Gary Edward “Garrison” Keillor (born August 7, 1942) is an American author, storyteller, humorist, voice actor, and radio personality. He is best known as the creator of the Minnesota Public Radio (MPR) show A Prairie Home Companion, which he hosted from 1974 to 2016. Keillor created the fictional Minnesota town Lake Wobegon, the setting of many of his books, including Lake Wobegon Days and Leaving Home: A Collection of Lake Wobegon Stories. Other creations include Guy Noir, a detective voiced by Keillor who appeared in A Prairie Home Companion comic skits. Keillor is also the creator of the five-minute daily radio/podcast program The Writer’s Almanac, which pairs one or two poems of his choice with a script about important literary, historical, and scientific events that coincided with that date in history.

Performing Arts of Woodstock is a not-for-profit year-round local theater organization presenting new and established plays of quality since 1964, when it was founded by Eda Crist and Edie LeFever. PAW is the oldest, continuously running theater organization in the history of Woodstock!

For more than 50 years, Performing Arts of Woodstock has been mounting quality productions of both new and classic plays — artistically challenging plays such as True West, The Beauty Queen of Leenane, The Dresser, The Good Woman of Setzuan, Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf?, Twelfth Night, Breaking the Code, Endgame, to name just a few from the last several years.

Keillor is donating the proceeds of An Evening of Poetry and Song to 
Performing Arts of Woodstock!

For tickets click the following link — Woodstock Playhouse.
Or call the box office at 845 679 6900  Prices are: $125, $75, $45.
Since PAW is a 501c3 organization, 65% of the ticket price is tax-deductible.

Performing Arts of Woodstock is also hosting a $25 pre-show reception at 6 pm so that Garrison Keillor and some of his fans can enjoy each other’s company. For reception reservations please call Adele at (845) 331‑2369 or email her at adeleacts@gmail.com for reception reservations.

Asbury Shorts combines award-winning films from past years with new international festival honorees, creating a rare opportunity for audiences to see world-class short films on a real cinema screen as opposed to You Tube or smart phones. Academy Award nominated director Jason Reitman (JUNO, Up in the Air, Thank You for Smoking and Young Adult) calls Asbury Shorts: “The best short film show I’ve ever seen.” The highly entertaining evening features the best in comedy, drama and animation.

“The Drive” — Directed by Corinne Kassor

Asbury Shorts is celebrating the work of women directors in this year’s presentation. Highlights include: “The Suitor,” a dark comedy from director Kate Riedl of Australia, a surreal tale of a young courtship in the wilds of the Australian Outback. “The Drive” is the poignant story of Evie, a loving daughter who struggles with role reversals as she drives her aging parents to an assisted living facility. Corinne Kassor directed this heart warming short. Director Amy Nicholson’s documentary “Pickle” examines the complicated relationships humans have with their pets in a film of unexpected warmth and mirth.

Death Taxes and Apple Juice

Asbury Short Film Concerts have been presented at: The Museum of Fine Arts Boston, The Lake Shore Theatre in Chicago, Summer Stage in Central Park, Director’s Guild Theater in Manhattan, The AERO Theatre in Santa Monica, CA, The Osprey Art Center in Nova Scotia, Canada, Royal Festival Hall in London, U.K., The Vero Beach Museum of Art and the Leminske Theater in Berlin, Germany to name just a few of the prestigious venues where audiences have enjoyed these amazing films. This will be Asbury Shorts eighth consecutive year screening globally honored films at The Rosendale Theatre.

The Rosendale Theatre Collective is dedicated to preserving the historic Rosendale Theatre and enhancing the cultural life and economic vitality of Rosendale and Ulster County through film, the performing arts and educational programming. The Collective works together with other arts organizations to sustain diverse cultural activities and exchanges for a wide audience.

The Rosendale Theatre is located at 408 Main Street, Rosendale, New York. General admission tickets cost $12 and $10 for Rosendale Theatre members. For directions and more information please call: 845.658.8989.

Preview, November 2nd at 8 pm

Alan Mathison Turing [June 23 1912 – June 7 1954] was an English computer scientist, mathematician, logician, cryptanalyst, philosopher and theoretical biologist.

Alan Turing was highly influential in the development of theoretical computer science. His Turing machine, is considered a model of a general purpose computer and Turing is considered the father of theoretical computer science and artificial intelligence. He worked for Britain’s codebreaking center at Bletchley Park during the Second World War and while at Bletchley devised a number of techniques for speeding the breaking of German ciphers, including improving an electromechanical machine that was capable of finding settings for the Enigma machine. Turing played a pivotal role in cracking intercepted coded messages that enabled the Allies to defeat the Nazis in many crucial engagements, and in doing so helped win the war.

The Enigma Machine

Prosecuted in 1952 for homosexual acts Turing accepted chemical castration treatment, with DES, as an alternative to prison. He died in 1954, 16 days before his 42nd birthday, from cyanide poisoning. In 2009, British Prime Minister Gordon Brown made an official public apology on behalf of the British government for “the appalling way he was treated.” Queen Elizabeth II granted him a posthumous pardon in 2013.

While the above paragraphs outline the brief details of a brilliant and complicated man. Hugh Whitemore’s play Breaking the Code, seeks to reveal the human being behind the brilliance and the tragedy of that life. This Thursday, November 2 at 8pm, Performing Arts of Woodstock will preview its production of Breaking the Code. Regular Performances will begin this weekend on Friday November 3 at 8pm, and continue for the next three weekends. [performance dates & time listed below]

Directed by Norman Wallace and Bette Siler and starring Norman Wallace as Alan Turing.

Performing Arts of Woodstock continues to present serious theater and this production promises to be one of its best!

Listen as Wallace Norman talks about Performing Arts of Woodstock’s production of Breaking the Code with Joe Donahue on WAMC

Breaking The Code
November 3, 4, 10, 11, 17 & 18 at 8 pm
November 5, 12 & 19 at 1:30 pm

Preview, November 2nd at 8 pm

Mescal Hornbeck Community Center
Woodstock

General Admission $23
Senior Citizens & Students $20

The Cast:
Wil Anderson
Craig T. Newman
Wallace Norman
John Remington
Farrell Reynolds
Rick Seiler
Bette Siler
Deborah Vines

For more information about Performing Arts of Woodstock and their production of Breaking the Code, go to performingartsofwoodstock.org

Online tickets are now available by Clicking Here

The production is based on Christopher Sergel’s adaptation of Harper Lee’s famous novel. It will be directed by Assistant Professor Catherine Doherty, a performer and director who is very active regionally in both roles.

Kordell Pritchard and Irene Tapert as Atticus Finch and Scout.

“To Kill a Mockingbird” is a bona fide classic, which in many ways is as relevant to our national identity now as it was upon first publication. It tells the story of historical events that rocked the small town of Maycomb, Ala., in 1935, beginning when a black man was accused of raping a white woman.

Atticus Finch, one of the great original characters in all of American fiction, is appointed to defend the accused man. He and his family soon become the focal points of a terrifying tale of poverty, racism, integrity, innocence and loss.

Sergel’s adaptation preserves Lee’s iconic Great Depression tale for the stage, bringing the small-town politics and deep emotional impact of the original to today’s theatrical audiences.

About The Director

A member of the SUNY New Paltz Theatre Arts faculty in both performance and design, Catherine Doherty has directed recent performances including “Parade,” in spring 2016, and “Mad Forest,” in fall 2016. She has served was the Associate Artistic Director of the Potsdam Music Theatre and as Producing Director at Northern Stage in White River Junction, Vt.

Her regional directing credits include: “You Can’t Take It With You,” “Noises Off” (co– directed with Brendan Burke) “Mary Poppins,” “The Elephant Man,” “Lend Me A Tenor,” “Madame Butterfly,” “Doubt,” “Chicago” and “Boeing Boeing.”

Doherty is also a proud member of Actor’s Equity Association. She has appeared in such roles as Margie in “Good People,” Nurse in “Romeo & Juliet,” and Lady Bracknell in “The Importance of Being Earnest.” She has worked in theatres including Shadowlands, Opera North, St. Michael’s Playhouse, Paper Mill Playhouse (N.J.), The John F. Kennedy Center for The Performing Arts and Theatre In The Square.

She has worked for ABC, CBS and Fox and is a two– time Telly Award recipient. Doherty’s short film, “Family Portrait,” received the Ida Lupino Award from the Directors Guild of America. She holds an MFA in Performance from The University of Georgia and an MFA in Directing from The American Film Institute.

Performances of “To Kill a Mockingbird” will be given from Oct. 12–14 and Oct. 19–21 beginning at 8 p.m., with Sunday matinee performances on Oct. 15 and Oct. 22 at 2 p.m. All performances will take place at Parker Theatre.

The Friday, Oct. 13 performance will be preceded by a panel conversation, beginning at 6:30 p.m., featuring SUNY New Paltz faculty and k-12 teachers from the Hudson Valley Writing Project. Panelists will discuss how To Kill a Mockingbird speaks to our current cultural and political landscape while also considering what lessons the play holds for students of all ages. This special event will also be held in Parker Theatre.

Tickets for “To Kill a Mockingbird” are $18 general reserve; $16 senior (62+), New Paltz faculty, alumni staff and non-New Paltz students; and $10 for SUNY New Paltz students and are available now via the Online Box Office, or by phone or in person at the Parker Theatre Box Office, open Monday-Friday from 11:30 a.m.-4:30 p.m. Contact the box office at (845) 257– 3880 or boxoffice@newpaltz.edu.

Some of the most exciting theater we can see this year will be available to us in the Hudson Valley. So much to see, hear and enjoy! You are bound to see a show on its way to Broadway soon. Among last year’s offerings, The Wolves and A 24– Decade History of Popular Music have been nominated for the 2017 Pulitzer Prize; The Babylon Line and the Light Years had NY productions, with Junk and The Last Match scheduled for production later this year.

This season, Powerhouse will welcome Tony winners Sam Gold and Michael Mayer, Tony nominees Scott Ellis and Sheryl Kaller and OBIE winner, Trip Cullman, plus Josh Radnor, composer Stephen Trask, actor and playwright Hamish Linklater, and two-time Pulitzer winner, Lynn Nottage.

“ The Powerhouse season brings our audience in contact with some of the country’s most exciting theater makers. It’s a special thrill to welcome Powerhouse newcomer Lisa Kron and to have Lynn Nottage come to Vassar College and the Hudson Valley,” says Vassar’s Powerhouse Producing Director Ed Cheetham. Ed has been involved in various capacities with Powerhouse since 1988 and oversees all productions—a full-time job.

“We are thrilled to partner with Vassar to produce our 33rd Powerhouse summer season of new works-in-progress,” said Johanna Pfaelzer, Artistic Director of New York Stage and Film. “The last several years at Powerhouse have been especially fertile ground for the development of some of the most exciting new works for the American theater. We look forward to providing this summer’s lineup of artists—an incredible collection of Powerhouse alums and first-timers—a rigorous and protected artistic community in which their work can flourish and prepare for the next step in its journey.”

Vassar & New York Stage and Film’s Powerhouse collaboration continues to be the launching pad for some of the most groundbreaking new works for the American theater, with countless productions in New York City, regionally and internationally. Notably, Lin-Manuel Miranda’s Hamilton and Stephen Karam’s The Humans, the reigning Tony® winners for Best Musical and Best Play, respectively—received early development in the Reading Series during the 2013 season at Powerhouse.

Most recently, during its 32nd Season last summer, Powerhouse presented first-look productions of two daring new works that were just named finalists for the 2017 Pulitzer Prize for Drama: Sarah DeLappe’s The Wolves, which moved directly from its Powerhouse premiere to a recent celebrated run at The Playwrights Realm in NYC; and Taylor Mac’s  A 24-Decade History of Popular Music. Among 30 other projects developed recently at Powerhouse with new or upcoming major productions: Richard Greenberg’s The Babylon Line at Lincoln Center Theater; The Light Years at Playwrights Horizons; Ayad Akhtar’s Junk at Lincoln Center Theater; and Anna Ziegler’s The Last Match at the Roundabout Theatre Company.

Josh Radnor

The upcoming 33rd Powerhouse Season will feature two main stage productions in the Powerhouse Theater:

Sacred Valley (June 29 – July 9) by Josh Radnor directed by Sheryl Kaller

Three people are forced to ask themselves the deepest questions about love, friendship, and growing up in this bittersweet comedy from Josh Radnor (Liberal Arts, How I Met your Mother, and Powerhouse’s The Babylon Line).

Good Men Wanted (July 20 – July 30) by Kevin Armento directed by Jaki Bradley and choreographed by Ani Taj

Good Men Wanted brings to life the incredible true stories of renegade women who disguised themselves as men to fight in the Civil War. In a searing drama punctuated by explosive dance sequences set to contemporary pop music, five women of vastly different backgrounds become warriors and spies.

The musical workshop presentations, presented in the Vogelstein Center for Drama & Film, will include three exciting new projects:

Lisa Kron

Stilyagi (June 23–25) lyrics by Lisa Kron with music by Peter Lerman.

Based on the motion picture The Hipsters, produced by Red Arrow Films directed by Michael Mayer

“This is musical about me, Mels Yefimovich Vasnetsov, when I was pulled from promising future by beautiful, corrupt and dissipated Stilyaga girl by name of Polly, who ruined my life in best and worst possible manner. Obviously, this is complicated Soviet story, not fit subject for frivolous American musical. But if you are interested, please, I invite you, come.”

This Ain’t No Disco (June 30 – July 2) music and lyrics by Stephen Trask & Peter Yanowitz, book by Rick Elice and directed by Trip Cullman

Set against the garbage strikes, the grit, the graffiti of NYC 1979, This Ain’t No Disco tells the story of drifters and dreamers who search for their place in the night world of Studio 54 and the Mudd Club. From the co-creator of Hedwig and the Angry Inch and the director of Six Degrees of Separation.

Lynn Nottage

The Secret Life of Bees (July 27–29) book by Lynn Nottage, music by Duncan Sheik with lyrics by Susan Birkenhead is based on the novel by Sue Monk Kidd and directed by Sam Gold.

When Rosaleen, her Black caretaker, is beaten and jailed for attempting to vote, white teenager Lily’s rebellious spirit is awakened and she and Rosaleen escape their circumstances to find the truth about her mother’s death. Three eccentric and spiritual Black sisters who run a colorful bee farm help both Lily and Rosaleen grow and heal with their wisdom, warmth and motherly love. Written by two time Pulitzer Prize winning playwright Lynn Nottage, lyrics by Tony and Drama Desk nominee Susan Birkenhead, composed by Tony Winner Duncan Sheik, and directed by Tony winner Sam Gold.

This summer’s ‘Inside Look’ Workshops to be presented in the Susan Stein Shiva Theater are:

The Great Leap (July 7–9) by Lauren Yee

San Francisco, spring 1989. Manford Lum, talks his way onto a college team, just before they travel to Beijing for a “friendship” game. He can sink 100 free throws in a row, so who cares about his background? When they arrive in China, Manford must juggle international politics and his own personal history. Inspired by events from the life (and short-lived basketball career) of playwright Lauren Yee’s father.

Hang Man (July 28–30) by Stacy Osei-Kuffour directed by Leah C. Gardiner

In the present day, in the backwoods of Mississippi, a Black man is found hanging from a tree. Nothing is quite what it seems in this surreal, funny, raw portrait of a town wrestling to seek meaning in life and death.

Dan Finnerty — “Little Orphan Danny”

The annual Readings Festival, split between two weekends (June 23–25 and July 21–23), will include: Amy and the Orphans by Lindsey Ferrentino, directed by Scott Ellis; Little Orphan Danny, with book, music, and lyrics by Dan Finnerty, directed by Sean Daniels; Ironweed by William Kennedy and Jodie Markell, based on the novel by William Kennedy, directed by Jodie Markell; Paris, Actors by Hamish Linklater; Serious Moonlight by Adrienne Shelly, co-adapted by Liz Tuccillo and Andy Ostroy; Jane Says by Diana Son;Kid Prince and Pablo by Brian Quijada; and additional projects to be announced.

Members of the noted Powerhouse Theater Training Program will present re-imaginings of William Shakespeare’s Hamlet (July 14–16) adapted and directed by Emily Mendelsohn and Cymbeline (July 21–23) adapted and directed by Andrew Willis-Woodward. Members of the Training Company will present Soundpainting (July 6, 13, 20, 27), a series of improvisational performances featuring music, dance, and acting in a dynamic and unique type of ensemble performance; as well as Workshop Performances of 12 Ophelias (a play with broken songs) (July 23–24) by Caridad Svich, directed by Heidi Handelsman; One Act Plays Festival (July 26); and Not, Not, Not, Not, Not Enough Oxygen (July 28) by Caryl Churchill. Young actors, playwrights, and directors from around the country and internationally, along with an exceptional faculty of artists, comprise this important component of the Powerhouse artistic community.

ABOUT POWERHOUSE THEATER

Now in its 33rd year, Powerhouse Theater is a collaboration between New York Stage and Film and Vassar College dedicated to both emerging and established artists in the development and production of new works for theater and film. The Powerhouse program consists of an eight-week residency on the Vassar campus during which more than 300 professional artists and 40 participants in the Powerhouse Training Program live and work together to create new theater works. In 2016, three productions that trace their developmental roots to Powerhouse ran simultaneously on Broadway – Hamilton, Bright Star, and The Humans – and in the 2016/17 theater season, ten projects premiered in New York City that had been developed and presented at Powerhouse: The Wolves (Playwrights Realm); The Babylon Line (Lincoln Center Theater); Rancho Viejo, The Light Years, and The Profane (Playwrights Horizons); Marry Harry (The York Theater); Nollywood Dreams (Cherry Lane Theater);The View Upstairs (Lynn Redgrave Theater); The Mother of Invention (Abingdon Theatre Company); and Taylor Mac’s epic A 24– Decade History of Popular Music (St. Ann’s Warehouse).  Later this year, they will be joined by Ayad Akhtar’s Junk (Lincoln Center Theater on Broadway) and Anna Ziegler’s The Last Match (Roundabout Theatre).

New York Stage and Film (Johanna Pfaelzer, Artistic Director; Thomas Pearson, Executive Director; Mark Linn-Baker, Max Mayer, Leslie Urdang, Producing Directors) is a not-for-profit company dedicated to both emerging and established artists in the development of new works for theater and film. Since 1985 New York Stage and Film has played a significant role in the development of new plays, provided a home for a diverse group of artists free from critical and commercial pressures, and established itself as a vital cultural institution for residents of the Hudson Valley and the New York metropolitan area.

Vassar College strives to make its events, performances, and facilities accessible to all. Individuals with disabilities requiring special accommodations must contact the Office of Campus Activities at least 48 hours in advance of an event, Mondays-Fridays, at (845) 437‑5370. Without sufficient notice, appropriate space/and or assistance may not be available.

For tickets and additional information visit the website.
For information about accessibility to campus facilities click here.
Click here for directions to the Vassar campus, located at 124 Raymond Avenue in Poughkeepsie, NY.

“Nobody beats The Wooster Group at the top of its game.” – New York Times

This summer, the Bard SummerScape festival presents the world premiere of a new theater production from The Wooster Group, the internationally recognized Obie and Bessie Award-winning experimental theater company. Titled A PINK CHAIR (IN PLACE OF A FAKE ANTIQUE), the new work is an homage to the late visionary Polish artist and director Tadeusz Kantor, whose daughter, Dorota Krakowska, serves as A PINK CHAIR’s dramaturge.

The piece is directed by company founding member Elizabeth LeCompte, whose string of honors includes the 2016 Dorothy & Lillian Gish Prize, a MacArthur Fellowship, and a National Endowment for the Arts Lifetime Achievement Award. A PINK CHAIR will be performed by Wooster Group company members and associates including Kate Valk, Ari Fliakos, Suzzy Roche, Jim Fletcher and Zbigniew Bzymek, in ten performances between July 13 and 23 in the LUMA Theater of the Frank Gehry-designed Fisher Center on Bard’s glorious Hudson Valley campus. As New York Arts declares: “Bard summer drama has been consistently of the highest order.”

As in previous seasons, SummerScape follows the theme of the Bard Music Festival, which this year explores “Fryderyk Chopin and His World.” Like Chopin, Tadeusz Kantor (1915–90) was one of Poland’s trailblazing visionaries. The stage director, set designer, creator of happenings, writer, and artist behind such revolutionary theatrical works as The Dead Class (1975) and Wielopole Wielopole (1980), Kantor was an iconic postwar artist whose influence continues to resonate. When productions by Kantor’s legendary company Cricot 2 traveled to New York City in the ’80s & early ’90s, they created a sensation and excited a community of auteur directors working across artistic disciplines.

Drawing inspiration from European Expressionism, Dadaism, Russian constructivism and the Bauhaus ­– as well as from American avant-garde movements such as happenings – Kantor became best-known in the West for his “Theater of Death”: a series of surrealistic works in which, in the shadow of Poland’s experience of war and totalitarianism, he sought to create what he called “a bridge between the audience and the kingdom of death.” In 1985, he explained:

“The dead are strangers who fascinate us, who invade our sphere when we least expect it. In everyday life, when we speak to one another, enter into biological contact with each other, we are hardly conscious of what man is. We reach this awareness at the sight of a corpse. There’s something eloquent about a dead man’s silence and stillness.”

He continued: “There are no heroes in my plays. I prefer to show the detritus of civilization, to express the ultimate by means of the poorest discarded objects, of people and things deprived of status and dignity. I don’t attempt to re-create a historical period, or translate so-called reality. We are never a single entity, although we’d like to think we are. I am the child I was and now this 70-year-old man. I am also the books I read and the family and friends I cannot forget. I am one and many.”

Tadeusz Kantor by Danuta B. Lomaczewska-East News

Kantor conceived of theater as a total artwork that “embraces and comprehends all modern art and its ideas, themes, and conflicts.” Indeed, describing him as “a theater conceptualist – director, playwright, painter, scenic designer and theoretician,” the New York Times concluded: “This creative interrelationship of artistic disciplines within a single individual may help explain the spellbinding impact of [his work]. … He is a sorcerer entreating us to enter his subconscious.”

The Wooster Group

Known for the creation and production of original multimedia works for theater, The Wooster Group is “one of the country’s foremost and most storied experimental theater groups” (Daily Beast). Under Elizabeth LeCompte’s direction, the New York-based company has worked, since 1975, as a consistent, full-time ensemble of performers and technical artists. According to the New York Times: “Throughout its almost 40, unceasingly fertile years of existence, this genre-bending troupe has taken theatergoers through twisting labyrinths of productions, in which reality and its representations are splintered by technology and irony.”

Director Elizabeth LeCompt courtesy NY Times

A PINK CHAIR (IN PLACE OF A FAKE ANTIQUE) was co-commissioned by Poland’s Adam Mickiewicz Institute as part of its international program celebrating the 100th anniversary of Kantor’s birth. The Wooster Group was chosen for this prestigious project because of the Group’s international reputation and the Institute’s appreciation of its work.

In A PINK CHAIR, The Wooster Group pays homage to Kantor’s work through an exploration of ecstasy, despair, and memory: themes that recur throughout his oeuvre. Weaving together live performance, music, and video with material from Kantor’s archives, the new piece takes the form of a conversation among the company, Kantor’s ghost, and his daughter, Dorota Krakowska, who is collaborating with The Wooster Group on this piece. Through her personal commentary, documentary footage of Kantor’s productions and rehearsals – focusing on his penultimate piece I Shall Never Return (1988) – and a sound score that includes the music of Chopin, The Wooster Group has created a new work that integrates Kantor’s vision with its own.

Directed and designed by: Elizabeth LeCompte
Performers: Zbigniew Bzymek, Enver Chakartash, Jim Fletcher,
Ari Fliakos, Gareth Hobbs, Erin Mullin, Suzzy Roche,
Danusia Trevino, and Kate Valk
Dramaturge: Dorota Krakowska
Set: Eric Dyer
Lighting: Jennifer Tipton and Ryan Seelig
Sound and Original Music: Eric Sluyter, Omar Zubair
Musical Director: Gareth Hobbs
Video and Projections: Robert Wuss
Additional Video: Zbigniew Bzymek
Costumes: Enver Chakartash
Assistant Director: Matthew Dipple
Stage Manager: Erin Mullin
Scene Shop: Joseph Silovsky Studios
Production Manager: Bona Lee

For full schedule, more information and for tickets go HERE

New York City Round-Trip Coach Transportation:

To make a reservation on the round-trip SummerScape coach provided exclusively to ticket holders for specific performances indicated by * in the listings above, call the box office at 845–758-7900 or select this option when purchasing tickets. The round-trip fare is $40 and reservations are required. The coach departs from behind Lincoln Center, on Amsterdam Avenue between 64th and 65th Streets. Find additional details HERE

The Department of Theatre Arts at SUNY New Paltz presents Sean O’Casey’s Shadow of a Gunman, the first in O’Casey’s “Dublin Trilogy,” examining the revolutionary politics of post-WWI Ireland and their effect on the city’s working class residents.

The new production features an all-student cast under the direction of Theatre Arts Chair Jack Wade.

In North Dublin during the Irish War of Independence (1919–1921), the streets are ablaze with guerrilla warfare between the Irish Republican Army (IRA) and the vicious auxiliary force, known as the Black and Tans, sent by the British to crush the rebellion at all costs.

In one tenement house, the young poet Donal Davoren lives among poor, hard-working Irish, Catholic and Protestant alike. In a classic case of mistaken identity, Davoren’s neighbors figure him for an IRA gunman on the run. When he realizes this revolutionary persona may be the key to the beautiful Minnie Powell’s heart, Davoren embraces the false role.

Shadow of a Gunman’s compassionate character portrayals deftly mix tragedy and comedy, as O’Casey guides Davoren through flights of fancy until a sharp twist of fate reveals the life and death consequences of his brazen impersonation.

Jacquline Evans (’19) as Minnie Powell and Zach Gibson (’19) as Donal Davoren — Photo by Jack Wade

The cast includes Zach Gibson ’19 as poet Donal Davoren, Andres Rodriguez ’18 as his peddler flat-mate Seumas Shields, and Jacqueline Evans ’19 as the enticing Minnie Powell.

About the Director

Director– Jack Wade

A theatre generalist, Jack Wade designs lighting and scenery, and directs in the College’s Mainstage Productions theatre program. His designs have been seen off-Broadway and in many regional theatres nationally and internationally. Wade is a member of United Scenic Artists, Local 829, and has been a distinguished mentor of many designers and performers who have gone on to work in the theatre, television and film industries.

Wade’s recent play, Red Masquerade, was recognized for distinguished achievement by the Kennedy Center American College Theatre Festival. He is a recipient of the Theatre Crafts International Award for Outstanding Achievement in Theatrical Design and Technology and a SUNY Chancellor’s Award for Excellence in Teaching.

Performances of Shadow of a Gunman will be given at 8 p.m. on March 2, 3, 4, 9, 10 and 11, and at 2 p.m. on March 5 and 12. All performances will take place in Parker Theatre on the New Paltz campus.

A supplemental panel discussion on “Sean O’Casey’s Dublin and the Irish War of Independence” will be held on March 3 at 6 p.m. in Parker Theatre, and will be free and open to the public. This event will be moderated by Ruan O’Donnell, professor and head of the History Department at the University of Limerick, Ireland. O’Donnell serves as director of the Irish Manuscripts Commission and as the official historian of the Robert Emmet Association, and is the editor of several scholarly anthologies.

Reserved tickets are $18 general, $16 senior (62+), SUNY New Paltz faculty/staff, non-New Paltz student, and $10 SUNY New Paltz student.

Tickets can be purchased through the online box office or in person at Parker Theatre. The Parker Box Office opens Feb. 20 with hours Monday – Friday, 11:30 a.m. – 4:30 p.m.

For additional information call (845) 257‑3880 or email boxoffice@newpaltz.edu.