RED HAT & TALES by Nick Salamone

• European Premiere
• Presented by Guy Masterson & Playwrights' Arena (USA)
• By Nick Salamone
• Performed by Nick Salamone & Elizabeth O'Connell
• Directed by John Lawrence Rivera
• NOMINTATED: THE STAGE BEST ACTOR 2003

Fringe First Winner in 1998 Nick Salamone, invites you into his stuffy, darkened closet...

to witness the workings of a claustrophobic marriage between two contemporary bisexuals. It tells the story of a man and a woman trapped by their own pasts; He, an erstwhile writer of greeting cards and she, an ex-stripper, now a television executive. After the man's identical twin dies of AIDS he gradually withdraws from his wife and society to live in the bottom of his hall closet.
His only communication with the outside world is through postcards that he writes to his family about long ago events of which he cannot quite let go. His wife gets drawn into her husbands closet as unresolved events from her own youth begin to surface.
The play examines how we can let ourselves be haunted by the past at the expense of the present and how sometimes with a little nudge we can slip free of the ghosts and into the future.

Reviews:

"Poetic and grotesque, disturbing and absurd, and very, very moving." (LA Nightlife Magazine)

"Salamone's writing is unique and intensely personal" (Backstage West LA)

"Red Hat & Tales, is Nick Salamone's latest adventure in absurdist theatre, a Samuel Beckett-inspired update for the 90's" (Frontiers Magazine LA)

"A whimsically surreal and disturbing funny absurdist comedy." (LA Times)

Biographies:

Nick Salamone: (Playwright/Performer) As a playwright, Nick's six produced plays have won numerous awards. His musical Moscow with music by Maury R. McIntyre has received the Fringe First Award and the Scotsman Audience Favourite Award and the Garland Award for Music and Lyrics. Other plays include All Souls' Day (1991 LA Weekly Award Nominee), Another House on Mercy Street (1992 LA Weekly Award), and Red Hat and Tales (1998 Maddy Award Nominee). A trilogy of his plays, All Souls' Day, Riffs & Credos and Whale Watchers (1999) were revived in 2000, for which Nick received the Maddy Award for Excellence in Playwriting. Nick's recent stage roles in Los Angeles have included Daniel in Michael Kearns' Complications, Reynolds in of Joe Pin Tauro's Bus stop Diner and Charles Nichols opposite Diana Bellamy in Dorothy Parkers' Ladies of the Corridor. He has appeared in scores of plays in LA, Off Off Broadway in NY and around the world. He has been nominated for acting awards (the Maddy and the LA Weekly Theater Critics) for performances in two of his own plays, Red Hat and Tales and All Souls Day. He is a member of the Classical Theater Lab where roles include Aufidius in Coriolanus and Mr. Harris in The Libertine. He played Sunny in his own work, Riffs & Credos directed by Jessica Kubzansky. Previously in Edinburgh he played Banquo in Shakespeare's Scottish play (twice) and Eddie in Robert Harder's Bill and Eddie again directed by Jon Rivera and Nic Arnzen's comedy WEHO. He has performed the role of a psychiatrist in Romulus Linney's 2. A selection of his New York work includes roles in the East Coast premiere of Lorca's A Shadow of Cypress, The 25th Anniversary revival of Joseph Heller's We Bombed in New Haven directed by Anthony DiPietro, The World premieres of Nightshift and A.R Gurney's The Opera Meeting and productions of Coward's Design for Living and Chekhov's The Seagull.

Elizabeth O'connell (Shelia) A Los Angeles native, Elizabeth studied drama at the University of Southern California under the direction of W. Duncan Ross. A founding member of the Open Fist Theater Company in Hollywood, her credits there include Baal, Etta Jenks, The Flight if the Earls, and The Architect and The Empress of Assyria for which she received a Drama Logue Award for Outstanding Performance. Other Southern California Theatre credits include work with the Tony-winning South Coast Repertory Company, the Mark Taper Forum, the Laguna Playhouse, and the Playwrights' Arena. British audiences will soon see her in the U.S. hospital drama Strong Medicine, produced by Whoopi Goldberg. It was while at University that Ms. O'Connell first appeared in Edinburgh, and she always thrilled to return, as a performer or audience member.

Jon Lawrence Rivera (Director) is the founding artistic director of Playwrights' Arena where he directed the following critically acclaimed productions: Paula Cizmar's Street Stories, Beechwood Drive by Steven Leigh Morris (also in Poland), Larry Fineberg's Faliure of Nerve starring Barbara Bain, Luis Alfaro's Bitter Homes and Gardens, Daniel Cariaga's Sleepwalk, Nick Salamone's All Souls Day, Straight as a Line by Luis Alfaro, Bill & Eddie by Robert Harders, The Next Step by Jean Colonomos, Atomic Quintet by Steven Leigh Morris, Suburban Anger by Christopher Meeks and Carla by Leonard Post starring Academy Award nominee Elisabeth Shue. Other directing credits include J For J by Jenny Sullivan starring John Ritter (Rubicon Theatre), Straight as a Line at Off-Broadway Primary Stages (New York Premiere). Bill & Eddie at the 2001 Edinburgh Fringe Festival (European Premiere), and all- Latino Production of Fool for Love starring Michael de Lorenzo, at the New Madrid Theatre, Dormant by Jorge Albertella at the LA Jewish Theatre, Clean by Edwin Sanchez (West Coast Premiere) at the Celebration Theatre, Lorca's Blood Wedding at the Kick theatre, The Tragic and Horrible Life of the Singing Nun by Blair Fell in Palm Springs, Southern Gothic From Virginity to Adultery by DeLaune Michel for Spoke Interludes and The Jones Boy. His productions have garnered over 70 Ovation, Garland, Drama-Logue, Maddy & LA Weekly Awards including the 1998 Fringe First Award and the 2001 Scotsman Readers Favourite Production (Music Category) for Nick Salamone & Maury McIntyre musical Moscow.