off the WALL Productions, the professional resident acting company at Carnegie Stage, is excited to announce its 2018-19 season, featuring one World premiere, one U.S. premiere, and one Pittsburgh premiere in the Acting Company’s three-play program.
Our focus is on: Consistently excellent art
Paying a living wage to all employees
Uplifting female artists
Diversity and gender politics
New, socially relevant plays
Our commitment to diversity in theater, especially by supporting female artists, has put us on a very special list; the International Center for Women Playwrights has honored us for five consecutive years with the 50/50 Applause Award for upholding and encouraging the works of the oft-overlooked female playwright.
Season twelve of “alternative theater for grownups” includes great plays, bold choices, and talented artists, and is not to be missed.
Charles Dickens’ A Christmas Carol
World Premiere
Conceived, co-adapted and performed by Mark Coffin
Co-adapted and directed by Heidi Mueller Smith
In this adaptation of Dickens’ best-known work, with its themes of inequity and renewal just as relevant in our society today as they were in 1843, the arc of the story is experienced through the mind and heart of Ebeneezer Scrooge as he journeys from his life of isolation and greed through dream-like vistas of fear, guilt, and shame, to his ultimate new reality of compassion and human transformation. This solo piece also employs the Narrator as the second most important character, as he moves from commentary and reporting to the seamless blending into Ebenezer himself. The use of light, music, and projections to reflect emotion and environment illuminate this magical production. Storytelling at its finest. Runs Nov. 30-Dec. 15, 2018.
Mumburger by Sarah Kosar*
U.S. Premiere
Tiffany's mum is killed by a Birds Eye truck on the M25. There’s family to call and a coffin to order, but first she has to talk to her dad – and for some reason that's the toughest thing on her to-do list. Meanwhile, an oozing paper bag appears, holding a dying wish that will either bring a father and daughter together, or drive them further apart. In her surreal play about grief, parenting, and alternative
meat, Kosar asks how far we can be pushed by love and obligation. Directed by Robyne Parrish. Runs March 1-16, 2019.
*Note about Sarah Kosar:
Sarah Kosar is an internationally produced and published playwright. She is originally from Butler, Pennsylvania and has lived in London for the past nine years. She has been granted an Exceptional Promise in Playwriting visa which was endorsed by the Royal Court, Soho Theatre, The Writers Guild of Great Britain and Playwright Simon Stephens. She was the Inaugural Writer in Residence at The Archivist’s Gallery where her play Mumburger premiered in July 2016 and later transferred to the Old Red Lion for Clive Judd’s Inaugural Season as Artistic Director in July 2017. She was featured in Exeunt’s list of great female playwrights that London’s theatres should be staging.
World Builders by Johnna Adams
Pittsburgh Premiere
In Johnna Adams’ dark romantic comedy, Whitney and Max live deep within their own imagined realities – one expansive and fanciful, the other dark and brutal. To break free of these visions and become functional members of society, they embark upon a clinical drug trial that might erase these worlds forever. But are they truly able to leave their fantasies behind? In a medicated age where our imaginations are colonized by mass media, how do we know when happiness and love are real? Directed by Linda Haston. Runs May 3-18, 2019.