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STUDY GUIDE ANNIE BAKER WILL ENO ATHOL FUGARD BRANDEN JACOBS-JENKINS SUZAN-LORI PARKS 2016-17 SEASON THE ANTIPODES Annie Baker DIRECTED BY Lila Neugebauer BY TABLE OF CONTENTS Theatrical Context . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4 Interview with Annie Baker . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7 Further Discussions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 10 Cast & Creative Team . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11 Playwright Bio . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 12 Cast Bios . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 13 Creative Team Bios . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 16 Signature Spotlight Series . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 18 About Signature . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 19 THEATRICAL CONTEXT Annie Baker continues her Signature residency with the world premiere of The Antipodes, which follows the extended Signature run of John. Read excerpts from two of Baker's earlier works and the first play of her residency, as well as an interview about her writing style to learn more about the playwright behind The Antipodes. THE ALIENS (2010) EVAN: Hey. It’s Evan. How are you. Um. I’m smoking a cigarette. (pause) I’m calling because I want to know how your recital thing went and if they gave you the first part of Pachelbel’s or if you had to play the other part. I bet you were good. Either way. Um. (pause) I’m also calling because my friend died? Um. I know that sounds really dramatic but um. My friend died. I don’t know. Um. He was like a genius and like a novelist and he died of a drug overdose. He was like one of my best friends. I’m um… I’d like to come visit you in Boston. Tracee Chimo, Deirdre O’Connell, and Heidi Schreck in Circle Mirror Transformation at Playwrights Horizons. Photo by Sam Gold. He’s the only person I um… My grandparents died when I was a baby. Okay. Sorry this message is ramble-y. CIRCLE MIRROR TRANSFORMATION (2010) LAUREN: Hey. Um. This is kind of a weird – but do you ever wonder how many times your life is gonna end? Louisa Krause and Matthew Maher in The Flick. Photo by Joan Marcus. 4 A pause. SCHULTZ: Uh… I’m not sure I know what you – LAUREN: Like how many people you’re… like how many times your life is gonna totally change and then, like, start all over again? And you’ll feel like what happened before wasn’t real and what’s happening now is actually… (she trails off) GENEVIEVE: Angry to be a doll! To be a piece of plastic or glass and to be shaped into a human form and trapped! With one expression on your face! Frozen! People man-handling you. And then put in a dress. Put in an itchy little dress! LAUREN: Yeah. JENNY: Yeah. Exactly. I felt like she was mad that she was a doll and mad at me for not doing a better job making her life as a doll easier. Sometimes I couldn’t sleep at night because I could feel her thinking all these horrible thoughts about me. So I would um... oh my god I still feel bad about this...I would get up in the middle of the night and lock her in the kitchen cupboard. So I wouldn’t feel her watching me. But then the next morning she’d be even more mad cuz she’d spent all night in the cupboard! And then I’d cry and beg her for forgiveness. You too. MERTIS: And would she forgive you? SCHULTZ: Uh… I don’t know. I guess I feel like my life is pretty real. LAUREN: … Yeah. Silence. SCHULTZ: Well. Uh. It’s great seeing you. JENNY: Nope. She never forgave me. JOHN (2015) JENNY: When I was little I was always worried about my dolls. I had this one doll, um, Samantha, and I always felt like she was incredibly angry at me. GENEVIEVE: Of course she was angry. MERTIS: What do you mean, Genevieve? INTERVIEW WITH ANNIE BAKER FROM SIGNATURE STORIES ISSUE 13 How did you get started as a writer? I always wanted to be a writer. I’m not sure why; neither of my parents are writers. But it was something I wanted to do all the time the second I learned (Top to Bottom) Georgia Engel, Lois Smith, and Christopher Abbott in John. Photos by Matthew Murphy. 5 how to do it. How I came to playwriting is a bit of a mystery to me. I guess I did a lot of high school theatre and I remember being part of those after-school plays was the happiest I ever felt as a kid. But I knew it wasn’t the acting that was making me happy… in fact, the acting itself was the part I wasn’t so crazy about. It was dealing with the theatre text that gave me pleasure, and the staging of the live event. How do you generally begin writing a play? I usually start with the setting, which for me is the play’s container. The setting dictates the structure. So I think of some intricate, specific world that I want to see theatricalized, and then within days a character usually follows. What do you look for when creating your characters? You know, I don’t feel like I “look” for them… it feels like they slowly come to me through a long, contemplative process. They emerge out of research I do and conversations I have with people. It never really feels like I create them; they’re sort of already there and I have to get their voices right. Often I’m writing for a particular actor […] and that actor and their cadences and personality lead me to the character. Which is not to say the characters are ever based on the actor – in fact, I take pleasure in writing characters that are very, very different from the actors who play them. Pauses almost become like additional characters in your plays. How do you approach shaping that rhythm in your writing? I really just transcribe the dialogue I hear in my head. I don’t have some sort of rhythmic strategy or technique that I apply to the writing. What are five plays you think everyone should read or see? Everything by Chekhov and most things by Shakespeare, and then, in no particular order: A Number by Caryl Churchill; Antigone by Mac Wellman; The Big Meal by Dan LeFranc; 70 Scenes of Halloween by Jeffrey Jones; The Oresteia (okay, that’s three plays, I’m cheating) by Aeschylus. Peter Friedman, Deirdre O’Connell, Reed Birney, Tracee Chimo, and Heidi Schreck in Circle Mirror Transformation at Playwrights Horizons. Photo by Sam Gold. 6 INTERVIEW WITH THE PLAYWRIGHT Residency Five playwright Annie Baker has a way of building worlds. In her acclaimed “Vermont Plays” – Body Awareness, Circle Mirror Transformation, and The Aliens – Baker peopled the fictional town of Shirley, Vermont with academics and poets, socially-awkward teenagers and amateur actors, lovers, friends, and family. The first play of her Signature residency, 2015’s John, brought a struggling couple to an exquisitely kitschy Bed and Breakfast in Gettysburg, Pennsylvania, where the proprietor slowly revealed herself to be more mysterious than she at first seemed. Throughout these plays, Baker has found the universal in the specific, creating recognizable portraits of individuals confronting the excruciating dilemma of being human. At the same time, Baker’s work has been characterized by her inventive formal style. In plays like the 2014 Pulitzer Prize-winning The Flick or her 2012 Uncle Vanya adaptation, she has explored the ways our words so often fail us. In Baker’s plays, a yoga ball rolling across the floor or a grieving character repeating the word “ladder” 127 times can be as revelatory as a soliloquy. Annie Baker. Photo by Gregory Costanzo. Now, Baker returns to Signature with the second play of her residency, The Antipodes. Directed by Lila Neugebauer, this world premiere again creates a world remarkably – and perhaps deceptively – like our own. Before rehearsals began, she spoke with Literary Associate Nathaniel French about being a Signature resident, the role of artists in today’s America, and reading Moby Dick, Norse mythology, and books about octopi to prepare for the play. 7 This is an exciting spring at Signature, with world premieres by you, Will Eno, and Branden Jacobs-Jenkins, as well as a new production of Suzan-Lori Parks’ Venus. Do you think that this larger theatrical conversation affects the way audiences view each play individually? God, I hope so...I feel so lucky to be in the season with Will and Branden, and of course Suzan-Lori too. But yes, my sense is that Will and Branden and I all took some pretty scary risks with these new plays. And it’s really nice to know that none of the other playwrights in the building are playing it safe. Hopefully audiences will pick up on that and not get too freaked out. How has being a Signature resident influenced your writing process and your thinking about a play? It’s influenced my process a lot. I think I’ve spoken about this before, but ever since Jim [Houghton, Signature’s Founder] offered me the residency, I’ve felt a responsibility to push myself and make more adventurous, vulnerable work. No more excuses. In terms of this particular play, and with John too, I was writing a play for a particular space in the Signature Center. I requested the Linney space because I wanted to try writing a play for a thrust or alley staging. I’ve written all my other plays for a proscenium stage. So the intimacy of the Linney and the particularity of that space definitely influenced the writing of this play. I wanted to have the audience and the actors all huddled around something together. Being a Signature resident also meant I knew who my director and designers would be far ahead of time, before finishing the play even, and that added another exciting element to the process. But most of all, I’ve felt so supported and held by the Signature staff, and that support is what allows you to do things that scare you. This has been a tumultuous year in American life. Has that influenced your thinking about the role of the theatre in our national conversation? This past year and the election has made me think a lot about theatre, and my responsibilities as an artist, and, you know, the point of it all. I’ve had moments of losing all faith in what I do for a living. Eventually I realized that I don’t always have to have faith in what I’m doing, and that in fact the work itself can reflect that loss of faith. Honestly, I’m not sure theatre is part of the national conversation. Anyway, the national conversation itself has just exploded and shattered and is lying in shards everywhere so I think we’re all still figuring out what it means to be part of a national conversation in the first place. In November I felt like maybe I didn’t want to make theatre anymore. Now I want to make it more than ever. It’s hard to figure out. The play reflects some of this. Can you tell us a little about your background with Lila Neugebauer? Why was she a good fit to direct this project? I met Lila when she was twenty-two and I was twenty-six. So we’ve been friends for nine, almost ten years, which is bonkers. We met in a somewhat romantic way in San Francisco and kept in touch ever since. She directed three productions of my plays and I saw and loved all three of them. We’ve been in dialogue for years about our work, and our frustrations with/love of contemporary theatre. It was very clear from the beginning for me that I was writing this play for Lila to direct. I sort of can’t imagine anyone else on the planet directing it. I don’t want to say too much about it, but the content of it feels related to conversations we’ve been having for years, and the form of it is slippery and complicated in a way that I feel only Lila could understand and orchestrate. She’s very special. You’ve said before that a play’s setting is important to your approach to a piece. What can you tell us about working with Scenic Designer Laura Jellinek and Lila on this process? It’s been a really fun and also fairly quick and decisive process. When Laura presented us with this particular concept for 8 the set, I think it was immediately clear to the three of us that she’d hit upon the right thing. Recently the design process has become about much smaller thinglike the color and placement of an exit sign. Both of them are wildly smart and open people. I’ve always wanted to work with Laura, and between the three of us there’s a lot of history. We all know one another’s work very well. We’ve put together an amazing cast for this play. What was the casting process like? How do you work with actors in the rehearsal room? It is indeed an amazing cast. I can happily say I know all nine of them—none of them are strangers, and every single person is someone I’ve worked with before or have vowed to work with in the past. I consider them all friends. Three of them have actually been in productions of The Flick, and two of them were in a play I was developing a couple of years ago at Sundance. Lila has also worked closely with a number of them. I can’t believe how wonderful they are. I’ve also never worked with a cast this big, except for Uncle Vanya, but that, of course, felt very different. For me rehearsing is about always being present and accessible and rigorous while also giving the actors and director enough emotional space to do what they need to do. I trust all nine of these actors, and I think they’re all incredible people. You’re known as a voracious reader. What are some of the things you’ve been reading lately? This week I finally let myself stop reading stuff for the play, so I just started the second volume of Susan Sontag’s beautiful journals. But recently, and these were all related to the play: Moby Dick (which I’m still in the middle of), John Durham Peters’ The Marvelous Clouds, Donna Haraway’s Staying with Trouble: Making Kin in the Chthulucene, Snorri Sturluson’s The Prose Edda, books about medieval monsters, many books of Hindu mythology, books about octopi, Umberto Eco’s Six Walks in the Fictional Woods, and then a lot of hilarious storytelling manuals. An octopus would hopefully be able to watch and enjoy this play. If you feel confused, that’s okay. You have one more play as part of your residency. Can you tell us anything about what you might be thinking about? I think it will either be a play about being sick, or a play about monks, or maybe a play about both. But right now they’re two different plays. You seem very interested in the ways that the same stories get told over and over, across cultures and centuries. Where does that interest come from? Aren’t we all interested in that? Hm maybe not. I don’t know. I am interested in that. Or maybe actually I’m interested in the fact that they’re not actually the same stories. People say they are, but I think they’re not. I think the stories change, and they should change. Is there anything you think it would be helpful for audience members to keep in mind heading into the play? You don’t need to have any prior knowledge of anything to watch this play. Hong Chau in John. Photo by Matthew Murphy. Maria Dizzia and Michael Shannon in Annie Baker's Uncle Vanya. Photo by Julieta Cervantes. 9 FURTHER DISCUSSION • Annie Baker’s dialogue is often described as sounding extremely “real” or “natural.” Was this your experience of how her characters talk? How would you describe her writing style? • Annie Baker says her starting-out point for writing a play is choosing its setting. What did you think of the setting of The Antipodes? Why do you think she chose this setting to tell this story? • How is the idea of “time” played with in this production? • This is a play about telling stories. Did any of the stories stick out to you? Why/why not? What do you think are the elements of a good story? • How did the design elements (lighting, sound, set, costumes) help create the world of this play? • Had you ever seen a play staged in this kind of audience configuration? What was it like to have audiences on both sides of the stage? Why was this choice made? 10 CAST & CREATIVE TEAM SIGNATURE THEATRE Artistic Director Paige Evans Executive Director Erika Mallin Founder James Houghton THE ANTIPODES Written by Annie Baker Directed by Lila Neugebauer Cast Phillip James Brannon Josh Charles Josh Hamilton Danny Mastrogiorgio Danny McCarthy Emily Cass McDonnell Brian Miskell Will Patton Nicole Rodenburg Scenic Design Laura Jellinek Costume Design Kaye Voyce Lighting Design Tyler Micoleau Sound Design Bray Poor Choreographer David Neumann Production Stage Manager Laura Smith Casting Telsey + Company, William Cantler, CSA Press Boneau/ Bryan-Brown Associate Artistic Director Beth Whitaker General Manager Gilbert Medina Director of Development Glenn Alan Stiskal Director of Marketing & Audience Services David Hatkoff Director of Finance Jeffrey Bledsoe Director of Production & Facilities Paul Ziemer 11 PLAYWRIGHT BIO ANNIE BAKER PLAYWRIGHT Annie Baker’s other plays include John (Signature Theatre, Obie Award for Collaboration, Drama Desk and Lucille Lortel nominations for Best Play), The Flick (Playwrights Horizons/Barrow Street Theatre/National Theatre, Pulitzer Prize for Drama, Hull-Warriner Award, Susan Smith Blackburn Award, Obie Award for Playwriting, UK Critics Circle Award for Best New Play), Circle Mirror Transformation (Playwrights Horizons, Obie Award for Best New American Play, Drama Desk nomination for Best Play), The Aliens (Rattlestick Playwrights Theater, Obie Award for Best New American Play), Body Awareness (Atlantic Theater Company, Drama Desk and Outer Critics Circle nominations for Best Play/Emerging Playwright), and an adaptation of Chekhov’s Uncle Vanya (Soho Rep, Drama Desk nomination for Best Revival), for which she also designed the costumes. Her plays have been produced at over 200 theaters throughout the U.S. and in over a dozen countries. Other honors include a Guggenheim Fellowship, Steinberg Playwriting Award, American Academy of Arts and Letters Award, New York Drama Critics’ Circle Award, and the Cullman Fellowship at the New York Public Library. She teaches with Branden Jacobs-Jenkins and Brighde Mullins in the Playwriting MFA Program at Hunter College. Photo of Annie Baker by Gregory Costanzo. 12 CAST BIOS PHILLIP JAMES BRANNON (ADAM) Off-Broadway/Regional: Tiny Beautiful Things, ToasT (The Public Theater); Nat Turner In Jerusalem, Love and Information, Belleville (NYTW); BootyCandy (Playwrights Horizons, Obie Award); The City Of Conversation (Lincoln Center); We Are Proud To Present... (Soho Rep); A Confederacy of Dunces (The Huntington Theatre, IRNE nomination); BootyCandy (The Wilma, Woolly Mammoth); The March, The Brother/Sister Plays (Steppenwolf); As You Like It, Richard III, Macbeth, Amadeus (Chicago Shakespeare Theater); The Ballad Of Emmett Till, The Cook, Oedipus Complex (Goodman Theatre); Titus Andronicus (Court Theatre). Film: Contagion. TV: “The Plug,” “Law & Order: SVU.” B.F.A. in Acting, DePaul University. JOSH CHARLES (DAVE) Off-Broadway: The Receptionist (MTC), The Distance From Here (MCC). Regional: The Glass Menagerie (Long Wharf), A Number (ACT), The Well-Appointed Room (Steppenwolf), A Dance Lesson (Long Wharf). Television: “The Good Wife,” “Masters of Sex,” “Drunk History,” “Wet Hot American Summer,” “Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt,” “Stella,” “Inside Amy Schumer,” “In Treatment,” “Sports Night.” Film: Hairspray, Dead Poets Society, Threesome, Crossing The Bridge, Pie In The Sky, Things To Do In Denver When You’re Dead, S.W.A.T., Four Brothers, Seeing Other People, Bird People, Freeheld, I Smile Back, Whiskey Tango Foxtrot. Upcoming: Norman, The Drowning, Amateur. (all at New Group); Cider House Rules (Atlantic); The Waverly Gallery (Promenade); Women and Wallace (YPF); Film/ TV Includes: Manchester By the Sea, Take Me to the River, “Gracepoint,” Kicking and Screaming, Frances Ha, Dark Skies, Away We Go, Margaret, “Outsourced,” Diggers, The House of Yes, Alive, “Madam Secretary,” “American Horror Story: Coven,” “Louie,” Upcoming: “13 Reasons Why” on Netflix and Blaze directed by Ethan Hawke. JOSH HAMILTON (JOSH) Broadway: The Front Page, Golden Boy, Lucky Guy, Rocky The Musical, Contact, Wait Until Dark and A Steady Rain. Off-Broadway includes The Tempest (Central Park), Burning (New Group), Stunning (LCT3), The Hallway Trilogy (Rattlestick), Wintertime (Second Stage) Sailor’s Song (Labyrinth) and more. TV: Re-cur’s on “The Affair,” “Billions,” “Gotham,” and “Show Me A Hero.” Also, “Elementary,” “Prime Suspect,” “Blue Bloods,” “The Good Wife,” “White Collar,” “Person Theatre includes Evening at the Talkhouse (National Theatre), The Real Thing (Broadway); An Intervention and A Doll’s House (Williamstown); Reasons To Be Happy (MCC); Dead Accounts (Broadway); Medieval Play (Signature); The Cherry Orchard and Three Sisters (CSC); The Coast of Utopia and Suburbia (LCT); Proof (Broadway); The Bridge Project (BAM/Old Vic); A Lie of the Mind, Hurlyburly, Things We Want, This is Our Youth DANNY MASTROGIORGIO (DANNY M1) 13 CAST BIOS & Orders,” “Book of Daniel,” and more. Films include The Cobbler, God’s Pocket, The Mend, Fighting, Enchanted, Blackbird, The Producers the Musical and others. DANNY MCCARTHY (DANNY M2) Danny was last seen at Signature in the Will Eno play, The Open House, for which he and his cast mates received a Special Drama Desk Award. Additional NY credits include: Kill Floor at Lincoln Center Theater, Grace on Broadway. A veteran of the Chicago theatre, Danny is a member of A Red Orchid Theatre. He has also appeared in multiple productions at Steppenwolf, most recently in Annie Baker’s The Flick. Film / TV Credits include Stronger with Jake Gyllenhaal (2017 release), Elvis & Nixon, Killing Kennedy, “Chicago Fire,” “Elementary,” and “Blue Bloods.” EMILY CASS MCDONNELL (ELEANOR) Recent theater credits include Mercury Fur (The New Group) and collaborations with Wallace Shawn and Andre Gregory on Grasses of a Thousand Colors (The Public Theater/Royal Court) and The Master Builder. Also: Ode to the Man Who Kneels with Richard Maxwell, True West and American Sligo with Adam Rapp, and Shoppers Carried by Escalators into the Flames and Des Moines by Denis Johnson. Emily loves to be part of new work by great writers. Recent film and TV work includes Jonathan Demme’s film version of The Master Builder, Ricky and the Flash, Men Go to Battle, Mildred Pierce, Marie and Bruce, and Blackbird. Emily is also interested in dreams, Jung, shamanism, Buddhism, death, and teaching work based on these interests. Emily thanks her mom, Kim, and Annie Baker. BRIAN MISKELL (BRIAN) Off-Broadway: The Flick (Barrow Street Theatre), The Undeniable Sound of Right Now, Afghanistan Zimbabwe America Kuwait, The Hill Town Plays (Rattlestick). Other recent cred- its include The Aliens (Studio Theatre in Washington, D.C., and West Coast Premiere at San Francisco Playhouse), Eightythree Down (Horse Trade Theater Group; NY Innovative Theatre Nomination), Barn (Rising Phoenix Rep). Film: The Raft, Adventure Film, Ten-One. A company member of Rising Phoenix Rep, Brian studied at the Lee Strasberg Institute and graduated from NYU’s Tisch School of the Arts. www.brianmiskell.com WILL PATTON (SANDY) Mr. Patton was in the original productions of Sam Shepard’s Fool For Love (Obie Award) in New York and A Lie Of The Mind in New York and London. He worked with Richard Foreman in What Did He See (Obie Award) and plays by writers Len Jenkin, Don DeLillo, and Denis Johnson. Will also worked extensively with Joseph Chaikin. He has appeared in films including Remember The Titans, Armageddon, The Mothman Prophecies, 14 CAST BIOS No Way Out, Desperately Seeking Susan, The Punisher, Entrapment, Gone In 60 Seconds, Meeks Cutoff and American Honey. Will starred for five seasons in Steven Spielberg’s “Falling Skies.” NICOLE RODENBURG (SARAH) Off-Broadway: The Flick (Barrow St.) Selected Theatre: Venus in Fur, As You Like It (Alley Theatre), the world premieres of The Whale (Denver Center for the Performing Arts), Slasher (Humana Festival), and The End (Guthrie Theater); Cherie in Bus Stop (Huntington Theatre Company) directed by Nicholas Martin; You Can’t Take It With You (GeVA Theatre Center) opposite Robert Vaughn; Merchant of Venice, Taming of the Shrew, The Tempest (Great River Shakespeare Festival). TV & Film: What Children Do, “Amish Witches,” “Inside Amy Schumer,” “The Girl’s Guide to Depravity.” Education: BFA, University of Minnesota/Guthrie Theater Actor Training Program. The cast and creative team of The Antipodes. Photo by Gregory Costanzo. 15 CREATIVE TEAM BIOS LILA NEUGEBAUER (Director) At Signature: Signature Plays; A.R. Gurney’s The Wayside Motor Inn (Drama Desk Nomination); and Branden Jacobs-Jenkins’ Everybody. Recent directing: Sarah DeLappe’s The Wolves (The Playwrights Realm at The Duke, NY Stage and Film), Abe Koogler’s Kill Floor (Lincoln Center), Mike Bartlett’s An Intervention (Williamstown), Amy Herzog’s After The Revolution and 4000 Miles (Baltimore Center Stage), Zoe Kazan’s Trudy and Max in Love and Eliza Clark’s Future Thinking (South Coast Rep), Lucas Hnath’s Red Speedo (Studio Theatre), Dan LeFranc’s Troublemaker (Berkeley Rep), Partners and O Guru Guru Guru (Humana Festivals), Annie Baker’s The Aliens (SF Playhouse, Studio Theatre), Associate Director on Karen O’s Stop The Virgens (St. Ann’s Warehouse, Sydney Opera House). As co-Artistic Director of The Mad Ones, Neugebauer conceives and directs ensemble-devised work, including Miles for Mary, Samuel & Alasdair: A Personal History of the Robot War, and The Essential Straight and Narrow. Drama League alum, Soho Rep Writer/Director Lab, Lincoln Center Direc- tors Lab, Ensemble Studio Theatre member, New Georges Affiliated Artist, New York Theatre Workshop Usual Suspect, and Princess Grace Award recipient. LAURA JELLINEK (Scenic Design) New York: Everybody (Signature Theatre); The Wolves (Playwrights Realm); A Life (Playwrights Horizons); The Nether (MCC, Lortel nomination), Buzzer (The Public), Marjorie Prime (Playwrights Horizons); Small Mouth Sounds (Ars Nova, Signature Center); The Village Bike (MCC); multiple projects with The Debate Society & The Mad Ones. Regional: Bard Summerscape, Cincinnati Playhouse, Oregon Shakespeare Festival, Williamstown Theatre Festival, Southcoast Rep. Opera: Boston Lyric Opera, Opera Philadelphia, Atlanta Opera, Juilliard. Obie for Sustained Excellence in Design. Upcoming projects with Opera Theatre of St. Louis, Yale Rep, and the Roundabout. KAYE VOYCE (Costume Design) Broadway: Significant Other, The Real Thing, The Realistic Joneses, and Shining City. Recent work includes: Endgame (Long Wharf), A Funny Thing Happened... (MCC), This Day Forward (Vineyard Theatre), Revolt. She Said. Revolt Again (Soho Rep), Signature Plays, The Wayside Motor Inn (Signature Theatre), Indian Summer and Detroit (Playwrights Horizons), The Mystery of Love and Sex and 4000 Miles (Lincoln Center Theater), Il Turco in Italia (Festival d’Aix-en-Provence, Opera Dijon, Teatro Regio Torino and Teatr Wielki, Warsaw), Trisha Brown’s final two dances: Rogues and Toss, and many shows with Richard Maxwell/NYCP including The Evening Parts 1 and 2 (Walker Arts Center, Museum of Contemporary Art Buenos Aires, tour). TYLER MICOLEAU (Lighting Design) Signature Theatre: The Wayside Motor Inn, Heartless. Recent Off-Broadway: The Band’s Visit (Atlantic); Antlia Pneumatica (Drama Desk nomination), Familiar (Playwrights Horizons); The Effect (Barrow Street, Lucille Lortel and OBIE Awards). Regional: La Jolla, Actors Theatre, Arena, Huntington, Alley, Goodman, ART, Trinity Rep, Old Globe, Long Wharf, among others. 2010 OBIE for Sustained Excellence. 16 CREATIVE TEAM BIOS BRAY POOR (Sound Design) Broadway: The Glass Menagerie, The Real Thing, In the Next Room, The American Plan. Recent Off-Broadway: original music and sound for Othello at NYTW, John Leguizamo’s Latin History for Morons at The Public, Signature Theatre, Playwrights Horizons, Second Stage Theatre, Roundabout Theatre Company, and LTC. Regional work at Berkeley Rep, Yale Rep, The Old Globe (Craig Noel Nomination for The Last Match), The Long Wharf, Arena Stage, South Coast Rep, Hartford Stage, among others. Awards: Obies for Sustained Excellence and Annie Baker’s John at Signature (also Drama Desk Nomination). DAVID NEUMANN (Choreographer) Original work as artistic director of Advanced Beginner Group: P.S.122, New York Live Arts, The Kitchen, Abrons Arts Center, The Chocolate Factory, Symphony Space and The Whitney. Performer and/or choreographer: Mikhail Baryshnikov, Big Dance Theater, Doug Elkins, Doug Varone and Sally Silvers. Choreography: Hadestown (NYTW), The Total Bent (The Public Theater), An Octoroon (Soho Rep), Hagoromo with Wendy Whelan and Jock Soto (BAM), most recently directing Geoff Sobelle in The Object Lesson (NYTW). Currently professor of theatre at Sarah Lawrence College. Recipient of three New York Dance and Performance Bessie Awards, including a 2015 Bessie Award for Outstanding Production for I Understand Everything Better. Thrilled to be making his Signature Theatre debut on The Antipodes. LAURA SMITH (Production Stage Manager) Atlantic Theater: Tell Hector I Miss Him; Juilliard: Appropriate; Baltimore Center Stage: Detroit ’67; As You Like It; 4000 Miles; After the Revolution; It’s a Wonderful Life; Amadeus; Wild with Happy; Twelfth Night; Stones in His Pockets; dance of the holy ghosts; Clybourne Park; Bus Stop; An Enemy of the People; The Whipping Man; The Rivals; Cyrano; Fabulation; Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf?, Shakespeare Theater Company: Salome; CATF: World Builders; Everyman: Pygmalion, Shipwrecked, Rabbit Hole, Doubt, Gem of the Ocean, The School for Scandal, A Number, Yellowman; Woolly Mammoth: Gruesome Playground Injuries, House of Gold, The Unmentionables, Vigils, After Ashley; Folger: Measure for Measure. ED HERMAN (Assistant Stage Manager) Selected NYC credits: Porto (PSM, Bushwick Starr), One Flea Spare (PSM, Playhouse Creatures), Sojourners (ASM, Playwrights Realm), John, Particle of Dread, And I and Silence (ASM, Signature Theatre), The Lives of The Saints (ASM, Primary Stages), Too Much Sun (ASM, The Vineyard), The Happiest Song Plays Last (ASM, Second Stage), Phoebe In Winter (ASM, Clubbed Thumb), A Dream Play (SM, NAATCO), These Seven Sicknesses (Co-SM, The Flea), Nymph Errant (ASM, Prospect Theater Co). Connecticut Theatre: Hamlet (PSM, SOS); What The Butler Saw, The Liar, Loot, Tick, Tick… Boom! (ASM, WCP). MACHEL ROSS (Assistant Director) is a creative collaborator based in NYC. Recent credits include Sarah DeLappe’s The Wolves (assistant director), Riot Antigone (La MaMa E.T.C., costume designer), Hadestown (NYTW, assistant costume designer) and Purple Lights of Joppa Illinois (Atlantic Stage Company, assistant costume designer). Many thanks to Lila and Annie for all of the lessons. 17 SIGNATURE SPOTLIGHT SERIES Learn about a work’s inspiration, ask questions of its creators, and deepen your understanding of the artistic process and the role of a theatre artist at the Center and beyond. Our free Signature Spotlight Series includes: TALKBACK SERIES Learn about the process of putting on a production, what it’s like to play the characters, what goes on behind the scenes, and much more in this postshow Q&A session with the cast and creative team. (Post-show on the Linney Stage) Tuesday, April 11th Thursday, April 27th Tuesday, May 2nd Tuesday, May 9th PAGE TO STAGE Hear the full story on how artists transform an idea into a play through a moderated discussion with members of the Artistic Team. Tuesday, April 18th, 6PM PARTICIPANTS: Playwright Annie Baker and Director Lila Neugebauer BOOK CLUB Delve into the context of a Signature playwright’s work by discussing a related book or play and explore theatre’s connection to other art forms through a guided discussion with Signature’s literary staff. Thursday, June 1st, 7:30PM BOOK: The Aliens and Circle Mirror Transformation by Annie Baker The Signature Spotlight Series is sponsored by American Express. 18 ABOUT SIGNATURE Signature Theatre celebrates playwrights and gives them an artistic home. By producing multiple plays by each resident writer, Signature offers an in-depth look at their bodies of work. Founded in 1991 by James Houghton, Signature makes an extended commitment to a playwright’s body of work, and during this journey the writer is engaged in every aspect of the creative process. By championing in-depth explorations of a playwright’s body of work, Signature delivers an intimate and immersive journey into A playwright’s singular vision. Signature serves its mission through its permanent home at The Pershing Square Signature Center, a three-theatre facility on West 42nd Street designed by Frank Gehry Architects to host Signature’s three distinct playwrights’ residencies and foster a cultural community. At the Center, opened in January 2012, Signature continues its founding Playwright-in-Residence model as Residency One, a first-of-its-kind, intensive exploration of a single writer’s body of work. Residency Five, the only program of its kind, was launched at the Center to support multiple playwrights as they build bodies of work by guaranteeing each writer three productions over a five-year period. The Legacy Program, launched during Signature’s 10th Anniversary, invites writers from both residencies back for productions of premiere or earlier plays. The Pershing Square Signature Center is a major contribution to New York City’s cultural landscape and provides a venue for cultural organizations that supports and encourages collaboration among artists throughout the space. In addition to its three intimate theatres, the Center features a studio theatre, a rehearsal studio and a public café, bar and bookstore. Through the Signature Ticket Initiative: A Generation of Access, Signature has also made an unprecedented commitment to making its productions accessible by underwriting the cost of the initial run tickets, currently priced at $30, through 2031. Signature has presented entire seasons of the work of Edward Albee, Lee Blessing, Horton Foote, María Irene Fornés, Athol Fugard, John Guare, A. R. Gurney, David Henry Hwang, Bill Irwin, Adrienne Kennedy, Tony Kushner, Romulus Linney, Charles Mee, Arthur Miller, Sam Shepard, Paula Vogel, Naomi Wallace, August Wilson, Lanford Wilson and a season celebrating the historic Negro Ensemble Company. Signature’s current Residency One playwright is Suzan-Lori Parks; current Residency Five playwrights are Annie Baker, Martha Clarke, Will Eno, Katori Hall, Quiara Alegría Hudes, Branden Jacobs-Jenkins, Kenneth Lonergan and Regina Taylor. Signature was the recipient of the 2014 Regional Theatre Tony Award®, and its productions and resident writers have been recognized with the Pulitzer Prize, Lucille Lortel Awards, Obie Awards, Drama Desk Awards, AUDELCO Awards, among many other distinctions. For more information, please visit signaturetheatre.org. 19