yelp Autodesk The Bernard Osher Foundation National New Play Network Peter J. Owens Fund Part 2: Letter from the Artistic Director I first met Steve Yockey when I was the artistic director of Actor's Express in Atlanta. Steve had recently completed an internship with the company and wanted me to read Medusa, a short film script that he had just finished. What I remember from that first encounter were his amazing intelligence and razor sharp wit. He's quick as lightning and, if you fumble a fact, you must be prepared to be corrected (often with an accompanying Wilde-like zing). I also remember his enthusiasm for playwriting, which was infectious. From that first meeting, I have never gone very long without having a new Yockey play to read, which, as you will see, is a very good thing. Steve's writing intrigues me because he peels back the gloss of our contemporary world to find a place where gods and monsters still live, do battle and wreak havoc on mere mortals. He likes to find the dark nooks that still scare us, the places our modern technology and socially super-connected lives still haven't shed light on. When you enter one of Steve's plays, you enter a world of layered meaning and each layer becomes a bit more unlike what we see in the normal everyday world. There's something very old about Steve's imagination. Much like Neil Gaiman, the old stories and gods aren't as far away to him as the rest of us. Steve's plays, even while probing around in the deep corners of our minds, are remarkably funny. He has a gift for what I call the horrific understatement - a simple, witty summation that brings the full weight of a momentous event into focus. For you, the audience, it can bring a sudden, unexpected burst of laughter that takes the entire room by surprise. This laughter evaporates quickly, leaving the painful underbelly of the moment exposed and all the more raw. This kind of humor involves a moral dilemma in the tradition of Oscar Wilde and Harold Pinter or, more recently, of Tracy Letts and Martin McDonagh. MTC worked on Bellwether in October 2009 while Steve was our National New Play Network playwright in residence for the 2009-10 season. (To learn about our New Play Program, see page 13.) We are far from the only company that has taken time and devoted resources to helping Steve and this play find its best form. This is not unusual in the creation of a new play, so I thought you might find it interesting to see a list of the companies that have helped Steve develop Bellwether. Our thanks go out to the artistic directors and creative teams at Actor's Express, Oregon Shakespeare Festival and the Public Theater. I think you'll agree it's been a labor of love well worth it. Enjoy the show! - Jasson Minadakis Part 3: Dramaturgy Article 1 - Our commitment: to develop and sustain American playwrights Marin Theatre Company is committed to exploring and developing new work for the American theater, supporting playwrights in their creative process from conception to production and engaging audiences with the best contemporary new plays. Through our New Play Program, we seek out writers and champion projects for continued life on MTC's stage and beyond. With our commissioning program, new play prizes, staged readings of new work, playwright residencies and a commitment to world premiere productions, MTC contributes to the future of the American theater. MTC's Commissioning Program encourages the creation of new work from a diverse group of passionate playwrights to be developed for our main stage and educational programs. MTC commissions original plays from writers in whose work we have a committed interest and whose voice speaks to our mission and our community. Our two New Play Prizes were established in 2007 to celebrate the work of American playwrights and to encourage the creation of bold, powerful new plays. We award the Sky Cooper New American Play Prize to an outstanding new work by an emerging or established playwright and the David Calicchio Emerging American Playwright Prize to a professionally unproduced playwright for a new work that shows outstanding promise and a distinctive new voice. MTC's New Works Series present plays in progress by new and emerging playwrights. We bring in playwrights to work with local artists in full-length, script-in-hand staged readings. These readings give a playwright an opportunity to develop a new play, expose our audience to a new voice and open doors to our artistic staff for potential future collaborations. Playwright Steve Yockey is a perfect example of how MTC's New Play Program supports a playwright and establishes a relationship that leads directly to a world premiere production. During the 2009-10 season, Yockey was our National New Play Network Playwright in Residence. Our Expanded Programs department commissioned two plays for young audiences from Yockey - Animal vs. Animal: an Aesop's Fables Mashup and TALL Tales. In October 2009, Bellwether received a developmental workshop and staged public reading as part of our New Works Series. The world premiere of Bellwether continues our relationship with playwright Steve Yockey. Article 2 - The collision of modern and mythical: An interview with playwright Steve Yockey The Greeks invented epic accounts of vengeful Gods to explain natural disasters, tragedies, the cycle of seasons and the movement of the heavens. To this day, children learn life lessons from fairy tales and myths filled with heroes and villainy. People tell these stories as a way of understanding a world that remains mysterious and vast, both the physical universe and the minds and hearts of human beings. Though we're living in an age where information lurches toward us in an endless stream, mankind still relies on storytellers for context, a way into the world, a way to understand what's happening around them. Playwright Steve Yockey is such a storyteller, writing fairy tales for adults and retellings of mythical stories set against the backdrop of today's morally complicated culture. Yockey is an Atlanta native who relocated to the West Coast after earning a graduate degree in dramatic writing from NYU's Tisch School of the Arts. His plays are of the modern world, but with an imaginative twist, incorporating larger-than-life scale and fantastic, otherworldly elements to explain contemporary events. In an interview with MTC's dramaturg Margot Melcon just before Bellwether rehearsals began, Steve explains some of the origins of the play and the relationship between writer and audience, from his point of view. Margot Melcon: Tell me about your jumping off point. What inspired you to write this play? Steve Yockey: The way my process works, I usually find an idea or event I'm wrestling with and need to explore or try to contextualize for myself. When I started Bellwether, there were a lot of stories in the news about missing children. I remember thinking how strange it was, this mob mentality, the way an entire community will turn on people based purely on supposition or circumstance. Additionally, in a lot of my work I look at familial relationships, specifically relationships between parents and children, what that bond is at its most stark level. It was that combined with this ongoing exploration of mythic storytelling that I have, which doesn't necessarily mean myths, but storytelling on a larger scale. Those three things collided to create what eventually became Bellwether. MM: When did you first start writing Bellwether? SY: It was 2008, but those same kinds of media stories are still happening now. It's always the same pattern: a child disappears, it becomes a media frenzy and, after a certain amount of time, if the child isn't found, suspicion (whether it's warranted or not) turns on the parents. We also don't get resolution for many of these stories. Because real life isn't often dramatically satisfying in the way a play can be. MM: I like that you took something that, in life, can be dramatically unsatisfying and you gave it a very dramatically satisfying moment. That's what you can do when you create the world. SY: Yes! You have all of the control. And that certainly allows you to bend reality into a more satisfying conclusion. MM: We see these stories of missing children in the news all the time and they do follow a pattern. When I was a kid, I don't remember this kind of thing happening. Is it a new phenomenon? SY: When we're younger we're not really exposed to that type of thing, the darker stories in the news. As we grow up it becomes more present but that's only because we're becoming more aware of the difficult things that happen in the world that we're shielded from as children. And then also, the news-and I put "news" in quotation marks-generally seems to be getting more and more salacious. When there is a competitive market for news and for audience, the more frightening it can be, the more intense it can be, the more likely you are to have viewership and so, by default, as we move further along our growth as a culture, the news focuses more and more on the negative. MM: The negative and sensational is what sells. SY: Fear sells. But we can't look to the news to tell us how much of any one thing is actually happening because what we see is selected, it's all chosen for us and presented as "news." And I'm fascinated by the idea that we don't see completion to news stories. We see the horrible thing that happened and we know that efforts are being made to rectify the situation, whether it's an investigation or recovery from a storm that hit, but we rarely see the follow up on it. We only see the awful thing. I'm sure many times the final result is far more fascinating than anything we could have imagined. That's another fun aspect of Bellwether. MM: Let's talk about that. You start with a premise that is familiar and you take it someplace wildly unexpected. What is that impulse? SY: I'm passionate about stories that are larger than life. I enjoy theater that is theatrical. I enjoy theater that takes advantage of an audience's willingness to go to different and exciting places. I write for the active audience of theatre, not a passive audience. They're willing to believe more which gives you freedom as a playwright, or any theater artist actually, to explore worlds that are greater than or apart from our everyday existence. As long as you keep up your end of the bargain, and don't try to cheat them, it can be very resonant for an audience when something that feels familiar is suddenly thrust out of context and takes an audience off guard. MM: Where do you think this interest in mythic and large, theatrical storytelling came from? SY: I was very young the first time I found out what actually happens in the story of Cinderella, with the birds pecking people's eyes out and the stepsisters cutting their toes off to make the shoe fit. It was so much darker than what we know of as Cinderella. And that's true of fairy tales in general and the modern, cultural wash that have been put on stories that used to be more graphic or maybe spoke more to their time. Those fairy tales present lessons. Little Red Riding Hood is essentially, "Don't trust strange men. They just want to have sex with you. Little girls beware." All these stories initially exist for a purpose. My fascination is in asking: What are the stories for today? What is the mythology to help us explain the way we're changing in this moment? MM: And yet you insist that there is no moral to your story, that there is no lesson. SY: I don't know that I insist that, per se. My plays aren't without morals. I think if it's dramatically satisfying and there is a reversal and your main character learns something, then there probably has to be some kind of moral. Whether that turns out to be something you want to know or not is a whole other thing. That said, I feel like Bellwether, and many of the plays that I'm writing now, are morally complicated. If a very pat version of how things work is presented and you're given a simple answer at the end of the play, I don't know how authentic or truthful that feels. That's not how our world works. MM: So there is moral ambiguity. And that allows people to feel what they want and they don't feel like you're prescribing anything. SY: That's true, or something like that. There is right and wrong but there isn't just one way to handle anything. Your choices about something might not be the best thing for your neighbor, and what your neighbor chooses might not be the best thing for you. Any story that includes multiple perspectives is going to get tricky. And more engaging. MM: How would you describe your work to somebody? Do you have a style or a defining characteristic that runs throughout your plays? SY: Heightened modern American realism with a theatrical twist? That's a fun thing to say, let's go with that. Naturalism scares me a bit; just because something fantastic happens in a play doesn't mean it's not realism as long as everyone in the play has a realistic reaction to it. I'm also often writing from a place of wanting to better understand something. As you write, the question and the curiosity becomes the jumping off point and feeds the narrative. MM: Once you pose these questions, you really let your imagination allow you to think beyond the obvious ways of answering the questions. SY: Hopefully that's true. The important thing is that you can't just throw a question on people. Your story can start from a question but ultimately as a playwright the responsibility is to tell a story with a beginning, middle and end that feels dramatically satisfying. And it is told through your lens on the world. You want the audience to be walking out at the end of the play talking about what they just saw, engaging with what they just saw; whether it's positive or negative, you crave that engagement. You want to have earned their attention. MM: Did you always want to be a writer? SY: I wanted to work in business as a non-specific goal because that's what my parents did and it was expected. And then at a certain point, I had that, whatever they call it now-it's a horrible term-quarter-life crisis? That thing that happens in your early 20s where you suddenly look around and say, I have no idea what I'm doing. MM: Can you imagine yourself doing anything else now? SY: Telling these stories is such an engrained part of who I am. It's what gets me through the day, what fuels the way I look at the world around me now and, to a large extent, how I interact with people. It's hard to imagine what it would be like to not have that. Article 3 - "I live in a nice neighborhood:" The creation of suburbia There were shifts in the United States in the last century that shaped the look and feel of our communities and changed the way the American Dream was defined. For many in this country, the frontier gave way to a new, iconic symbol of freedom and prosperity: home ownership. A single-family home implies status and economic stability, not only for individuals but also for a country that measures growth in new housing starts. As industry moved away from city centers and transportation became more reliable, families that could afford to moved as well. They staked a claim on a new kind of frontier in the suburbs. In the first half of the 20th century, there was a huge demographic shift as America became less rural and more urban, as industrial jobs attracted not only waves of immigrants but also agricultural workers within the US. But cities quickly became congested and overpopulated and had to expand, one way or another. New Deal government programs subsidized highway and public transportation construction and post-World War II housing construction soared. With help from Veterans Affairs and Federal Housing Administration loans, returning soldiers were all but promised a home of their own. The first suburbs were built just outside of cities and seemed to spring up overnight. Developers borrowed techniques from automated manufacturing plants and created assembly line construction of homes, with few frills and little variation. The urban walking culture, with living areas built above shops and small mom-and-pop stores on every corner gave way to strip malls and big box stores. New zoning laws separated homes from work, shopping and public institutions, making automobiles a necessity. Early suburbs promised not only independence but also the ability to choose similar individuals as neighbors. These new communities, deliberately or merely by location and cost, often filtered out people deemed undesirable because of their race, ethnicity, religion or class and became homogeneous, the houses and residents indistinguishable from each other. The perceived safety in a community of the like-minded was to protect new suburbanites from the unpredictability of the city, as well as the looming threat coming from outside the country. Cold War-fueled paranoia fed into the need for the privacy and protection. Lawns and white picket fences transformed homes into modern day fortresses, impenetrable from the outside. Separation from the other implied safety and control. A nice neighborhood these days means clean, well-lit streets with manicured lawns and neighbors who, though very similar to you, pretty much leave you alone. Part 4: Who's Who Section A: Artistic Staff Biographies Steve Yockey (Playwright) is a roaming company member with Out of Hand Theatre in Atlanta, Georgia, and his plays have been produced around the country and in Asia. His Bay Area theater credits include CARTOON, Sleepy, Large Animal Games and Disassembly at Impact Theatre; Skin at Climate Theater and Encore Theatre Company; and Octopus at Magic Theatre and Encore. This season, afterlife - a ghost story is receiving a National New Play Network [NNPN] rolling world premiere at Southern Rep in New Orleans, New Repertory Theatre in Boston and Edgemar Center for the Arts in Los Angeles. Yockey's published works Octopus, CARTOON, Large Animal Games and Subculture (collected short plays) are available from Samuel French. His other plays include Wonder, Feverish, Heavier than... and The Thrush & the Woodpecker. Yockey holds a BA from the University of Georgia and an MFA in Dramatic Writing from NYU's Tisch School of the Arts. He is a recent recipient of a Coca-Cola Artist Residency to teach dramatic structure at Emory University. After completing a yearlong NNPN playwriting residency with Marin Theatre Company, Yockey now lives and works in Los Angeles. Ryan Rilette (Director) is in his fifth season as producing director at MTC, where he has directed Fuddy Meers, In the Red and Brown Water, boom and Magic Forest Farm. He will direct God of Carnage later this season. From 2002 to 2008, Rilette served as producing artistic director of Southern Rep in New Orleans, where he directed the world premieres of The Breach, Rising Water, The Sunken Living Room, The Vulgar Soul and The House of Plunder and regional premieres of Kimberly Akimbo, The Goat, or Who Is Sylvia? and In Walks Ed. He has also directed for A.C.T.'s MFA program, New Theatre in Miami, the Tennessee Williams Festival, Soho Rep and the Flea, among others. He is the president of the National New Play Network, cofounder and former executive artistic director of Rude Mechanicals Theater Company in New York and a former professor at Tulane and Loyola Universities. Section B: Cast Biographies Rachel Harker (Maddy) makes her MTC debut in Bellwether. She recently appeared in Legacy of Light and The Dresser at San Jose Rep and The Glass Menagerie with San Jose Rep on Tour. Off-Broadway, she has appeared in Bill W. and Dr. Bob. In the Boston area, Harker won Elliot Norton and Independent Reviewers of New England Awards for her portrayal of Blanche in A Streetcar Named Desire at New Repertory Theatre, as well as Elliot Norton Awards for her roles in Harold Pinter's Ashes to Ashes and The Lover at New Repertory Theatre and The Cutting at Stoneham Theatre. Other theater credits include Sherlock's Last Case at American Stage Festival, Lend Me a Tenor at Lyric Stage and Private Lives at the Public Theatre in Maine. Her film work includes Disney's The Game Plan, The Invention of Lying, Don MacKay and The Legend of Lucy Keyes. Liz Sklar (Neighbor 4/Reporter 1) has appeared at MTC in Seagull and is currently an MTC teacher in residence at Martin Luther King Junior Academy in Marin City (funded in part by the National Endowment for the Arts' Shakespeare in American Communities program). Her Bay Area credits include Care of Trees at Shotgun Players, A Christmas Carol at A.C.T., The Tempest at Cal Shakes, The Winter's Tale at Marin Shakespeare Company and The Foreigner at Ross Valley Players. In New York, she most recently played Lady Macbeth in Macbeth at Mortal Folly Theatre. Other regional credits include Philistines, The Lady from the Sea, The Servant of Two Masters, Village Wooing, Little Shop of Horrors, Good Breeding and A Midsummer Night's Dream. She co-starred with Stacy Keach in Imbued, now touring film festivals worldwide. Sklar holds a BA in Theater Arts from Brown University, an MFA in Acting from A.C.T. and has been training with the SITI Company in New York. Marissa Keltie (Neighbor 2/Reporter 2) makes her main stage debut in Bellwether at MTC, where she has previously performed script-in-hand readings as part of MTC's New Works Series. Bellwether marks her fifth time working with playwright Steve Yockey, having appeared in CARTOON, Sleepy, Large Animal Games and Disassembly. She has appeared in the Bay Area at Cal Shakes, SF Playhouse, Shotgun Players, Crowded Fire Theater, Central Works, Berkeley Playhouse and Impact Theatre, where she is a company member. Keltie is a proud recipient of Theatre Bay Area's 2009 TITAN Award. Mollie Stickney (Neighbor 3/Reporter 3) has appeared at MTC in Fuddy Meers and Happy Now?. She has performed throughout the Bay Area at theaters such as A.C.T., Berkeley Rep, Magic Theatre, Theater on the Square and SF Playhouse. She is a graduate of A.C.T.'s MFA program. Film credits include Out on a Limb, The Confessional and the upcoming Love and Taxes starring Josh Kornbluth. Danny Wolohan (Neighbor 5/Detective 1) makes his MTC debut in Bellwether. He is a member of Campo Santo and the ESP Project, resident companies at Intersection for the Arts. With ESP, he appeared in the world premieres of One Window, Orbit and 51802. With Campo Santo, he appeared in seven world premieres and collaborated with such writers as Denis Johnson, Dave Eggers, Philip Kan Gotanda, Octavio Solis and Jessica Hagedorn. Wolohan has been nominated for several San Francisco Bay Area Theatre Critics Circle Awards and received the Dean Goodman Choice Award for Best Supporting Actor. He was named SF Weekly's Best Ensemble Actor of 2006, Bay Area Reporter's Best Drag Performance of 2005 and was featured on the cover of American Theatre Magazine as one of seven actors in the nation one should travel to see. Wolohan currently lives in New York City, where he and playwright Will Eno recently won the Williamsburg Brooklyn Doubles Tennis Championship. Patrick Jones (Neighbor 6/Detective 2) makes his main stage debut in Bellwether at MTC, where he has appeared in the School Tour productions of Animal vs. Animal: an Aesop's Fables Mashup and TALL Tales. His recent Bay Area credits include Metamorphosis at Aurora Theatre Company, Exit, Pursued by a Bear at Crowded Fire Theater, Taboos at National Center for New Plays at Stanford, Under Milk Wood at Stanford Summer Theater, The Real Thing at Livermore Shakespeare Festival and How to Write a New Book for the Bible at TheatreWorks New Works Festival. He has appeared in New York at Personal Space Theatrics, New York Classical Theater and 52nd Street Project, and, nationally, at Denver Center, Florida Studio Theater, Northern Stage in Vermont, Cleveland Play House, Great Lakes Theater Festival and Kentucky Shakespeare Festival. Jones received his MFA from Case Western Reserve University. Arwen Anderson (Jackie Draft) has appeared at MTC in A Streetcar Named Desire. She recently appeared in the world premiere of Amanda Dehnert's The Verona Project at Cal Shakes. Other Bay Area theater credits include An Accident, Mauritius, Mrs. Whitney, Expedition 6 and The Rules of Charity at Magic Theatre; Love in American Times at San Jose Rep; Lobby Hero and The Shape of Things at Aurora Theatre Company; Tales of the City (workshop) at A.C.T.; Nickel & Dimed at TheatreWorks and Brava! for Women in the Arts; as well as roles with Marines Memorial Theatre, Encore Theatre Company, Word for Word and Climate Theater. Her film work includes Hog Island, Ashley 22 and Dark Retreat. Anderson graduated with degrees in Theatre and Psychology from Wesleyan University, is a local singer/songwriter and trains and teaches aerial silk and trapeze at the Circus Center of San Francisco. Gabriel Marin (Alan Draft) has appeared at MTC in A Streetcar Named Desire. He recently appeared in Love in American Times at San Jose Rep, Wirehead at SF Playhouse, Collapse at Aurora Theatre Company and Superior Donuts at TheatreWorks. Locally, he has appeared at A.C.T., Bay Area Playwrights Foundation, Black Box Theatre, Center REP, Central Works, Magic Theatre, PlayGround, San Francisco Fringe Festival, San Jose Rep, The Jewish Theatre, Thick Description, Word for Word and Z Space. East Bay Express named Marin "Best Actor" in their Best of the East Bay 2010 issue. He has performed on NBC, CBS, PBS and the BBC. Kathryn Zdan (The Doll) makes her MTC debut in Bellwether. She recently appeared in the world premiere of Steve Yockey's Disassembly at Impact Theatre. Other Bay Area credits include Lend Me a Tenor and Romeo and Juliet at Livermore Shakespeare Festival, This World in a Woman's Hands at Shotgun Players, Cabaret at Center REP, Forever Never Comes at Crowded Fire, Oliver! at Berkeley Playhouse, Engaged at Shakespeare Santa Cruz and The Shape of Things at Worklight Theatre. Nationally, Zdan has performed with the Dell'Arte Company and, internationally, with the Amsterdam-based street performance group Warner & Consorten. She earned a BFA from the University of California at Santa Barbara and an MFA from the Dell'Arte International School of Physical Theatre. She teaches physical theater and acting at Tamalpais High School's Conservatory Theater Ensemble. She is a Mill Valley native. Jessica Lynn Carroll (Amy) makes her MTC debut in Bellwether. She recently appeared in Boeing-Boeing at Center REP. She has appeared in Auctioning the Ainsleys and New Works Festival productions of The Burnt Part Boys, Asphalt Beach and The Funkentine Rapture at TheatreWorks; Urinetown (San Francisco Bay Area Theatre Critics Circle Award nominee) and Ragtime at Foothill Music Theatre; Our Town at Palo Alto Players; and You're a Good Man, Charlie Brown at Theatre on San Pedro Square. She has participated in readings of new plays at PlayGround and Playwright's Foundation. Carroll earned a BFA in Acting from Southern Methodist University in Dallas, Texas. Roselyn Hallett (Understudy) is working with MTC for the first time on Bellwether. Her Bay Area credits include The House of Blue Leaves at Jewel Theatre Company, Home Below Zero at Bay Area Playwrights Festival, Imaginary Love at Hapgood Theatre Company, Killer Joe with Renegade Theatre Experiment, The Glass Menagerie at Pear Avenue Theatre and California Conservatory Theatre, Doubt at New Conservatory Theatre, Under Milk Wood and Translations at Stanford Summer Theater and Mrs. Warren's Profession at Cal Shakes (understudy). Hallett holds degrees in Drama and English from Stanford University. Section C: Production Staff Biographies Courtney Ames (Stage Manager) has stage managed for MTC's productions of My Children! My Africa!, The Seafarer, Jacques Brel is Alive and Well and Living in Paris and Found Objects. Her other stage management credits include The Full Monty and Little Shop of Horrors at American Musical Theatre of San Jose; Boleros for the Disenchanted at A.C.T.; Yellow Face, It Ain't Nothin' But the Blues, Theophilus North and M. Butterfly at TheatreWorks; and La Serva Padrona and Trouble in Tahiti at San Francisco Opera. She holds an MFA in Stage Management from U.C. San Diego. Giulio Cesare Perrone (Scenic Designer) has designed sets for MTC's productions of Tartuffe (also Director and Costume Designer), Killer Joe, Charlie Cox Runs with Scissors, Visions of Kerouac, The Music Lesson, The Puppetmaster of Lodz, Bloodknot and Kindertransport. Also a playwright and stage director, he has worked on over 150 American theater and opera productions. His credits include San Diego Repertory Theatre, San Jose Rep, Festival Opera, Dell'Arte International School of Physical Theatre, Opera San JosŽ, Cal Shakes, TheatreWorks, A Travelling Jewish Theatre and the Alley Theatre. Perrone recently co-founded the Inferno Theatre Company, which premiered its first show, Galileo's Daughters, in September 2010. He received Pew Charitable Trusts/Theatre Communications Group National Theatre Artists Residency Program grants in 2000 to adapt John Milton's Paradise Lost and 2002 to adapt The Memoirs of Jacques Casanova. Perrone began his career in his native Italy until he moved to the U.S. in 1995. York Kennedy (Lighting Designer) has designed lighting for MTC's productions of In the Red and Brown Water (also Set Designer), My Name is Asher Lev, The Last Schwartz and Communicating Doors. His designs have been seen in theaters across America and in Europe including Arena Stage, The Old Globe, Berkeley Rep, Seattle Repertory, A.C.T., Sacramento Opera, the Alley Theatre, Dallas Theatre Center, Yale Rep, Brooklyn Academy of Music, Goodspeed Musicals and the Denver Center. Awards for theatrical lighting include the Drama-Logue, San Diego Drama Critics Circle, Back Stage West Garland, Arizoni Theatre Award and the San Francisco Bay Area Theatre Critics Circle Award. In the dance world, Kennedy has designed for Malashock Dance, Brian Webb and Tracey Rhodes. As an architectural lighting designer, he has designed both nationally and internationally numerous themed environments, theme park, residential, retail, restaurant and museum projects including the Sony Metreon Sendak Playspace in San Francisco, Warner Bros. Movie World in Madrid, Le Centre de Loisirs in Morocco and The LEGO Racers 4D attraction in Germany, Denmark, England and the U.S.A. He is a graduate of the California Institute for the Arts and the Yale School of Drama. Fumiko Bielefeldt (Costume Designer) has designed costumes for MTC's productions of Edward Albee's Tiny Alice, Equivocation, What the Butler Saw, Lovers & Executioners, Frozen, Displaced, Fugitive Kind, Indiscretions and Candida. Other recent credits include Miss Julie at Aurora Theatre; Sense and Sensibility, Snow Falling on Cedars, Light in the Piazza, Twentieth Century and Caroline, or Change at TheatreWorks; Evie's Waltz at Magic Theatre; and Emma for Cincinnati Playhouse in the Park and The Repertory Theatre of St. Louis. Her designs have also appeared at A.C.T., Cal Shakes, Theatre of Yugen and Kansas City Repertory Theatre. In Japan, she has designed for Tokyo Theatre of Children and Tokyo Shitamachi Festival. Fumiko has received many awards, including the Barbara Bladen Porter Special Award, San Francisco Bay Area Theater Critics Circle, Dean Goodman Choice, Back Stage West Garland and Drama-Logue awards. Chris Houston (Composer and Sound Designer) is a pianist, composer and sound designer. He has designed sound for MTC's productions of Seven Guitars, Edward Albee's Tiny Alice, Fuddy Meers, Seagull, Happy Now?, In the Red and Brown Water, Equivocation, Sunlight, boom, My Name is Asher Lev, Magic Forest Farm, Lydia, The Seafarer, Frankie and Johnny in the Clair de Lune, Love Person, A Streetcar Named Desire, said Sa•d and Lovers & Executioners. Locally, his designs and compositions have been featured at A.C.T., Aurora Theatre Company, SF Playhouse, Center REP, Magic Theatre and the San Francisco Shakespeare Festival. Section D: Administrative Staff Biographies Jasson Minadakis (Artistic Director) is in his sixth season as artistic director of MTC. This season, he will direct The Glass Menagerie and Othello, the Moor of Venice. In past seasons, he directed Edward Albee's Tiny Alice, Seagull, Happy Now?, Equivocation (2010 Bay Area Critics Circle Award for Director), Sunlight, Lydia, The Seafarer, Frankie and Johnny in the Clair de Lune, A Streetcar Named Desire, said Sa•d, Love Song and The Subject Tonight is Love. As artistic director of Actor's Express Theatre Company, he directed The Pillowman, Bug, The Love Song of J. Robert Oppenheimer, Echoes of Another Man, Killer Joe, Burn This, The Goat or, Who is Sylvia?, Blue/Orange, and Bel Canto. As producing artistic director of Cincinnati Shakespeare Festival, he directed Jesus Hopped the 'A' Train, Chagrin Falls, The Beard of Avon, Arcadia, Nocturne, Fuddy Meers, Lovers & Executioners, Jacob Marley's Christmas Carol, Betrayal, The Weir, Waiting for Godot, The Misanthrope, A Chance of Lightning, The Three Musketeers, Dracula, The Color Wheel, and 19 productions of Shakespeare. Regional credits include Cat on a Hot Tin Roof and Hamlet at Georgia Shakespeare, Copenhagen at Playhouse on the Square and Bedroom Farce at Wayside Theatre. The Atlanta Journal Constitution, Creative Loafing and Southern Voice named him Best Director of 2004. He has won "Production of the Year" awards for The Pillowman and Bug (Actor's Express), Copenhagen (Playhouse on the Square) and Chagrin Falls (Cincinnati). Seren Helday (Properties Artisan) is resident props artisan for MTC. She has provided props for all productions since 2008. She has also provided props for A.C.T., Center REP, Cal Shakes and SF Playhouse. She spent one year as Master Carpenter at New Conservatory Theatre Center in San Francisco, building some 30 shows for their season. Helday was also technical director of the Live Theatre Workshop in Tucson in addition to working as a designer, performer and manager. Margot Melcon (Dramaturg) joined MTC in 2008 and has served as dramaturg for all productions in the past three seasons. She was Literary and Publications Associate at A.C.T. for four years. She has worked with the Kennedy Center and Bay Area Playwrights Festival, was a fellow at the National Critic's Institute at the O'Neill Playwrights Festival and is a freelance writer for American Theatre magazine. She is a graduate of California State University, Chico. Recently, she taught a Principles of Dramaturgy course at the Playwrights Foundation in San Francisco. Meg Pearson (Casting Director) has directed casting for all MTC mainstage productions since 2008. In addition, she directs casting for MTC's School Tour and MTC's New Works staged readings series. Outside of MTC, Ms. Pearson recently served as casting director on the feature film Seducing Charlie Barker, directed by Amy Glazer, and is a member of the Board of Directors of the Bay Area Children's Theatre. Before coming to MTC, she served as casting assistant on television shows Las Vegas, King of Queens and Grounded for Life, as well as feature films Eurotrip, Dude, Where's My Car? and Straight Jacket. Pearson is a graduate of the Theatre Arts program at Boston College. Section E: About MTC Celebrating our 45th Anniversary this season, Marin Theatre Company is the Bay Area's premier mid-sized theater and the leading professional theater in the North Bay. We produce a six-show season of provocative plays by passionate playwrights from the 20th century and today in our intimate 231-seat proscenium theater. We are committed to the development and production of new plays by American playwrights, with a comprehensive New Play Program that includes at least one world premiere each season, two nationally recognized annual playwriting awards, new play readings and workshops by the nation's best emerging playwrights and a leadership position in the National New Play Network. Our numerous educational programs serve more than 6,000 students each year. MTC is a proud member of the National New Play Network, the country's alliance of non-profit professional theaters that champions the development, production and continued life of new plays for the American theater. Part 5: Expanded Programs Article - Learning by doing (and casting and directing): An interview with intern Cole von Glahn Between 15 and 20 college students intern with MTC every season. Many work in our Summer Camp as teaching assistants and stage managers. Some support our literary manager and dramaturg Margot Melcon, reading scripts, conducting dramaturgical research and writing material for our website and playbills. Production interns assist our designers and help our master electrician Travis Rexroat hang lights. In our administrative office, interns help run our fundraising events and learn about marketing and public relations. To learn more about the intern experience at MTC, Josh Costello, Artistic Director of Expanded Programs, spoke with Cole von Glahn just before he returned to Tufts University to begin his sophomore year. MTC: Why did you sign up for an internship with MTC? Cole von Glahn: I was on MTC's Teen Board for two years in high school. When it came time after my freshman year at Tufts to look at internship programs, MTC was a natural inclusion on the list. It's close by and easily accessible, but, most importantly, I already had a great relationship with MTC and knew that I really liked the people who are here! MTC: How did you first get interested in theater? CvG: In the sixth grade, my mom forcibly dragged me to an audition for Our Town. I spent the next three years enjoying theater, but not really thinking about it in any serious manner. Then, I got to Terra Linda [High School] and took a [drama] class with Ms. [Christina] Stroeh. And that's what really sparked my interest in theater in a big, big way. MTC: What were your duties as an intern? CvG: First, I was a casting intern, which involved a lot of headshot filing, putting together audition lists and generally helping to organize and find actors in MTC's database. Then, as a directing intern, I was able to assistant direct Seven Guitars with Kent Gash, which was an incredible experience. For the most part, I was observing rehearsals and really seeing how a director works in a professional capacity, but Kent would also task me to odd jobs like running lines with actors or checking sight lines. MTC: What was your favorite moment of your internship? CvG: Of the casting internship, it was undoubtedly when I got to sit in on an audition. The actors were super nice and it was fascinating to watch Meg [Pearson, casting director,] and Ryan [Rilette, producing director,] talk through each audition. For Seven Guitars, it was seeing the "blood wall" come down under lights with sound for the first time. As soon as I felt the chills run down my body, I knew the show would work, which is the most incredible feeling. MTC: What else would you like people to know? CvG: Well, if anyone reading this is young and thinking about going into theater in a serious manner, I would like to share one piece of advice. If you love theater, it doesn't matter what else you do. I was a total nerdy jock (just go with it) and probably the last person most people would have thought would try and go into theater professionally. A lot of people assume theater has a "type," which I find ridiculous. All we do is tell stories. So, if you're a varsity MVP of the league, who is an award-winning chemist on the side but also loves theater... well, you're the one who can tell that story most accurately! As for MTC, for me, it's a very special place. It's a professional theater that made a 16-year-old kid think he was cool and a 19-year-old kid think he could actually make it. That's a rare thing to find in a group of people whose livelihood is on the line. They are a welcoming group of people who still remember what it's like to want to do theater and still remember the most important thing about theater: that it is first and foremost about the people, not the money, or whatever. I couldn't have asked for a better environment to start acclimating to the professional world. Learn more about MTC's Expanded Programs Visit marintheatre.org and click on "Education" to learn about all of MTC's Expanded Programs. For more information, contact Josh Costello, josh@marintheatre.org or 415.388.5200 x3310. - Marin Young Playwrights Festival (accepting scripts now through Nov. 18) - Theater for Young Audiences, including School Tour (Anansi the Spider booking now), Student Matinees (booking now for The Glass Menagerie and Othello) and Family Matinees - Drama Classes and Workshops - Internships - Teen Advisory Board - Summer Theater Camps Part 6: Patron information CONTACT US Box Office: 415.388.5208 Tuesday-Saturday, 12-5PM Closed Sundays, Mondays and Holidays During performance runs the box office is open until show time and on Sundays. Address: 397 Miller Avenue, Mill Valley CA 94941 General: 415.388.5200 Playbill Advertising: Sasha Hnatkovich, 415.388.5200 x3313 Group Sales: Groups of 15 or more receive a discounted rate plus a free group leader ticket. Julie Knight, 415.388.5200 x3302 PERFORMANCE SCHEDULE Tues, Thu, Fri, and Sat 8:00pm Wed 7:30pm Sun 7:00pm Matinees: Thu 1:00pm ¥ Sat & Sun 2:00pm TICKET PRICES Previews: Thu through Sun, $34 All Other Performances: Tues, $38/34 (excludes Opening) Wed, Thu eve & Sun eve, $44/$39 Fri, $50/45 Sat eve, $55/50 Matinees Thu, Sat & Sun $44/$39 Opening Night with Cast Reception, $55/50 Note: Price difference is between center and side sections. Ticket discounts Under 30: $20, all performances, must show valid ID Seniors: $6 off tickets to Thu & Sat matinees; $3 discount to all other performances Rush tickets: $15 (based on availability, one hour prior to curtain) SERVICES & INFORMATION Arrive on time: Performances begin promptly. There are no refunds for latecomers. Late patrons cannot be seated until a designated seating break or possibly intermission. Patrons returning late from intermission will be seated at the discretion of the House Managers. MTC CafŽ: Food and beverages are available before performances and during intermission. Save time and order intermission refreshments prior to the start of the performance. Recycling: Please help MTC conserve resources. Recycle your programs in the racks provided on the way out of the theater, and use the labeled recycling bins for cans, bottles and paper. Recording Equipment: The use of sound, video or photographic recording equipment during performances is prohibited. Listening Devices: For patrons with impaired hearing, listening devices are available free. Please see the House Manager for details. For information about physical and program access at MTC, please call 415.388.5208 or dial 711 to use the California Telecommunications Relay Service. END