| From the creators of The Government Inspector comes THE ALCHEMIST with Manoel Felciano, Jacob Ming-Trent, Reg Rogers, Jennifer Sánchez and more | |
| Posted by: Official_Press_Release 11:26 am EDT 09/29/21 | |
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| RED BULL THEATER (https://www.redbulltheater.com/the-alchemist) Announces the Complete Cast for Their First Live, In-Person Production of the 2021-‘22 Season: Ben Jonson’s (https://www.redbulltheater.com/the-alchemist) THE ALCHEMIST (https://www.redbulltheater.com/the-alchemist) A Comedy, Adapted by Jeffrey Hatcher Directed by Jesse Berger The Pair That Created the Hit Comedy The Government Inspector Featuring Nathan Christopher, Stephen DeRosa, Carson Elrod, Manoel Felciano, Teresa Avia Lim, Jacob Ming-Trent, Louis Mustillo, Reg Rogers, Jennifer Sánchez, and Allen Tedder Limited Off-Broadway Engagement Begins November 7th at New World Stages Opening Night Set for November 21st TICKETS ON SALE NOW! RED BULL THEATER (https://www.redbulltheater.com/) (Jesse Berger, Founder and Artistic Director | Jim Bredeson, Managing Director) today announced the cast for the World Premiere of a brand new adaptation of Ben Jonson’s classic comedy, The Alchemist, (https://www.redbulltheater.com/the-alchemist) adapted by Jeffrey Hatcher and directed by Jesse Berger, the team that created the hit comedy The Government Inspector. (https://www.redbulltheater.com/the-government-inspector) Featured in the cast will be Nathan Christopher (Red Bull debut); Stephen DeRosa (Red Bull: The Government Inspector; Broadway: Gary: A Sequel to Titus Andronicus, The Nance, Into the Woods, The Man Who Came to Dinner); Carson Elrod (Bway: Peter and The Starcatcher, Reckless, Noises Off; Off-Bway: The Tempest, Measure for Measure, All's Well That Ends Well - NYSF; The Liar, The Heir Apparent - CSC); Manoel Felciano (Red Bull: The Changeling; Bway: To Kill a Mockingbird, Amélie, Sweeney Todd - Tony nomination); Teresa Avia Lim (Bway: Junk - Lincoln Center Theater; Off-Bway: Caesar and Cleopatra - GTG, The Taming of the Shrew - Public Theater); Jacob Ming-Trent (Falstaff in Shakespeare in the Park’s Merry Wives, Lortel Award winner - Father Comes Home From the Wars…, Panda in HBO's “Watchmen”); Louis Mustillo ("Mike & Molly," Bartenders - OCC nomination Best Solo Performance); Reg Rogers (Bway: Tootsie, The Royal Family - OCC nominations; The Iceman Cometh, Present Laughter, The Big Knife and Holiday - Tony and Drama Desk nominations. The Dazzle - OBIE and Lucille Lortel Awards); Jennifer Sánchez (Bway: Pretty Woman, On Your Feet, Women on the Verge of a Nervous Breakdown); and Allen Tedder (Bway: To Kill a Mockingbird, King Lear - Shakespeare in the Park). The creative team includes Alexis Distler (scenic design), Tilly Grimes (costumes), Cha See (lighting), Greg Pliska (sound), Deborah Hecht (dialect and voice), and Rick Sordelet (action movement). Scholar Tanya Pollard will serve as dramaturg. Performances begin at New World Stages (340 West 50th Street) on November 7th, for a limited Off-Broadway engagement, through December 19th only. Opening Night is set for Sunday November 21st. To purchase tickets visit Telecharge.com, (https://www.telecharge.com/Off-Broadway/The-Alchemist/Overview) call (212) 239-6200, or visit the New World Stages box office (daily, after 1pm). "Live theater! In person! Finally! And a COMEDY! Hooray! I couldn’t be more excited to get back to doing what we do best -- sharing classic stories with audiences, featuring some of the finest actors in the country. In the case of The Alchemist, it is a thrill to be diving back into rehearsals with one of the greatest comedies ever written. A forerunner to Dirty Rotten Scoundrels and the like, this delectable confection of con artists and buffoons on the make is in love with (and makes hilarious fun of) the foibles of all people—especially with the alchemical trickery of actors and the magic of theater itself. In Jeffrey Hatcher’s fantastic (and even more farcical) new version, it comes to contemporary life sans scholastic dust, plus an extra comic twist... Or twelve. Who could have foretold the timeliness of this comedy? A play that takes place at the end of a plague? Neither Jeffrey Hatcher nor I can claim that kind of prescience, when we first planned this adaptation in 2018. However, it does give me a sense of joy and hope that we are returning to live theater with a play that points us (in a fun way) to a return to a more normal life in 2022 with fewer masks, fewer worries about our plague, and more LAUGHS.” said Berger, smiling through his Delta double mask. "As we return to in-person performance, the health and safety of everyone involved is of paramount importance to all of us. We’re thrilled that our first production during these extraordinary times will be held at New World Stages, owned and operated by The Shubert Organization. As it has worked to reopen their Broadway venues, The Shubert Organization has proven to be committed to the health and safety of all theatre employees, production staff, cast, and audience members. This is a commitment that Red Bull Theater shares. Masks, proof of vaccination, and a photo ID will be required for all guests. We invite our audiences, new and old, to come back and laugh with us, safely and with confidence,“ said Managing Director Jim Bredeson. "Samuel Coleridge wrote that Ben Jonson’s The Alchemist was one of the ‘three most perfect plots ever planned’ (the other two perfect plots were Oedipus and Tom Jones, both of which I plan to screw up next), so when Jesse Berger asked me to adapt the play for Red Bull, I took Coleridge’s comment as a warning: ‘Don’t screw up the plot.’ Jonson’s comedy is an exquisitely wound mechanism and a joy to watch unwind, but his language can be daunting. He’s funniest to those who know what Jonson knew, and there’s nothing worse than a joke that requires a footnote to explain why it’s funny. Purists will call what I’ve written a free adaptation, and much of it anachronistic, but it’s intended to be in Jonson’s style and spirit, if not his meter. Of course, I did screw around with the plot. Ours is a slimmed down version of the play, with fewer characters and one setting instead of four. In making it more compact, I couldn’t help but change Jonson’s perfect plan. To those in the know, t his will be evident in the role of Dol Common. Dol has more to do than she did in the original. Jonson’s Dol is a great character, but Jesse and I thought she got tossed about a bit, so she’s been given more brass. Ditto Dame Pliant. Dol and Dame Pliant are the only females in the play. Two women against eight men. We’ve tried to make it a fair fight. So, apart from dumbing down the highbrow jokes, ruining the perfect plot, tossing in anachronisms, and adding a song very much like one sung by Shirley Bassey in 1964, the play is pretty much your grandmother’s The Alchemist. If your grandmother was Shirley Bassey,” said Jeffrey Hatcher. Ben Jonson’s Jacobean jack-in-the-box of a play is a side-splitting, screwball farce of magical proportions. London. 1606. It’s plague time again. When a wealthy gentleman flees to the country, his trusted servant opens his house to a pair of con artists and sets up a den of criminal capitalism. Claiming alchemical powers, the quick-witted trio fleece an onslaught of greedy sheep with their virtuosic ability to improvise amidst increasingly frantic comings and goings. It’s comic gold with dupes, double-dupes, duels, disguises, and a lucky flea named “Lewis.” ABOUT THE PLAYWRIGHTS Jeffrey Hatcher’s work was last presented by Red Bull Theater in 2017 with his hit version of inane corruption à la Gogol, The Government Inspector. (https://www.redbulltheater.com/the-government-inspector) His Broadway credits include Never Gonna Dance (book). Off-Broadway credits include Three Viewings and A Picasso at Manhattan Theatre Club; Scotland Road and The Turn of the Screw at Primary Stages; Tuesdays with Morrie (with Mitch Albom) at the Minetta Lane; Murder by Poe, The Turn of the Screw, and The Spy at The Acting Company; and Neddy at American Place. Other credits include Compleat Female Stage Beauty, Mrs. Mannerly, Murderers, Mercy of a Storm, Smash, Korczak's Children, To Fool the Eye, Confederacy of Dunces, The Critic, Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, and others at The Guthrie, Old Globe, Yale Rep, The Geffen, Seattle Rep, Cincinnati Playhouse, Cleveland Playhouse, South Coast Rep, Arizona Theater Company, San Jose Rep, The Empty Space, Indiana Rep, Children’s Theater Company, History Theater, Madison Rep, Intiman, Illusion, Denver Center, Oregon Shakespeare Festival, Alabama Shakespeare Festival, Milwaukee Rep, Repertory Theater of St. Louis, Actors Theater of Louisville, Philadelphia Theater Company, Huntington, Shakespeare Theatre (D.C.), Asolo, City Theater, Studio Arena and dozens more in the U.S. and abroad. Film and television credits include Stage Beauty, Casanova, The Duchess, Mr. Holmes, and episodes of “Columbo” and "The Mentalist." Grants/awards: NEA, TCG, Lila Wallace Fund, Rosenthal New Play Prize, Frankel Award, Charles MacArthur Fellowship Award, McKnight Foundation, Jerome Foundation, Barrymore Award Best New Play, and IVEY Award Best New Play. He is a member and/or alumnus of The Playwrights Center, the Dramatists Guild, the Writers Guild, and New Dramatists. Poet, playwright, actor, and scholar, Ben Jonson (1572-1637) embodied the pressures and possibilities of his fast-paced urban literary world. Raised in London, he had an elite classical education at the Westminster School, but he apprenticed as a bricklayer, which he resented, before reportedly killing a man in single combat as a soldier in Flanders. Notorious for drinking and fighting, he was frequently on the wrong side of the law; he was nearly hanged in 1598 after killing an actor in a duel, and was imprisoned in 1597 and 1605 for co-writing plays that fell afoul of censors. Fiercely competitive, he claimed that he “beat Marston, and took his pistol from him,” and he responded to the legend that Shakespeare had “never blotted line” by writing, “my answer hath been, would he had blotted a thousand.” Yet he also revelled in friendships, frequently collaborated with other writers, and was revered by younger poets who became known as “Sons of Ben.” In keeping with his mixture of grittiness and aspirations to gentility, his literary output ranged from commercial drama to elite court masques and lyric poems. The satiric comedies for which Jonson is best known reflect the mix of urban ambition, work, violence, and playfulness that shaped his own experience. ABOUT THE DIRECTOR Since founding Red Bull Theater in 2003, Jesse Berger has directed Pericles, The Revenger’s Tragedy, Edward the Second, Women Beware Women, The Duchess of Malfi, The Witch of Edmonton, The Maids, Volpone, Loot, 'Tis Pity She's a Whore, The Changeling, and The Government Inspector. Under his leadership, Red Bull produces a variety of classical work, including past productions such as Erica Schmidt’s Mac Beth, Michael Sexton’s Coriolanus, Keith Hamilton Cobb’s American Moor, over 200 readings online and in person through the OBIE Award-winning Revelation Reading Series, inspiring new writing in conversation with the classics through the annual Short New Play Festival, and offering education and outreach through free Bull Session discussions, Classical ?Acting? Intensives?, RemarkaBULL Podversations, and Shakespeare in Schools. Jesse has also directed in New York and across the country at such theaters as Denver Center Theatre (Richard III), Old Globe (Othello), Pittsburgh Public (Venus in Fur, The Laramie Project, I Am My Own Wife, Life X 3, A Number, Circle Mirror Transformation), PlayMakers Rep (An Iliad), Barrington Stage (Sleuth, Absurd Person Singular), NY Theater Workshop, SoHo Rep, Lincoln Center Theater Director’s Lab, Theaterworks/USA, Urban Stages, Great Lakes Theater Festival, Dorset Theatre Festival, Theatre J, Asolo Theatre, Washington Shakespeare Co (Marat/Sade), and the Idaho, Utah, Arizona, Hamptons, and St. Louis Shakespeare Festivals, among others. Jesse received a Helen Hayes Award for Outstanding Direction of Marat/Sade, and he has been thrice-nominated for the SDC Joe A. Callaway Award for Excellence in Directing for The Government Inspector, The Witch of Edmonton, and 'Tis Pity She's a Whore. His production of The Maids was nominated as Outstanding Revival by both the Drama League and Lucille Lortel Awards. Jesse received a 2018 OBIE Award for Outstanding Direction of The Government Inspector. ABOUT RED BULL THEATER Red Bull Theater, hailed as “the city’s gutsiest classical theater” by Time Out New York, brings rarely seen classic plays to dynamic new life for contemporary audiences, uniting a respect for tradition with a modern sensibility. Named for the rowdy Jacobean playhouse that illegally performed plays in England during the years of Puritan rule, Red Bull Theater is New York City’s home for dynamic performances of great plays that stand the test of time. With the Jacobean plays of Shakespeare and his contemporaries as its cornerstone, the company also produces new works that are in conversation with the classics. A home for artists, scholars and students, Red Bull Theater delights and engages the intellect and imagination of audiences, and strives to make its work accessible, diverse, and welcoming to all. Red Bull Theater believes in the power of great classic stories and plays of heightened language to deepen our understanding of the human condition, in the special ability of live theater to create unique, collective experiences, and the timeless capacity of classical theater to illuminate the events of our times. Variety agreed, hailing Red Bull’s work as: “Proof that classical theater can still be surprising after hundreds of years.” Since its debut in 2003 with a production of Shakespeare’s Pericles starring Daniel Breaker, Red Bull Theater has served adventurous theatergoers with Off-Broadway productions, Revelation Readings, and the annual Short New Play Festival. The company also offers outreach programs including Shakespeare in Schools bringing professional actors and teaching artists into public school classrooms; Bull Sessions, free post-play discussions with top scholars; and Classical Acting Intensives led by veteran theater professionals. During the pandemic, Red Bull responded swiftly to the shutdown, creating several ongoing programs to serve audiences and artists with our mission: RemarkaBULL Podversations, Online Readings, Seminars, and more. Red Bull Theater strives to be a home for all artists and theatergoers. We value and practice inclusiveness, equity and diversity in all of our activities, and are committed to antiracist action. All of us at Red Bull Theater are committed to actively working to help realize a more perfect union—a racially and socially just America. "The classics-shaking Red Bull Theater,” as Time Out NY has called it, has presented 20 Off-Broadway productions and nearly 200 Revelation Readings of rarely seen classics, serving a community of more than 5,000 artists and providing quality artistic programming to an audience of over 65,000. The company’s unique programming has received ongoing critical acclaim, and has been recognized with Lortel, Drama Desk, Drama League, Callaway, Off Broadway Alliance, and OBIE nominations and Awards. For more information about The Alchemist, or any of Red Bull Theater's programs, visitwww.redbulltheater.com (http://www.redbulltheater.com/) . NATHAN CHRISTOPHER is delighted to be making his debut with Red Bull Theater. Based in Minneapolis, Minnesota, Nathan has appeared on stage at the Guthrie Theater, the Children’s Theater, the Jungle Theater, Ten Thousand Things Theater and Illusion Theater among others. Favorite roles include Jeff in Lobby Hero by Kenneth Lonergan and Bilbo Baggins in The Hobbit. Nathan has also taken part in touring productions around the United States, Europe and Russia and appeared in a number of independent films. He has a B.A. in theater from the University of Minnesota. When not acting, Nathan is also a freelance artist and illustrator. STEPHEN DEROSA. Red Bull: The Government Inspector; Broadway: Gary: A Sequel, On the Town, Betrayal, The Nance, Hairspray, Twentieth Century, Henry IV, Into the Woods, The Man Who Came to Dinner; Off-Broadway: Little Shop of Horrors, These Paper Bullets!, Love's Fire, Irma Vep. Regional: Paper Mill Playhouse, Arena Stage, George Street Playhouse, Yale Rep. Film/TV: “Blue Bloods,” “The Blacklist,” “Boardwalk Empire” (Eddie Cantor). MFA: Yale Drama. CARSON ELROD’s Broadway credits include Peter and The Starcatcher, Reckless, Noises Off. Metropolitan Opera: The Merry Widow. Off-Broadway: Seize The King (Classical Theatre of Harlem), The Tempest, Measure for Measure, All's Well That Ends Well (NYSF), The Liar, The Heir Apparent (CSC). Important Hats of the 20th Century, The Explorer’s Club (MTC), Lives of The Saints, All in the Timing (Primary Stages), Cavedweller (NYTW). Regional: Williamstown, Yale Rep, Baltimore Center Stage, Shakespeare Theatre DC, Westport, Denver Center, Tanglewood, Berkshire Theatre Festival, Berkeley Rep, A.R.T. TV: “The Good Fight,” “Law & Order: CI,” “30 Rock.” Film: Wedding Crashers, Kissing Jessica Stein. MANOEL FELCIANO was most recently seen as Prosecutor Horace Gilmer in Aaron Sorkin's Broadway production To Kill a Mockingbird. Other Broadway: Sweeney Todd (Tony nomination), Amélie, Disaster!, Brooklyn, Jesus Christ Superstar, Cabaret. Off Broadway: Lynne Nottage’s By The Way, Meet Vera Stark and The Secret Life of Bees, The Changeling (Red Bull), Trumpery, Much Ado About Nothing, Shockheaded Peter. Regionally: Twelfth Night (dir. Rebecca Taichman) The Tempest, Much Ado About Nothing, world premiere of Mothers and Sons with Tyne Daly, The Exorcist with Brooke Shields, Clybourne Park, Round and Round the Garden, Caucasian Chalk Circle, November, Jerry in At Home at the Zoo (Rebecca Taichman Dir.), Elektra with Olympia Dukakis, Ragtime (Kennedy Center), Three Sisters (dir. Michael Greif, Williamstown), George in Sunday in the Park with George opposite Kelli O'Hara. Various Film/TV, Teaching/Directing in the MFA programs of ACT, NYU and Columbia. Education: BA from Yale and MFA from NYU. TERESA AVIA LIM. Broadway: Ayad Akhtar's Junk at Lincoln Center. Other works: Cleopatra in Caesar & Cleopatra for Gingold Theatrical Group; Shakespeare in the Park's all female production of Taming of the Shrew, NAATCO's Awake and Sing!, and Macbeth with the Mobile Shakespeare Unit at the Public Theatre. Teresa originated her roles in Peerless, Water by the Spoonful, Edith Can Shoot Things and Hit Them, and Concerning Strange Devices from the Distant West. TV/Film: “The Code,” “Ray Donovan,” “Blue Bloods,” “Limitless,” “Unforgettable,” “Law and Order: Criminal Intent,” “Dispatched,” “Take Me with You,” and Monster. She is a graduate of the Yale School of Drama and an inaugural Recipient of the Jerome L. Greene Foundation Scholarship. JACOB MING-TRENT was most recently seen as Falstaff in Shakespeare in the Park’s Merry Wives as well as The Forty-Year-Old Version (Netflix) and R#J (Sundance). Several Off-Broadway productions, including Father Comes Home From the Wars..., for which he earned a Lortel Award for Best Supporting Actor. TV: starred in the series “White Famous” (Showtime), played Panda in “Watchmen” (HBO), “Ray Donovan” season six (Showtime), “Feed the Beast” (AMC), etc. Film: Starred in the reboot of SuperFly (Sony), The Possession of Hanna Grace (Screen Gems), etc. Upcoming: “Only Murders in the Building” opposite Steve Martin and Martin Short (Hulu) and “Wu-Tang: An American Saga” (Hulu). Broadway: Hands on a Hardbody and Shrek The Musical. LOUIS MUSTILLO’s long-running play Bartenders received an Outer Critics Circle nomination for Best Solo Performance. In 2019 he appeared opposite Andy Garcia in Jeffery Hatcher's adaptation of Key Largo, directed by Doug Hughes at The Geffen in Los Angeles. He played Vince Moranto for six seasons on “Mike and Molly.” Has appeared in 30 films. Recently completed the inspirational Bobcat Moretti and the very funny Magic Hour. Mr Mustillo has appeared in over sixty TV shows including “The Sopranos” playing put upon gardener Sal Vitro and most recently “Bluebloods” and “NCIS.” REG ROGERS's Broadway credits include Tootsie and The Royal Family (Outer Critics Circle nominations), The Iceman Cometh, Present Laughter, You Can't Take It With You, A Free Man of Color, The Big Knife and Holiday (Tony and Drama Desk nominations). Off-Broadway includes All’s Well That Ends Well, Measure for Measure, The Pain and the Itch, Cellini, and The Dazzle (OBIE and Lucille Lortel Awards). Film and TV include: I Shot Andy Warhol, Primal Fear, Lovely By Surprise, “Friends,” “The Americans," "Boardwalk Empire," “Flesh And Bone,” "The Knick," “Hell On Wheels,” “You,” “NOS4A2” and most recently Neville Townsend on “The Blacklist.” JENNIFER SÁNCHEZ’s Broadway credits include The Rose Tattoo, Pretty Woman, Sunday in the Park With George, On Your Feet, Spider-Man: Turn off the Dark, Ghost, Women on the Verge of a Nervous Breakdown, West Side Story. Off-Broadway: Little Miss Sunshine, I’m Getting My Act Together and Taking it on the Road. Jennifer is originally from Albuquerque, New Mexico where her headshot is featured on a billboard in the middle of the desert. She is a songwriter, Brooklynite, and mother to one very tall son. ALLEN TEDDER most recently appeared on Broadway in To Kill a Mockingbird (Guitarist). Off Broadway: King Lear (Delacorte Theater). Regional: PlayMakers Repertory Company. Training: UNC Chapel Hill; The Juilliard School. Allen is from North Carolina and is very grateful to have made it onto the stage here with these great artists. He is so glad to be working with Red Bull Theater. |
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