2009–10 season > Tiny Kushner > Who’s who
who’s who
Tony Kushner, Playwright
Tony Taccone, Director
Annie Smart, Scenic Design
Anita Yavich, Costume Design
Alexander V. Nichols, Lighting and Projection Design
Victor Zupanc, Sound Design
Lynne Soffer, Voice and Speech Consultant
Marcela Lorca, Movement
Kimberly Mark Webb, Stage Manager
Mina Morita, Assistant Director
Cast (in order of appearance)
Jim Lichtscheidl
Valeri Mudek
Kate Eifrig
J.C. Cutler
Tony Kushner
Playwright
Born in New York City in 1956 and raised in Lake Charles, Louisiana, Tony is best known for his two-part epic, Angels in America: A Gay Fantasia on National Themes. His other plays include A Bright Room Called Day; Homebody/Kabul; Hydriotaphia; Slavs!; Caroline, or Change, the musical for which he wrote book and lyrics, with music by composer Jeanine Tesori; and The Intelligent Homosexual’s Guide to Capitalism and Socialism with a Key to the Scriptures. Kushner has translated and adapted S.Y. Ansky’s The Dybbuk, Pierre Corneille’s The Illusion, Bertolt Brecht’s The Good Person of Sezuan and Mother Courage and Her Children and the English-language libretto for the children’s opera Brundibar by Hans Krása, for which he wrote a curtain-raiser, But The Giraffe! He wrote the screenplays for Mike Nichols’ film of Angels in America and Steven Spielberg’s Munich. His books include Brundibar, illustrations by Maurice Sendak; The Art of Maurice Sendak, 1980 to the Present; and Wrestling With Zion: Progressive Jewish-American Responses to the Israeli-Palestinian Conflict, co-edited with Alisa Solomon. Tony is the recipient of a Pulitzer Prize for Drama, an Emmy Award, two Tony Awards, three Obie Awards, an Oscar nomination, an Arts Award from the American Academy of Arts and Letters, the PEN/Laura Pels Award for a Mid-Career Playwright, a Spirit of Justice Award from the Gay and Lesbian Advocates and Defenders and a Cultural Achievement Award from The National Foundation for Jewish Culture, among many others. Caroline, or Change received the Evening Standard Award, the London Drama Critics’ Circle Award and the Olivier Award for Best Musical. In 2008, he became the first recipient of the Harold and Mimi Steinberg Distinguished Playwright Award. He is the subject of a documentary film, Wrestling with Angels: Playwright Tony Kushner, made by the Oscar-winning filmmaker Freida Lee Mock. He is working on a screenplay about Abraham Lincoln. He lives in Manhattan with his husband, Mark Harris. This is Tony’s seventh collaboration with Tony Taccone and his sixth show at Berkeley Rep.
Tony Taccone
Director
Tony is artistic director of Berkeley Rep, where he has staged more than 35 shows—including world premieres by Culture Clash, Rinde Eckert, David Edgar, Danny Hoch, Geoff Hoyle, Quincy Long and Itamar Moses. Tony made his Broadway debut with Bridge & Tunnel, which was lauded by the critics and won a Tony Award for its star, Sarah Jones. This fall he returns to Broadway to direct Carrie Fisher’s Wishful Drinking, which set box-office records at Berkeley Rep before enjoying a six-city national tour. Tony commissioned Tony Kushner’s legendary Angels in America, co-directed its world premiere at the Mark Taper Forum and has collaborated with Kushner on seven projects including Brundibar and the premiere of Tiny Kushner. In 2004, his production of Continental Divide transferred to the Barbican in London after playing the Oregon Shakespeare Festival, Berkeley Rep, La Jolla Playhouse and England’s Birmingham Rep. His many regional credits include Actors Theatre of Louisville, Arena Stage, Arizona Repertory Theatre, the Eureka Theatre, the Guthrie Theater, Hartford Stage, the Huntington Theatre Company, The Public Theater, San Jose Repertory Theatre, Seattle Repertory Theatre and Yale Repertory Theatre.
Annie Smart
Scenic Design
Annie has designed sets and costumes for the premieres of Caryl Churchill’s Fen, Ice Cream and Hot Fudge and A Mouthful of Birds. Her other London design credits include the National Theatre productions of The Father, Man Beast and Virtue, Black Snow, The Mountain Giants and Churchill’s The Skriker. Her California credits include A Doll’s House, Night and Day and The Threepenny Opera at A.C.T.; An Ideal Husband, Man and Superman, Othello, The Tempest and Private Lives at Cal Shakes; Going to St. Ives, The Importance of Being Earnest, Norah, Sheridan and Wintertime at La Jolla Playhouse; the Theater Artaud and national tour production of The History and Mystery of the Universe; and Big Love, Fêtes de la Nuit, Finn in the Underworld, Heartbreak House, Honour, In the Next Room (or the vibrator play), The Mystery of Irma Vep, Passing Strange, Suddenly Last Summer, Taking Over, To the Lighthouse, Yellowjackets and Yellowman for Berkeley Rep.
Anita Yavich
Costume Design
At Berkeley Rep, Anita’s work has been seen in Civil Sex and The Oresteia. Regionally, she worked on Miracle at Naples with The Huntington Theatre Company; Being Alive with Philadelphia Theatre Company; Henry V, a co-production of the The Acting Company and the Guthrie Theater; Our Town and Paradise Lost with the Oregon Shakespeare Festival; Peach Blossom Fan at the Walt Disney Concert Hall; and Snow in June at American Repertory Theatre. On Broadway, her work includes Anna in the Tropics, and off-Broadway, her projects include Coraline the musical, Iphigenia 2.0, Kit Marlowe, Measure for Pleasure, New Jerusalem, Orphan of Chao, Pericles, Coriolanus, Svejk, The Winter’s Tale and The Wooden Breeks. With the San Francisco Opera she worked on Arsace II, and with the Metropolitan Opera on Les Troyens and Cyrano, which also toured to La Scala and the Royal Opera House. Her other projects include Osvaldo Golijov’s Ainadamar at Tanglewood, Chanticleer’s Hildegarde: A Measure of Joy and the international tour of Steve Reich’s Three Tales. She also designed the puppets and costumes for The Sound of Music at the Salzburger Marionetten Theater. In 2006, Anita won an Obie Award for Sustained Excellence in Design.
Alexander V. Nichols
Lighting and Projection Design
Alexander’s theatre credits include the Broadway production of Carrie Fisher’s Wishful Drinking, originally presented at Berkeley Rep, and the off-Broadway productions of Marga Gomez’s Los Big Names, Rinde Eckert’s Horizon, Sarah Jones’ Bridge & Tunnel and Danny Hoch’s Taking Over. Alexander has created production designs for American Conservatory Theater, Berkeley Rep, the Mark Taper Forum, OSF, Arena Stage, The Huntington Theatre Company, La Jolla Playhouse and Seattle Repertory Theatre. His dance credits include several seasons as the resident designer for American Repertory Ballet, Hartford Ballet and Pennsylvania Ballet. Alex was the lighting designer for American Ballet Theatre at the Metropolitan Opera House and elsewhere and is the resident visual designer for Margaret Jenkins Dance Co. His designs are in the permanent repertory of Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater, Boston Ballet, Hong Kong Ballet, Hubbard Street, ODC/SF, Royal Winnipeg Ballet, San Francisco Ballet and Singapore Dance Theatre. Recent projects include the museum installation Circle of Memory, in collaboration with Eleanor Coppola, recently presented in Salzburg, Austria, and video and visual design for LIFE—A Journey Through Time with photographer Frans Lanting and composer Philip Glass recently presented at Alice Tully Hall.
Victor Zupanc
Sound Design
Victor’s more than 250 productions have taken him to the The Acting Company, BAM, The Children’s Theatre Company (where he has worked as music director and composer since 1989), the Jungle Theater, the Kennedy Center, La Jolla Playhouse, the Mixed Blood Theatre Company, The New Victory Theater, Playwrights Horizons and San Diego Repertory Theatre. Among Victor’s more than 25 productions as a sound designer, composer or musical contractor at the Guthrie Theater are Blithe Spirit, Blood Wedding, A Christmas Carol (13 productions since 1996), The Comedy of Errors, The Importance of Being Earnest, The Invention of Love, Martin Guerre, Merrily We Roll Along, The Royal Family and Sweeney Todd. He has scored two feature films, including the international release The Operator, and several documentaries for PBS, and his original compositions have been performed in Australia, Canada, China, Great Britain, Japan and New Zealand. Among his awards are the Bush Foundation and McKnight Theater Artist Fellowships and grants from the Fulbright, Jerome and Otto Bremer foundations, as well as two Los Angeles Theatre Critics Circle Awards and two Hollywood Drama-Logue Awards.
Marcela Lorca
Movement
For the Guthrie Theater, Marcela directed Blood Wedding; Caroline, or Change; Confluence; and The Secret Fall of Constance Wilde, among others. Her theater experience includes work at BAM, the Goodman Theater, Grupo del Centro, Jonathan Stone’s Dinner, Juilliard, Long Wharf Theatre, the Missouri Repertory Theatre, the Mixed Blood Theatre Company, National Opera of the Dominican Republic, New York University, OSF and Shakespeare Theatre Company. Marcela is the head of movement for the University of Minnesota/Guthrie Theater B.F.A. actor training program and she teaches in A Guthrie Experience for Actors in Training and at the Juilliard School. Among her awards are a McKnight Theater Fellowship, a McKnight Choreographic Fellowship and two Hometown Awards.
Kimberly Mark Webb
Stage Manager
Having joined Berkeley Rep in 1976, Kimberly has stage managed more than 70 productions in the ensuing decades. Other work includes many productions at American Conservatory Theater, as well as projects for Aurora Theatre Company, Center Theatre Group in Los Angeles, Boston’s Huntington Theatre Company, Kansas City Repertory Theatre and Theatre Three in Dallas.
cast
J.C. Cutler
J.C. has appeared in more than 25 productions at the Guthrie Theater since 1993, including A Christmas Carol (five productions), Gross Indecency: The Three Trials of Oscar Wilde, Julius Caesar, King Lear, Macbeth, The Magic Fire, Major Barbara, School for Scandal, Summer and Smoke and A View from the Bridge. During three seasons with the Children’s Theatre Company, J.C. appeared in Rembrandt Takes a Walk in both Minneapolis and Moscow. Among his many shows with the Jungle Theater are Betrayal, Dial M for Murder, Hitchcock Blonde, The Ice Fishing Play and Shining City. J.C. has also worked with Cricket Theatre, Eye of the Storm Theatre, Florida Stage, Illusion Theater, Mixed Blood Theatre Company, Park Square Theatre, The Public Theater/New York Shakespeare Festival and the Shakespeare Theatre Company in Washington, D.C. He toured with Triple Espresso around the country and to Dublin. On film, J.C. has been seen in Ishtar and North Country and on TV in Hunt for Justice and All My Children. He taught in the M.F.A. acting program at the University of Minnesota and trained at the Juilliard School and Carleton College.
Kate Eifrig
Regionally, Kate has appeared at the Guthrie Theater in 9 Parts of Desire, The Government Inspector, The Great Gatsby, His Girl Friday, Pericles and The Ugly One. She also appeared in Love, Janis at the Ordway Center, Recent Tragic Events at the Jungle Theater and Slither at Eye of the Storm Theatre. With Ten Thousand Things Theater Company, Kate appeared in Antigone, The Good Person of Szechwan, Little Shop of Horrors, Red Noses, Twelfth Night and The Winter’s Tale. Her work with Park Square Theatre includes An Experiment with an Air Pump, Saint Joan and The Waiting Room, and at the Fifty Foot Penguin Theater she acted in Escape from Happiness, Loot and Separation. She also appeared in A Bright Room Called Day and Unidentified Human Remains… at the Outward Spiral Theatre Company. Kate’s film work includes Grown Men and Twin Cities and she also appeared in the television show Let’s Bowl! Kate was named a McKnight Theater Artist Fellow 2008–2009 and City Pages awarded her the title of Best Actress in 2006.
Jim Lichtscheidl
Jim last appeared at Berkeley Rep with Theatre de la Jeune Lune in The Miser, which also toured to the Actor’s Theater of Louisville, Alley Theater and La Jolla Playhouse. He has been seen in more than 20 productions at the Guthrie Theater since 1998, including As You Like It, The Government Inspector, His Girl Friday, Merrily We Roll Along, Nickel and Dimed, Peer Gynt (with Mark Rylance), Sideman and The Two Gentlemen of Verona. Recent credits include Jacob Marley’s Christmas Carol at Park Square Theatre, Richard III with Ten Thousand Things Theater and Tartuffe with Theatre de la Jeune Lune. He has also worked with Brave New Workshop, Frank Theatre, the Jungle Theater, Theater Latté Da and Thirst Theater. Jim’s film and television work includes The Confession of Lee Harvey Oswald, Factotum, A Serious Man, Unlocking Rose Red and With or Without You. Among his awards are the 2006 Ivey Award, Best of the Fringe and City Pages’ 2005 Best Comedy for his original multimedia creation KNOCK! Jim has taught at the University of Minnesota’s B.F.A. actor training program and at the Brave New Institute.
Valeri Mudek
Valeri appeared at the Guthrie Theater in A Midsummer Night’s Dream, Tiny Kushner and The Two Gentlemen of Verona; with Hudson Valley Shakespeare in As You Like It and Richard III; with Minnesota Fringe Festival in Corleone; and with Shakespeare on the Cape in Cloud 9. Valeri holds a B.F.A. from the University of Minnesota/Guthrie Theater actor training program and performed in the program’s A Doll’s House, Lizards… and Macbeth.
The actors and stage manager employed in this production are members of Actors’ Equity Association, the Union of Professional Actors and Stage Managers in the United States.
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in-kind sponsors
Darling Flower Shop / Hotel Shattuck Plaza / Peet’s Coffee and Tea / Raymond Vineyards / Semifreddi’s / TCHO / Tomatina
season sponsors
