Breaking Ground Reading Series
Breaking Ground is the Huntington Theatre Company's reading series, a vital part of our new play development program. This series brings attention to the work of local playwrights and presents national writers into partnership with the Huntington. Over the last seven years, Breaking Ground plays have gone on to appear at the Huntington as well as theatres in Boston, across the country, and internationally. Unless otherwise noted, admission to all Breaking Ground readings is FREE and open to the public. Check back often for information on upcoming readings!
Past Breaking Ground Readings
The Disappearance of the Jews
by Lawrence Goodman
Directed by Melia Bensussen
Monday, November 21 at 7pm
Calderwood Pavilion at the BCA / South End
Still haunted by World War II, Heshie, a senile old man, sets out on a quest to keep the Holocaust from ever happening again. His first mission? Capture the neighbor he belives is Adolf Eichmann's widow. Heshie's son Martin wants to halt his father's antics, but he's also embroiled in a disastrous love affair with a gentile. As the two men struggle over the future of their religion, Lawrence Goodman's outrageous play takes a rollicking ride deep into the Jewish heart of darkness.
Featuring Will LeBow, Anne Scurria, Mark Zeisler, Jennie Israel, and Gordova Rashovich.
Lawrence Goodman is in his second year as a Huntington Playwriting Fellow. His plays include The Zionist Conspiracy, The Disappearance of the Jews, Keep Your Distance, An Evening of Highly Self-Indulgent Semi-Autobiographical Comedy, and Rain Later. His work has been performed at The Brick Playhouse in Philadelphia, the HERE Arts Center in New York, and the New York International Fringe Festival. He received the 2011 Rhode Island Fellowship Award in Play and Screenwriting. He holds an MFA in Creative Writing from Goddard College in Vermont and a BA in English from Harvard College. He lives with his wife and two sons in Providence, RI.
SHELTER
by Miranda Craigwell
Directed by M. Bevin O'Gara
Wednesday, December 14 at 7pm
254 Huntingont Avenue — Rehearsal Hall
A dark Louisiana fugue that stretches from antebellum days to post-Katrina, Shelter chronicles the stories of a handful of souls stranded in the Superdome. What future is possible if we can't make sense of the past? Lies splinter the truth for which these souls search while everywhere, the water keeps rising.
Miranda Craigwell is a writer for the stage and screen, as well as an actress. Her works include The Strongest Shape (Paines Plough Future Perfect finalist), Reply, Please (Rose Theatre in London), Requests (staged reading), and Sugar Moth. Most recently she had the great pleasure of playing "Oya" in the award-winning Brother/Sister plays produced by Company One. She attended Brown University where she graduated with a BA in literature and cultures in English, and was awarded a David Zucconi Memorial Fellowship, which allowed her to travel to London to studey Eighteenth century female letter writers and epistolary theory. While abroad, she began performing her written work in slam poetry competitions at the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art, Theatre Royal Stratford, and other venues before being named the Farrago Central London Slam Poet Champion in 2005. In 2007, Ms. Craigwell received a Master's degree with Distinction from Rose Bruford College of Drama for both acting and playwriting. She recently became a recipient of the Huntington Playwriting Fellowship (2010 — 2012). She currently serves on the founders committee of Rose Bruford College of Drama (Kent, UK) and is a writer, director, and producer for the Boston-based production company Beyond Measure Productions.