Workshops of new plays by Ruben Polendo and Adam Rapp, play reading of work by Brooke Berman and Stephen Adly Guirgis and panels featuring John Guare and Frank Wood will all be part of "Clip 2001 Light," an eight-day festival, running Jan. 14-21, presented by Rising Phoenix Repertory and hosted by MCC Theater of Manhattan.
Rising Phoenix is a young company dedicated to new plays and reinterpretations of classics, old and contemporary. MCC, of course, is the leading Off-Broadway nonprofit which gave the theatre Wit, The Grey Zone and Nixon's Nixon.
The event kicks off with a reading of In Arabia We'D All Be Kings by Stephen Adly Guirgis, on Jan. 14 at 4:30 PM. Arabia was a minor Off-Broadway success in 1999. Guirgis' Jesus Hopped the A Train recently completed a sold-out Off-Broadway limited run and is expected to remount at a different theatre in late spring. Other readings include:
The Wooden Breeks by Glen Berger, Jan. 16 at noon.
Burning by Joe Hortua, Jan. 18 at noon.
Smashing by Brooke Berman, Jan. 20th at noon.
"Clip 2001 Light" will also host two workshops. The first, Jan. 17 and 18 at 8 PM, is a new adaptation of The Mahabharata by Ruben Polendo. The mammoth work was famously transformed into a marathon theatre piece by Peter Brook. Polendo will also direct. Then, on Jan. 19 and 20 at 2:30 PM, Carolyn Cantor will direct Adam Rapp's Stone Cold Dead Serious. The prolific Rapp (brother of actor Anthony Rapp) is a graduate of the Juilliard Playwriting Program. In addition, the festival will also feature a series of panels, including an Artistic Director Panel (Jan. 14 at 7 pm), an Actor Panel (Jan. 15 at 7 PM), an Agent Panel (Jan. 19 at 6:30 PM), a Director Panel (Jan. 20 at 5 PM) and a Playwright Panel (Jan. 21 at 6pm, preceded at 3 PM by a "Photoplay" by the MCC Playwrights Coalition). Some of the artists the panels will feature are John Guare, Jim Nicola, Joan Macintosh, Frank Wood, Kathleen Chalfant, Constance Congdon, Chuck Mee, Eduardo Machado and Len Jenkin. Also offered is an Actor Master Class on Jan. 16 at 6:30 PM.
Admission to all events is free. MCC Theater is located at 120 West 28th Street. For reservations please call (212) 946-5198.
—By Robert Simonson
