Brett
Singer & Associates, LLC
Urban Stages
(Frances
Hill, Artistic Director, Sonia Kozlova, Managing Director)
Presents
The New York Premiere Of
Sheila is a successful, middle-aged Jewish businesswoman who has a
terminal illness. Until now Judaism has been her security blanket, but its
teachings are no longer providing the comfort she seeks. A charismatic black
televangelist walks off the TV screen, through Sheila's back door and into her
fragile life. The choice is his arms or the arms of her daughter. When you are
about to bite the dust, do you take a bite of the apple? Do you choose
forbidden fruit or the fruit of your loins? This sexually charged drama
addresses life's ironic twists and turns.
APOSTASY was first produced at New Jersey Rep, where Talkin' Broadway called it
"an engaging, intelligent new play" that was "rich and
multi-layered." The Asbury Park Press called the play
"provocative", going on to say that APOSTASY
is "a button-pusher that seeks to provoke a reaction at every
turn, even as it foils most attempts to predict plotlines and pigeonhole
motivations." And Upstage said, "Playwright Gino Dilorio has done an
amazing job of presenting religion with a nice blend of faith and cynicism…[APOSTASY] will keep you riveted from start
to its amazing finish."
Playwright Gino DiIorio’s new play The
Hard Way won 1st place in the BBC’s 2005 International Playwriting
Competition. The play was broadcast internationally over BBC Radio in the Fall
of 2005. His play Winterizing the Summer House was chosen as
one of the top ten plays in the 2002 Writer Digest’s national play competition,
and was produced by New Jersey Rep in 2003.
Are You the Wife of Michael Cleary? was
given its world premiere in May of 2006 at the Abymill Theatre in Fethard,
Ireland. The play is also being
produced at a number of other venues across Ireland. Centennial Casting (co-written
with Nancy Bleemer) received its world premiere at the Penguin Rep in July of
2006. Gino won a Berrilla Kerr Award
for Playwriting in 2003, and his plays have been finalists at the O’Neill
Center, the Humana Festival and New Dramatists.
Since 1983, director Frances Hill has overseen more than 600 staged
readings and workshops, plus over 75 productions of new work for the stage.
Directing credits include Jim Lehrer's Chili
Queen (Urban Stages and The Kennedy Center), John C. Picardi's Seven Rabbits on a Pole and The Sweepers (Urban Stages and Capital
Rep), and Comfort Women by
Chungmi Kim. As Artistic Director of
Urban Stages, she has moved two plays to commercial off-Broadway runs: Minor Demons and Men on the Verge of a His-Panic Breakdown,
which won an Outer Critics Circle Award.
The cast of APOSTASY includes
Susan Greenhill ("Law and Order", "Chapelle's Show", Crimes of the Heart on Broadway), Susan
Louise O'Connor (Marion Bridge at
Urban Stages, Never Swim Alone, See Bob Run,
named an "Actor to Watch" by Time Out New York), and
Harold Surratt ("The Pelican Brief", "Devil's Advocate",
and Serious Money on Broadway).
The design team will be Roman Tatarowicz
(Sets), Josh Bradford (Lighting), and David M. Lawson (Sound). Video and
Projections will be by William Cusick, who recently designed the projections
for Tom Stoppard's The Coast of Utopia at
Lincoln Center.
Urban Stages’ mission is to discover and
develop new plays by authors of diverse cultural backgrounds. Their most recent productions were the
critically acclaimed Marion Bridge
by Daniel MacIvor, Bulrusher by
Eisa Davis and Live Girls by
Victoria Stewart.
The schedule for APOSTASY will be Tuesdays through Saturdays at 8PM,
with Saturday and Sunday matinees at 2PM. Tickets will be $25.00 for previews
(March 24th through March 28th) and $40.00 beginning on
March 29th. Tickets may be purchased by calling Smarttix at
212-868-4444, or online at www.urbanstages.org.
APOSTASY
A New Play by Gino DiIorio
At Urban Stages, 259 West 30th Street (between 7th
and 8th avenues)
SCHEDULE:
Previews: Saturday 3/24 at 8pm, Sunday 3/25 at 3pm, Tuesday
3/27 at 8pm, and Wednesday 3/28 at 8pm: $25.00
Opening night scheduled for Thursday, 3/29 at 8pm; Through
Sunday, May 6th
Tuesdays through Saturdays at 8PM, Saturday and Sunday
matinees at 2PM
TICKETS: $25 before 3/29, $40 after; Call 212-868-4444, or
order online at www.urbanstages.org
# # #
311
West 43rd
Street, #1107 phone: (212)
307-7181