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Actors Studio Repertory Season
The Actors Studio Drama School Repertory Season is designed to present graduating students to the public and professional world. We invite you to view professional productions of the work students have created during their three years with us. Here you will witness a series of scenes, one-act and full-length plays, some of them written by our students, and all of them directed and performed by our MFA graduates.
View the Repertory Season Playbill
Week 1: April 3–6
The Altruists by Nicky Silver
Directed by Lauren Shields
Cast: Jacquie Bonnet, Blake Brundy, Anna Medley, Justin Schulsohn, Kelechi Udenkwo
The Altruists revolves around a dedicated, if disorganized and demented, group of young radicals. These are the kids who protest. They protest arts funding and arms funding. They protest school cutbacks and AIDS cutbacks and welfare cutbacks. They march for gay rights and children’s rights and Women Against Drunk Drivers. But their morality is put to the test one day when Sydney, a shallow, anorexic soap-opera actress, fires a gun into the hulking body of her sleeping boyfriend. This dark, absurdist comedy that delves into the complexities of altruism and the motivation behind seemingly selfless acts.
The Altruists received its world premiere at the Vineyard Theatre, New York City, February 2000.
Produced by special arrangement with Broadway Licensing.
Week 2: April 10–13
Authorial Intent by Itamar Moses
Directed by P. David Hughes
Cast: Carly Cooper, Jake Malavsky
Three days after moving in together, a woman tells a man she doesn't love him anymore. Suddenly, as they deconstruct their relationship, the play itself undergoes a parallel breakdown. Leaving the characters, and the actors performing them to ask, Is there anything at all behind the artifices we use in art and in life?
Produced by special arrangement with Playscripts, Inc.
Week 3: April 17–20
Original Works: New One Act Plays
two dudes, a couple of brews, and a rusty canoe by Jake Mierva
Directed by Rabiah Rowther
Cast: Cameron Eastland, Justin Schulsohn
It's the Fourth of July on a lake in Minnesota, and two cousins, Tyler and Chase Lundgren, are preparing their annual firework show. While Chase has been looking forward to this event all year, Tyler has been dreading it. Tyler's always felt like he's needed to hide his feelings in order for his cousin to have fun, but this year's different. Tyler's going to air everything out, and tell his aggressive cousin that he wants this tradition to end.
Scripture by Grayson May
Directed by Lindsey Alterman
Cast: Parker Jenkins, Anna Medley
To save her mother, Sarah prepares an elaborate ritual, pieced together with holy words and prophetic compulsions. But the ritual is as much sacrificial as it is sacred, and when her childhood friend Michael interferes, Sarah is forced to make the choice between holiness and humanity.
Week 4: April 24–27
Exit, Pursued by a Bear by Lauren Gunderson
Directed by Zakk Ottmers
Cast: Donovan Fowler, Jesse Kinstler, Natalie Estelle Marsan, Nicole Stewart
Inspired by Shakespeare's stage direction in The Winter's Tale, Lauren Gunderson’s Exit, pursued by a bear is about Nan, who has decided to teach her abusive husband Kyle a lesson. With the help of her friend Simon (acting as her emotional -- and actual -- cheerleader) and a stripper named Sweetheart, she forces Kyle to watch as they reenact scenes from their painful past. Through this night of emotional trials and ridiculous theatrics, Nan and Kyle are both freed from their past in this smart, dark revenge comedy.
Produced by special arrangement with Playscripts, Inc.
Week 5: May 1–4
Five Times In One Night by Chiara Atik
Directed by Rabiah Rowther
Cast: Carly Cooper, Cameron Eastland
Five couples explore the delights and disappointments of their sex lives. Whether they are the first two people on Earth or the last two, modern partners with shifting needs, exes on the eve of a life-altering event or twelfth-century pen pals, following their most natural desires uncovers truths about their humanity. Altogether, Five Times in One Night is a hilarious examination of intimacy through the ages.
Five Times in One Night was developed by the Ensemble Studio Theatre/Youngblood program and received its world premiere production at the Ensemble Studio Theatre on February 14, 2015.
Week 6: May 8–11
The Laramie Project by Moisés Kaufman and the Members of Tectonic Theater Project
Directed by Lindsey Alterman
Cast: Donovan Fowler, Jesse Kinstler, Parker Jenkins, Alexa Passante, Justin Schulsohn, Nicole Stewart
25 years ago, Matthew Shepard was severely beaten and left to die in an empty field. The men who targeted him did so because he was gay. In the proceeding months, nationwide attention was cast on hate, culminating in a movement that would lead to landmark anti-hate crime legislation in America. In November of that year, the members of the Tectonic Theatre Project travelled to Laramie, Wyoming to interview the people of the town where the murder occurred. This play is a collection of those interviews, as well as other found texts, that examines the thoughts and beliefs of the community before, during, and after the crime against Matthew.
The Laramie Project
by Moisés Kaufman
and the Members of Tectonic Theater Project
The US West World Premiere produced by
The Denver Center Theatre Company
Donovan Marley, Artistic Director
in association with
Tectonic Theater Project
Moisés Kaufman, Artistic Director.
Originally produced in New York City at the Union Square Theatre
by Roy Gabay and Tectonic Theater Project
in association with Gayle Francis and the Araca Group
Associate Producers: Mara Isaacs and Hart Sharp Entertainment
The Laramie Project was developed in part with the support of
The Sundance Theatre Laboratory.