July New Theatre Benefit Benefits From New Theater

By Bill Hirschman

New Theatre has a long tradition of promoting new works; now new works return the favor as 14 playwrights donate their efforts at a July 6-8 benefit for the Miami-Dade company dubbed the Miami 1-Acts Festival.

Two different programs of short plays running 10 to 20 minutes each will be shown twice during the three days at the theater’s new home at the Roxy Performing Arts Center, 1645 SW 107th Avenue, near FIU. Fourteen directors and 35 actors are slated to participate in full but spare productions.

Program A will be presented at 8 p.m. July 6 and 5:30 p.m. July 8. Program B will be presented at 8 p.m. July 7 and 1 p.m. July 8. Therefore, it is possible to both programs on one day, July 8.

Playwrights whose works have been slated include: Robert Caisley (Winter), a semi-finalist for the Eugene O’Neill fellowship; David Caudle (In Development and Likeness) a gold medal finalist for the Pinter Review and an Ambie Award winner; James Carrey, theater artist and educator; Juan C. Sanchez (Red Tide and Property Line), two-time Carbonell nominee; Sandra Riley, founder of Crystal Parrot Players; Catherine Bush, finalist for the Steinberg ATCA Award; Ricky J. Martinez, New Theatre’s artistic director; Vanessa Garcia,  founder of the Krane Inc.; Ruth Pleva & Elly Rakowitz, co-authors; Edward G. Excaliber, FIU alumnus; Andie Arthur, South Florida Theatre League executive director; Christopher De Paola, Emmy-nominated actor; Susie Westfall, co-founder of City Theatre; and Thomas Daniel Valls, playwriting student at New York University

The directors expected to participate include: Sandra Riley; James Carrey; Ana Andreu, program director, and Charles Sothers, Theatre Arts Director at The Roxy Performing Arts Center; Ricky J. Martinez, Artistic Director, Eileen Suarez, Managing Director, Steven A. Chambers, Literary Manager and Jerry Jensen, Production Stage Manager at New Theatre; Jesus Quintero JQ Studio’s artistic director; Ozzie Quintana, Impromedy’s artistic director; Ernesto Miyares, television/film actor; FIU theater professor Stephen S. Neal; FIU student Erik Rodriguez, and Katherine Siegel, co-founder of Lost Girls.

Actors expected to perform include: Lucas Hood, Freddy McCormack, Giordan Diaz, Ashley Chang, David Solomon, Carey Hart, Erik Rodriquez, Luis E. Mora, Kent Wilson, Charlie Sothers, Sabrina Gore, Hanna Citrin, Evelyn Perez, Miguel Luciano, Laura Aleman, Jesus Quintero, Mark Duncan, Sasha Pimentel, Javier Cabrera, Francesca Toledo, Monnie King, Merry Jo Cortada, Peter King, Jennifer Lehr, Peter Mir, Andrew Rodriguez-Triana, Nicole Quintana, Orietta Caula, Jason Caceres, Perla del Mar Rodriguez, Paul Poppy, Sonia Roman, Vanessa Garcia, Andres Robledo and New Theatre’s Board Chairman Steven E. Eisenberg.

Admission to each program is $10 with a happy hour one hour before curtain time with beer selling for a donation of $2.50. For more details and advance tickets, call (305) 443-5909 or visit www.new-theatre.org.