Direct from its sold-out critically acclaimed 2013 world premiere in Washington, D.C., The Wild Root Company will present free readings of Topher Payne’s 2014 American Theatre Critics’ New Play Winner, a moving comedy about two gay couples living in Washington, D.C. in the 1950’s, on June 19 at Manhattan Theatre Club.
The Wild Root Company, a New York City-based production endeavor committed to cultivating new works from emerging playwrights and screenwriters, will present two free industry readings of Topher Payne’s timely new comedy PERFECT ARRANGEMENT on Thursday June 19, 2014 at 3:00 and 7:30 pm at The Creative Center at Manhattan Theatre Club. Linda Lombardi, who helmed the play’s critically acclaimed, sold-out world premiere at The Source Festival in Washington, D.C. in 2013, will direct. The Wild Root Company will produce the readings in association with Sean Hudock, Rocco Natale and Thatcher Stevens.
The cast of PERFECT ARRANGEMENT will feature Susan Louise O’Connor, who received a Theatre World Award, the Dorothy Loudon Broadway Debut Fellowship and an Outer Critics Circle Nomination for her Broadway debut in Blithe Spirit opposite Angela Lansbury, as well as members of the original Washington D.C. cast: Raven Bonniwell, Christine Callsen, Andrew Keller, Kiernan McGowan, Jill Nienhiser, Zach Brewster-Geisz.
The Creative Center at Manhattan Theatre Club is located at 311 West 43rd Street on the 8th Floor.
Industry folk who wish to reserve free seats for PERFECT ARRANGEMENT may do so by emailing wildrootcompany@gmail.com or by visiting www.WildRoot.org.
ABOUT THE WILD ROOT COMPANY
Founded by Producer Sean Hudock, The Wild Root Company is a New York City-based non-profit production endeavor and a fiscally sponsored project of Fractured Atlas, a 501 (c) (3) public charity. We’re committed to cultivating and presenting bold and challenging new works of theatre and film from emerging playwrights and screenwriters. Learn more at www.WildRoot.org.
ABOUT PLAYWRIGHT TOPHER PAYNE
Topher Payne is an artistic associate with Atlanta’s Process Theatre Company and the Flying Carpet Theatre and is the executive producer of the Atlanta 24-Hour Plays for Working Title Playwrights. His plays Swell Party and Angry Fags were both nominated for outstanding world premiere at the 2-13 Suzi Awards and the latter won the Gene-Gabriel Moore Playwriting Award. The Georgia Ensemble Theatre premiered his comedy The Only Light in Reno last January. He wrote about his life with, in his words, “humiliating candor” from 2005 to 2009 in his David Magazine column, Necessary Luxuries, which was compiled into a book of the same name. From 2010-13, he chronicled suburban life in his Domestically Disturbed column in The GA Voice, winning the 2012 National Newspaper Association award for Best Humor Column.
ABOUT DIRECTOR LINDA LOMBARDI
Linda Lombardi is Literary Manager at Arena Stage in Washington, DC, where she has provided dramaturgical support on The Velocity of Autumn,Love in Afghanistan, Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner, and Camp David. As a director/dramaturg, plays include a new adaptation of Sophocles’ Ajax;Henry IV, Part I; Henry IV, Part II; Henry V; The White Devil; Blackened Windows and, in 2013, she directed Perfect Arrangement in D.C.’s Source Festival, which became the first play in Festival history to extend. Currently, she is working on Time of the Troubles, slated for summer 2015.
