History

The Performance Project, inaugurated in 1995 to promote a more experimental approach to acting and directing, focuses on ensemble driven, company-created new works and new interpretations of classic texts. Six full-length works, as well as many shorter pieces, have resulted: PROOF directed by Alex Roe; SENSELESS and SENSELESS: VOTE BUT DON'T MEAN IT, directed by Ralph Buckley; BETWEEN THE MYSTS, directed by Valerie Gramling and based on the Arthurian Legends of Morgan le Fey; and TITUS ANDRONICUS, directed by Jeffrey Guyton, which marked the company's classical debut. Performed in the East River Park Amphitheater, TITUS represented the return of free Shakespeare to the Amphitheater that served as the original home of Joseph Papp's New York Shakespeare Festival. KING GILGAMESH is scheduled for production in 2006. Based on the ancient epic poem and combining theatre with African and Middle Eastern music and dance, adapted and directed by Artistic Director Suzanne von Eck.

Plays that the organization has produced under The Playwrights Project include the New York City Premieres of THE SHANNON DOYLE INCIDENT by John Morrison; THE ICE FISHING PLAY by Kevin Kling; THE GEOGRAPHY OF LUCK by Marlane Meyer; a concert version of a new pop opera ODYSSEUS, music and lyrics by Clifford J. Tasner; Mikhail Bulgakov's BLACK SNOW adapted for the stage by Keith Reddin; and the World Premiere of TWO, NIKITA by Jeffrey Hatcher.