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Monday, October 26, 2015

PROVOCATIVE PLAY BY DONALD MARGULIES OPENS IN HACKENSACK ON NOVEMBER 6

CS_Flyer

TICKETS: $19 at the door.
Tickets online: www.theatrecompany.biz/tickets
Tickets by E-mail: ticketrequests.thecompany@gmail.com

Collected Stories was a Pulitzer Prize finalist in April 1997. It also received a Drama Desk Award nomination for Best Play, and was a finalist for the Dramatists Guild/Hull-Warriner Award for Best Play.

This highly entertaining and thought-provoking play focuses on how two friends and colleagues deal with betrayal.

IMG_1240Ruth Steiner is a university professor and acclaimed short story writer. As the story begins, she has taken on a new key student, Lisa Morrison—who will eventually become her protégée and then friend. Over the course of 6 years, under Ruth’s tutelage, Lisa grows from an insecure, clumsy, young graduate student into a confident, successful writer herself. (Right: Jennifer Robbins and Liz Zazzi)

Unfortunately, to realize her full potential Lisa must write a novel—one that will turn Ruth's world upside-down. And, then each has to deal with the moral dilemma of whether a real person's life events are suitable for another to use in their own creative process.

"The conflict between the established artist and the adulatory fan who becomes a protégé, disciple, colleague and friend—and finally threatening rival—is one of those great topics…It resurfaces in Donald Margulies's provocative new play, COLLECTED STORIES…. As always, Margulies is literate, intellectually stimulating, and able to create characters of both dramatic and human interest. And he sustains this interest through six scenes covering six years that only briefly leave Ruth's cozily messy, book-infested Greenwich Village apartment. Here two worlds clash in age-old, ecumenical dueling, led up to by great mutual emotional investment and all the more bitter for it." —NY Magazine.

Collected Stories has been produced in many places in America and Europe since 1997. It premiered on Broadway in a limited engagement production by the Manhattan Theatre Club from April 2010 through June 2010.

Please note: Adult language. No one under 16 will be permitted without an adult.

Cast/Crew:

  • Liz Zazzi*: Ruth
  • Jennifer Robbins: Sarah
    * Member of Actor’s Equity
  • Joe Curran: Production
  • Steve Greenberg: AD
  • Kathi Nubile: House
  • Lou Scarpati: Director
  • Phil Sosinsky: Production

The Company Theatre Group, Inc., was founded in the summer of 2007 by a number of like-minded actors, directors, and writers. In the beginning there was not a lot of formal organization, and they were known simply as The Company.

In May of 2008, The Company produced its first show, Chapter Two, at the Hackensack Cultural Arts Center. Then, in January of 2009, The Company became The Company Theatre Group, Inc. The organization received its non-profit status in July 2009.

By May 2012, they were producing under equity contracts.

To date, The Company Theatre Group, Inc., has produced more than 40 shows and readings in Hackensack.

Then, as now, The Company draws inspiration from the acclaimed Group Theatre.  And, like the Group Theatre, The Company Theatre Group believes in creating authentic human behavior on stage—“Life in Fiction” they call it.  Their goal always is to create a thought-provoking experience in an environment where each audience member can feel like a fly on the wall watching the lives of real people unfold and sometimes unravel right before their eyes.

The Hackensack Cultural Arts Center, owned and managed by the Hackensack Recreation and Cultural Department, hosts a variety of artistic events, including theatrical productions, poetry readings, art galas and historical reenactments. The Cultural Arts Center also produces its own programming, including comedy nights and an annual children’s show in December.