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| BOYS WILL BE BOYS, Melissa Bubnic’s (Shameless) gender-bending, play about ruthless London bankers, has US premiere at 59E59 Theaters | |
| Posted by: Official_Press_Release 07:29 pm EST 02/12/20 | |
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| BOYS WILL BE BOYS, Melissa Bubnic's (Shameless) gender-bending, cabaret-infused play about ruthless London bankers, has US premiere at 59E59 Theaters New York, New York February 12, 2020 -59E59 Theaters (Val Day, Artistic Director; Brian Beirne, Managing Director), welcomes the world premiere of BOYS WILL BE BOYS, written by Melissa Bubnic and directed by Lily Dorment. Produced by The Pond Theatre Company, BOYS WILL BE BOYS begins performances on Thursday, March 26 for a limited engagement through Sunday, April 12. Press Opening is Wednesday, April 1 at 7:30 pm. The performance schedule is Tuesday - Saturday at 7:30 pm; Sunday at 2:30 pm. Performances are at 59E59 Theaters (59 East 59th Street, between Park and Madison). Single tickets are $25 ($20 for 59E59 Members). Tickets are available by calling the 59E59 Box Office at 646-892-7999 or by visiting www.59e59.org. The running time is 1 hour and 45 minutes, including intermission. Astrid Wentworth is at the top of her game. A superstar trader in the male-dominated world of banking and high finance. She is ruthless and relentless, but she's always played by the boys' rules to get to the top. So when Astrid takes on protégée Priya, she is the perfect person to help this ambitious young woman navigate the industry - as long as Priya is willing to listen. BOYS WILL BE BOYS marks Australian playwright Melissa Bubnic's New York debut. She wrote this prescient play prior to the #MeToo movement, making it a trenchant look at how a woman succeeds in an environment drowning in male toxicity. Is she part of the problem or part of the solution…or both? And in the era of #MeToo, what happens to the women who had to play by the rules of the patriarchy in order to succeed? The idea for BOYS WILL BE BOYS was sparked by a conversation between Bubnic and fellow Aussie, actor Cate Blanchett, who wanted to see a play about women in male-dominated industries. Bubnic felt the London banking scene - with its money and glamor - was an inherently theatrical backdrop for the story. Calling the play "an all-female Glengarry Glen Ross" by Lyn Gardner writing in The Guardian, Bubnic admitted to hoping audiences liked Astrid and her unapologetic ambition. But, she added, "I bet David Mamet didn't go round worrying whether audiences would like the characters in Glengarry Glen Ross." The all-female cast features Colleen Clinton (Muswell Hill, Abigail's Party with The Pond Theatre/The Barrow Group), Laura Hooper (Design for Living, dir. Jack Hofsis, at HB Studio), Elisha Mudly (Balls at 59E59), Sandra Shipley (Present Laughter on Broadway), Laura Yumi Snell (After the Storm with Lea Salonga at the Kennedy Center), and Angie Tennant (The Dead, 1904 at Irish Rep). The production is framed like a cabaret, threading music originally performed by iconic female voices (like Nina Simone and Etta James) through the story with piano accompaniment by Laura Yumi Snell. The design team includes Brittany Vasta (scenic designer); Caitlin Smith Rapoport (lighting designer); Grier Coleman (costume designer); Ien DeNio (sound designer); and Lauren Page Russell (props designer). Natalie Lamonte is the movement director. The Production Stage Manager is Kacey Gritters. ### BIOS Melissa Bubnic (playwright) is a writer for stage and screen. She has written for TV shows Shameless, Hollyoaks, and Crackanory, and most recently Sky One's most-watched original drama, Delicious. She is developing original TV projects for broadcasters (FX and ITV) and production companies (New Pictures and Carnival Films). She won the Channel 4 Sonia Friedman Production Award for Best Play for Monkey Work, Baboon Chop and the Lysicrates Prize for Playwriting for Ghosting the Party. Her adaptation of Hedda Gabler for Queensland Theatre won universal acclaim in 2018. Her play Boys Will Be Boys was commissioned and premiered by the Sydney Theatre Company in 2015 and has since been produced by Headlong and the Bush Theatre in London, and by Auckland's Silo Theatre Company. Her play Beached won the 2010 Patrick White Award and has been staged at Griffin Theatre Company in Sydney, the Marlowe Theatre in Canterbury and Soho Theatre in London. Lily Dorment (director) is a London-born, Brooklyn-based director and actor. She is a proud co-founder of The Pond Theatre Company. Recent projects: The Naturalists (Co-Director with Colleen Clinton, The Pond); The Thing With Feathers and Expecting Isabel (Assistant Director to Seth Barrish, The Barrow Group). Recent acting projects: Abigail's Party and Muswell Hill (The Pond/The Barrow Group), Calendar Girls (Ivoryton Playhouse), and the short film Nica (lead). She has studied acting and directing at The Barrow Group and RADA. She holds degrees from Yale and Columbia. The Pond Theatre The Pond Theatre Company presents US premieres of British and Irish plays and provides context for those works through the revival of modern classics. Founded in New York City by an international group of actors from the UK, Ireland and the United States, The Pond showcases the work of playwrights whose work may have been produced in the UK or Ireland but who have had few, if any, opportunities to present their work to US audiences. About 59E59 Theaters 59E59 Theaters is committed to curating innovative and invigorating work never-before-seen by New York audiences. Providing a space for emerging and established not-for-profit theater companies to reach new audiences, 59E59's partnering with these producing theater companies by giving them highly-subsidized rental rates, as well as production, marketing, and press support. Companies also receive 100% of their net box office sales. The Elysabeth Kleinhans Theatrical Foundation was established by Founding Artistic Director, Elysabeth Kleinhans to create a new, state-of-the-art theater complex to host original and innovative theatrical productions in East Midtown Manhattan. In 2002, the building at 59 East 59th Street was donated to the Foundation. The building was then gut renovated, creating three brand new theaters, Theater A, Theater B, and Theater C, designed by architect, Leo Modrcin, who collaborated with the Foundation to create an inviting ambiance. Under the leadership of Founding Artistic Director Elysabeth Kleinhans and Executive Producer Peter Tear, 59E59 Theaters opened its inaugural season in February 2004 with a production of The Stendhal Syndrome produced by then resident company, Primary Stages, in the largest of its three spaces, Theater A. Shortly following, in April 2004, the other two spaces, Theater B and Theater C opened their doors with productions of Sun Is Shining, by the groundbreaking British-Chinese Mu Lan Theatre Company, and My Arm, Tim Crouch's critically-acclaimed hour-long solo show from the Edinburgh Festival Fringe, during the Theaters' first annual Brits Off Broadway. Since 2004, the theaters have been continuously occupied with shows running from three to seven weeks. In 2017, Elysabeth Kleinhans and Peter Tear stepped down from their roles, and Val Day, a longtime agent with William Morris and ICM, was appointed as Artistic Director. With the addition of a new Artistic Director, 59E59 Theaters moved to the final phase of transitioning from the founding team to a traditional theater management structure, begun in 2012 with the appointment of Brian Beirne as Managing Director. |
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