E2E: Polishing Shakespeare

Producing Company

Bios

Brian Dykstra (Playwright/Performer) is an actor, writer and HBO Def Poet. His plays have been presented and produced Off Broadway, in the UK, and in regional theaters across the USA. His play Clean Alternatives received its world premiere Off Broadway at 59E59 Theaters and went on to be awarded a Fringe First at the Edinburgh Festival Fringe. It has also seen productions at the Kitchen Theatre Company in Ithaca, NY and Yellow Taxi Productions (winning the New Hampshire Theatre Award for Best Original Production). Brian has become a regular at the Kitchen Theatre, with productions of his plays The Two of You, Strangerhorse, The Jesus Factor, A Play on Words, Ho!, Brian Dykstra Selling Out and most recently an encore production of Clean Alternatives. His play Hiding Behind Comets received its world premiere at Cincinnati Playhouse in the Park during its 2004 Tony Award-winning season and was awarded the National Theatre Conference Playwright Award. His first solo show, Cornered & Alone, received an extended Off Broadway run and was hailed by critics, but landed him on several watch-lists including the NRA and Rush Limbaugh. He’s currently working on a play about how white men screw up everything called Art Thieves, another play about how social media screws up relationships with a working title of Body & Pole, and two musicals, one based on The Learned Ladies with composer Ray Leslee and Crazy, Make Crazy with songwriter/composer Terry Delsing. Thanks to The Drilling Company for getting this started and to the Resident Acting Company for producing the script in hand performance that led to this production. www.briandykstra.net

Margarett Perry (Director) is an award-winning director of new plays. She has directed and developed new work Off Broadway and in regional theatres across the country as well as in Scotland and London. Her previous 59E59 productions include: Brian Dykstra’s Clean Alternatives (Fringe First Award/Edinburgh), A Play on Words and Education (also by Brian Dykstra), and Body Politic by Richard Abrons & Margarett Perry as well as the East to Edinburgh shows: Shortlist, The Golfer, Clean Alternatives, and No Parole. Margarett directed the world premiere of John Jiler’s The Rosenberg/Strange Fruit Project at New Jersey Repertory Company last spring that went on to perform at the Assembly Rooms in Edinburgh. Other recent world premieres include: the critically-acclaimed world premieres of Born in East Berlin by Rogelio Martinez and Seared by Theresa Rebeck both at San Francisco Playhouse, The House by Brian Parks (US, London & Scotland), and Banned from Baseball by Patricia O’Hara (Human Race). Margarett was the resident director at The Kitchen Theatre in Ithaca where she has directed over 25 productions including The Thanksgiving Play, Sunset Baby, The Motherfucker with the Hat, Paloma, and world premieres by Brian Parks (The House), Rob Ackerman (Call Me Waldo), Rachel Axler (Archeology), and Brian Dykstra (The Two of You, Strangerhorse). Other recent favorites include: Shrek the Musical (Connecticut Rep), Used to Was/Maybe Did (Center Theatre Group), The Revolutionists (Human Race), and A Doll’s House, Part 2 (Hudson Stage). Margarett was an artistic fellow with the Lark for years and considered it her theatrical home base. www.margarettperry.com

Kate Levy (Actor) Broadway and National Tours: Bernhardt/Hamlet, On Golden Pond (with Michael Learned and Tom Bosley), The Graduate. New York: Stalking the Bogyeman (NY Rep), The Memorandum (The Actors Co. Theater), The Return of the Prodigal and Soldier's Wife (The Mint), Halfway Home (The New Group). Regional: The Lady Hamlet (Provincetown Theater), The Niceties (Milwaukee Rep), Fingersmith (A.R.T.), Hay Fever (Florida Rep), Third and The Other Place (Hartford TheatreWorks; CT Critics Circle and St. Louis Theater Circle awards for Best Actress), Snow Falling on Cedars (Hartford Stage), Well (Denver Center), A Sleeping Country (Cincinnati Playhouse in the Park), The Goat (Arena Stage), Outrage (Portland Center Stage), On Golden Pond (Cleveland Play House), Uncle Vanya (Denver Center), Present Laughter (Pioneer), Heaven (Yale Rep), Dinner with Friends (Alliance), The Real Thing (Alley Theatre). Also: Barrow St. Theater, MTC, Roundabout, The O'Neill, Merrimack Rep, Northern Stage, Theater Under the Stars, Florida Stage, Syracuse Stage, Indiana Rep, Clarence Brown, Philadelphia Festival for New Plays, BoarsHead. Numerous Shakespeare roles at various festivals. Television: Succession, The Deuce, Younger, The Sinner, Odd Mom Out, The Affair, Elementary, all three Law & Orders, Blue Bloods, Unfortettable, A Gifted Man, Royal Pains, The Good Wife, Gossip Girl. Film: Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close. BA, Tufts University; MFA, American Conservatory Theatre.

Kate Siahaan-Rigg (Actor) is an award-winning artist & activist. Upon graduation from the Juilliard School of Drama, she immediately hit the New York comedy clubs, poetry spaces, and downtown haunts for multi-hyphenate performers with restless hearts. She writes, performs, and produces work for television, film, stage, and dive bars around the world. She is one of only two winners of the Juilliard Interarts Award given to artists who crossed disciplines to create work across the school's divisions. Notable theater world premieres: Wilder Rediscovered (Actors Theater Louisville), Most Fabulous Story Ever Told (New York Theater Workshop), Cygnus (Women’s Project), Three Kinds of Exile (Atlantic), BFE (Playwrights Horizons), The World of Extreme Happiness (Manhattan Theater Club), Collective Rage (Wooly Mammoth), A Thousand Splendid Suns (ACT). Solo shows: Birth of a nASIAN (CTGLA, La Mama ETC/Comedy Central Theater/The Smithsonian Institute), Americasiana (MACLA/Dixon Place/The Smithsonian Institute), Happy Lucky Golden Tofu Panda Dragon Good Time Fun Fun Show (La Mama ETC/Edinburgh Fringe/indie film), Zombie Asian Moms (La Mama ETC). TV: New Amsterdam, Tales of The City, The Path, Law and Order SVU, Law and Order, Family Guy, The Dr. Phil Show (3 seasons). Film: Mile 22, Race Is the Place, That's What She Said, I see you and you see me, Family Guy Movie. Stand-up comic and rapper in stadiums and dive bars around the world. Training: Juilliard. www.katerigg.com  IG @kateriggnyc 

Twilight Theatre Company was founded by Sturgis Warner in 1998 committed to the development of new work. Some highlights include Ted LoRusso's Prelude to the First Day, Suite for Four Actors and Percussionist, Brian Dykstra’s A Play on Words (59E59) and Palestine by Najla Saïd which had a sold-out 9 week Off-Broadway run.  Now under the artistic leadership of Margarett Perry, Twilight continues its mission to support new work through readings, workshops, and productions. Last season, Twilight produced two new plays to at the Edinburgh Festival Fringe, Assembly Rooms — the world premiere of Shortlist by Brian Parks (in collaboration with Flying Bridge Theatre in Wales) and the UK premiere of John Jiler’s The Rosenberg/Strange Fruit Project which will have its New York Off Broadway premiere this summer. This season, Twilight is working with UK artists to bring their work to the US and is producing Watson: The Final Problem and Appraisal at 59E59 Theaters’ Brits Off Broadway Festival as well as bringing two world premiere’s to Edinburgh – Plotters by Brian Parks and Polishing Shakespeare by Brian Dykstra. Twilight’s mission is to develop, workshop, and produce new work and to tell stories that deepen our awareness, encourage compassion, and ignite conversation. www.twilighttheatrecompany.org

The Resident Acting Company
We believe theatre is best when created by artists experienced in working together, and allied in producing theatre as a company. Our strength lies in the power of our ensemble, and our communion with our audience. We are dedicated to a full repertory, strongly rooted in the classics, which we know reflects, enlightens, and informs our contemporary culture. We endeavor to find innovative methods to interpret these plays, re-examining and challenging traditional forms, while honoring the playwright’s original intent. We challenge conventional casting ideas about gender and age. We champion the inclusion of all ethnicities and identifications onto our stage, and into our company, and audiences. We are committed to inhabiting the heart of these great plays with truth, humor, humanity and clarity, striving always to serve the playwright, to serve our community with educational programming, and inviting our audiences, community and colleagues to think anew about themselves, and the world we live in. www.racnyc.org