Archived entries for Tara Karsian

Review: “God’s Ear”

LA Weekly

“God’s Ear”

God's Ear - publicity photo

Pictured: Jeremy Shranko, Amanda Saunders,Alana Dietze, and Tara Karsian

GO! “He’s in a coma, hooked to a respirator.” With these simple words, Mel (Amanda Saunders) informs her husband, Ted (Paul Caramagno), via telephone, about their brain-dead son, a victim of an accidental drowning. It is one of the rare instances in Jenny Schwartz’s eccentric drama where words and meaning coalesce into sensibility. For the remainder of the play, Mel and Ted become immersed in the seductive discord of a surreal world where language is increasingly divorced from context and reality, time and place contract, and the weight of loss is, literally, spoken out of existence. It’s a bizarre mise-en-scene, compounded by the appearance of a tooth fairy (Tara Karsian), a transvestite flight attendant (Jeremy Shranko) and a curvaceous b-girl (Andrea Grano). With a nod to the absurdist canon, and perhaps Lewis Carroll, Schwartz’s use of clichés, idiom and chatter is at times brilliant and funny, though the verbal effusion obscures the searing emotional and psychological pain at the heart of the piece. There is an appropriately other-worldly resonance about director Rory Kozoll’s staging, nicely accented by Kristie Roldan’s lighting. Zephyr Theatre, 7456 Melrose Ave., Hlywd.; Fri.-Sat., 8 p.m.; Sun., 7 p.m., through Feb. 19. (877) 369-9112.

(Lovell Estell III)

Announcing: “God’s Ear” Begins Performances January 12, 2012

PERFORMANCES SET TO BEGIN JANUARY 12
ECHO THEATER COMPANY’S LA PREMIERE OF
GOD’S EAR
BY JENNY SCHWARTZ
DIRECTED BY RORY KOZOLL

OPENS JANUARY 14 AT THE ZEPHYR THEATRE

God's Ear posterThe Los Angeles premiere of God’s Ear, a play by Jenny Schwartz, directed by Rory Kozoll, is set to begin preview performances on January 12 at the Zephyr Theatre. The Echo Theater Company’s production of God’s Ear will play an additional preview performance on January 13, and will open on Saturday, January 14 at 8:00pm. The engagement runs through Sunday, February 19.

In God’s Ear, a couple suffers a tragic accident, and their grief propels them into a fantastical world where the Tooth Fairy sings, their flight attendant is a cross dresser, and GI Joe offers family counseling. It’s a lyrically absurd journey of love, loss, and laughter. Playwright Jenny Schwartz is a New York-based playwright and a graduate of Juilliard, where she received a fellowship in the Lila Acheson Wallace Playwrighting Program. God’s Ear premiered at New Georges in 2007, was subsequently produced by the Vineyard Theatre in 2008, and was a finalist for the 2007 Susan Smith Blackburn Award.

The cast will feature (in alphabetical order) Troy Blendell, Paul Caramagno, Alana Dietze, Andrea Grano, Tara Karsian, Amanda Saunders, Jeremy Shranko, and Jarrett Worley. The design team includes set by Melissa Ficociello, lighting by Kristie Roldan, costumes by Jordan Bass, and sound by Drew Dalzell. Music direction is by Alex Mackyol, and Leia Crawford is the production stage manager. God’s Ear is produced for the Echo Theater Company by Lauren Bass and Chris Fields.

The multiple award-winning Echo Theater Company has presented 47 Los Angeles premiere productions, 37 world premieres, and 22 commissions. These productions introduced Los Angeles to the work of David Lindsay-Abaire, Sarah Ruhl, Adam Rapp, Adam Bock, Cusi Cram, Gary Sunshine, Ron Fitzgerald, Tanya Barfield, and Mike Batistick, among many others. Most recently, the Echo was nominated for three Ovation Awards including Best Ensemble and Best Play for its West Coast premiere of Mark Schultz’s Everything Will Be Different. The company also received seven LA Weekly Award nominations for its world premiere production of Matt Benjamin and Logan Brown’s Wirehead. The West Coast premiere of Jessica Goldberg’s Body Politic garnered Ovation nominations for Best Play and Best Ensemble. The Echo also engages in community outreach programs including a free public reading series, ActOut, an educational outreach program dedicated to helping at-risk youth, and PlayTime, an outreach program in which Echo members perform fairy tales, nursery rhymes and theater pieces for sick children of all ages in a number of facilities and hospitals in Los Angeles.

Performances are Fridays and Saturdays at 8:00pm and Sundays at 7:00pm. Tickets are $25 and may be purchased by visiting www.echotheatercompany.com or by calling (877) 369-9112. The Zephyr Theatre is located at 7456 Melrose Avenue in Los Angeles, 90046. Street parking is available.

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01-03-12

Announcing: “The Interlopers” 7/21 Performance Canceled, Monday 7/18 Performance Added

THE INTERLOPERS AT BOOTLEG THEATER
WRITTEN BY GARY LENNON, DIRECTED BY JIM FALL
THURSDAY, JULY 21 PERFORMANCE CANCELED
MONDAY, JULY 18 PERFORMANCE ADDED


The Bootleg Theater, Alicia Adams, Artistic Director, has announced a schedule change for The Interlopers, a world premiere play by Gary Lennon, directed by Jim Fall.  The performance scheduled for Thursday, July 21 has been canceled.  An additional performance has been scheduled for Monday, July 18The Interlopers runs through Saturday, July 23.

The Interlopers is a Romeo and Juliet story set in the transgender world of Los Angeles. Through the theme of identity, the play explores a group of unique misfits who call themselves family, and who are brave enough to challenge the obstacle course called life. Examining these singular and special people, the play follows them on their journeys to being their whole and authentic selves.

The cast of The Interlopers features (in alphabetical order) RD Call, Leandro Cano, Ralph Cole, Jr., Paul Elia, Tara Karsian, Diarra Kilpatrick, Clifford Morts, Trevor Peterson, and Darryl Stephens. Set design is by Jason Adams, lighting design is by Sohail Najafi, costume design is by Ann Closs-Farley, video and sound design is by Corwin Evans, and original musical composition is by Mervyn Warren. Sara Gosschalk is the stage manager, and the world premiere of The Interlopers is being produced by Jessica Hanna and Alicia Adams for Bootleg Theater.

Gary Lennon’s other plays include the critically acclaimed Blackout, Dates and Nuts, and .45, which opened in the winter of 2010 at London’s Hampstead Theater, directed by Wilson Milam. Lennon adapted both Blackout and .45 into feature films; Blackout became Drunks, starring Faye Dunaway, Diane Wiest, Amanda Plummer, and Parker Posey. .45 starred Milla Jovovich and Stephen Dorf. Lennon has also written and produced extensively for television, including on shows such as The Unusuals, The Shield, The Black Donnellys, and Justified, which was a 2010 WGA Award nominee and recently won the 2011 Peabody Award.

Jim Fall is perhaps best known as the director of the feature film Trick, starring Tori Spelling, Christian Campbell, and J.P. Pitoc. He also directed The Lizzie McGuire Movie for Walt Disney Pictures, among others. On television, Jim directed several episodes of So NoTORIous for VH1, Grosse Pointe (produced by Darren Star), and the A&E feature Wedding Wars, starring John Stamos and James Brolin. Fall just finished Holiday Engagement, an independent feature he co-wrote and directed, starring Shelley Long, Bonnie Somerville, and Jordan Bridges. He is currently in development on a feature he has written entitled Dorothy on the Rocks, which is based on the novel by Barbara Suter.

The Bootleg Theater is a 1930s warehouse and a home for Los Angeles artists who work in theater, music, dance, and film. Bootleg provides artistic support and production resources to help these artists create original and daring interdisciplinary work. Combining art forms creates work that is surprising, unexpected, exciting, and reflective of life in Los Angeles, a city where the boundaries are elastic, and not bound by tradition. Bootleg offers Los Angeles a celebration of itself.

Tickets for all performances of The Interlopers may be purchased online by visiting www.bootlegtheater.org or by calling (213) 389-3856.

The Bootleg Theater is located at 2220 Beverly Boulevard, in Los Angeles, 90057.

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07-12-11

In photo: Darryl Stephens and Trevor Peterson. PHOTO BY ASHLEY WEST LEONARD.