Join us this Spring for new works by two extraordinary contemporary writers with top Bay Area actors and directors!

The Spring 2013 Series features seemingly traditional families placed under trying and unusual circumstances. JC Lee's Forgetting explores what happens when a son who has been missing for years returns home from war, and Nikole Beckwith's Imagine my Sadness is a darkly humorous take on how a quirky family deals with death.

You can read more about the series on BroadwayWorld.com here.

Readings are always 100% FREE.
Donate $20 ahead of time to the Series, and save yourself a seat and a drink!

To RSVP email rsvp@playwrightsfoundation.org or call 415.626.2176.

Getting to the Shows - Stanford (4/22 & 5/13)

Getting to the Shows - San Francisco (4/23 & 5/14)

JC Lee's Forgetting
Directed by Susannah Martin

Featuring: Adrian Anchondo, Carolyn Doyle*, Gary Martinez*, Marissa Keltie*, and Maro Guevara (*= AEA members)

• Monday, April 22, 7:30pm at Roble Hall, Stanford University
  
• Tuesday, April 23, 7pm. NOHspace, San Francisco
  

About the Play
The cellular makeup of our bodies regenerates constantly. What remains of our former selves? When Matthew unexpectedly returns home from war after six years, his face injured and bandaged, there are countless questions his family is forced to grapple with. But perhaps his mother Cynthia wrestles with the greatest question of all: is this actually her son? How can she trust Matthew if she can't trust her own memories?

About the Playwright
JC is a NNPN Playwright in Residence at the Marin Theatre Company and a recent writing fellow at The Playwrights Realm. For several years he was the Founding Artistic Director of the Omicron Theatre Project and a member of the Theatre Faculty at the Lehigh Valley Charter High School for the Performing Arts. JC's plays have been seen/staged/developed throughout the United States including South Coast Repertory, American Conservatory Theatre, The Magic Theatre, The Williamstown Theatre Festival, the Bay Area Playwrights Festival, Wordsmyth Theatre, Sleepwalkers Theatre, Crowded Fire Theatre Company, Azuka Theatre Company, Aurora Theatre Company and many others. He's currently under commisson from South Coast Repertory and is a recent graduate of the Lila Acheson Wallace American Playwrights Program at The Juilliard School.

Nikole Beckwith's Imagine My Sadness
Directed by Marilee Talkington

Featuring: JoAnne Winter*, Bernard Vash, Megan Trout, Sean Garahan, Carl Holvick-Thomas, Elena Wright* (*= AEA members)

• Monday, May 13, 7:30pm at Roble Hall, Stanford University
  
• Tuesday, May 14, 7pm. NOHspace, San Francisco
  

About the Play
According to Sally’s family the five stages of grief are: Denial, Depression for Dummies, Social Ineptitude, Beekeeping, and Slaying Cyborgs. Not necessarily in that order. But when your deviant son shoots up a Taco Bell and dies in the process, how do you cope with his death when no one is sorry for your loss? Beckwith concocts a quirky, darkly comic story that reevaluates the very definition of tragedy.

About the Playwright
Nikole Beckwith’s plays have been read and performed with Ensemble Studio Theater, LAByrinth Theater Company, The Rattlestick Playwrights Theater, Barrow Street Theater, 3LD, The Flea, Lesser America and the Old Vic in London. She is an alum of EST's Youngblood, a former associate artist of Atlantic Center for the Arts and a 2010/2011 member of The Public Theater’s Emerging Writers Group. Her first play Everything is Ours was a finalist for the 2011 National Playwrights Conference and was part of Chautauqua Theater Company's New Play Workshop 2012 Signature Staged Reading Series, directed by Adrienne Campbell-Holt. Her newest play Stockholm, Pennsylvania recently finished a SuperLab with Playwrights Horizons & Clubbed Thumb Directed by Jo Bonney, and her screenplay adaptation of the script garnered her a 2012 Nicholl Fellowship in Screenwriting, awarded by The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences and made the 2012 Black List of best (as of yet) unproduced screenplays. She started off 2013 as the first non-UK playwright to be given a writing attachment at The National Theatre Studio in London, where she is developing new work.

As an actor, Beckwith has developed new work with Gregory S. Moss and Eric Bogosian among others. She made her New York stage debut in Joshua Conkel's hit play MilkMilkLemonade to critical acclaim, has appeared on the NYC rite of passage known as Law & Order and performs most Saturdays with The Story Pirates, a kids literacy and arts organization where she is an actor, director and teaching artist.

Her comic strip companion piece to The Civilians' You Better Sit Down: Tales From Our Parents' Divorce can be viewed on the WNYC culture page, her other comics have been seen on The Huffington Post, The Hairpin and various other outposts on the Internet.

She is from Newburyport, Massachusetts.

Directions to Stanford University
Map of Stanford University Campus

Stanford University Venue
Roble Hall Theater, Roble Hall Complex, Stanford University

PUBLIC TRANSPORTATION
Caltrain operates between San Francisco and Stanford. A free public shuttle called the Marguerite runs between the Stanford train station and the campus. You can take either the A or B line and exit on the appropriate mall (consult the campus map).

DRIVING DIRECTIONS
From San Francisco: Take 280 South to Alpine Road exit (35 - 40 minutes in normal traffic). Turn left off exit ramp. Make a right turn onto Junipero Serra Boulevard. Make a Left at Campus Drive West. Make a right on St. Teresa Street. Parking Lot 31 will be on your right side; please park in that lot. Roble Hall is on the south side of Parking Lot 31. Look for the Roble Hall Theater upon entering.

From East Bay: Take 880 South to 84 West, Dumbarton Bridge. Once across the bridge, take your first left onto University and follow to 101 South. Take 101 South and take the Oregon Expressway Exit. Stay straight when you exit (though the road curves a little bit to the right.) You will drive for a little while, and after you cross El Camino Real, the road turns into Page Mill Rd – stay straight. Take a right on Junipero Serra Boulevard. Then RIGHT at the THIRD stoplight. This is Campus Drive West. Make a right on St. Teresa Street. Parking Lot 31 will be on your right side; please park in that lot. Roble Hall is on the south side of Parking Lot 31. Look for the Roble Hall Theater upon entering.

Directions to San Francisco Reading Venues

Theatre of Yugen (1/15 & 3/12)
NOHspace Theater, 2840 Mariposa Street (@ Alabama Street), San Francisco

The A.C.T. Costume Shop (2/12)
The A.C.T. Costume Shop, 1117 Market Street (@ 7th Street), San Francisco

Read about past Rough Readings in our Rough Readings Archive