Staged Readings

by Aly Kantor
directed by Jill Eikenberry

Again and again, best friends Jac and Amelia find themselves meeting in bathrooms, while real world tragedies and paradigm shifts assert themselves on the world outside. Vulnerability, humor, and uncensored honesty reign as they are forced to grapple with the question “Has anyone ever been safe? Are we?” ‘Occupied’ is a critical examination of the millennial generation’s relationship to safety, told through the lens of female friendship from September 11 to today. With Ella Dershowitz and Melissa Joyner.

This reading will take place at The Studio Theatre, 179 Broadway, Long Branch.

by Jack Canfora
directed by Eleanor Handley

Vienna, 1787. Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, at the height of his powers but struggling financially, meets a serious and supremely confident teenager who wants to hire him as a teacher: Ludwig Van Beethoven. This comedic drama imagines how the relationship between two of music’s towering geniuses (whom many scholars believe met in real life) might have evolved. Featuring some of the great works of each composer, as well as some brilliantly imagined ‘collaborations’, The Vienna Lessons shows how these two men, separated by temperament and age, nonetheless find in each other the unique bond only true visionaries can share.

This reading will take place at The Studio Theatre, 179 Broadway, Long Branch.

by D.W. Gregory
directed by James Glossman

When an anonymous painting of a nude woman takes first prize in her community’s inaugural art competition, its wealthy patron is horrified. She lobbies the judges for a more appropriate winner–unaware that her own secretary is the muse who inspired the offending work. But horror turns to outrage when she learns the unnamed artist is actually her mailman, who keeps losing her deliveries, and worse—-that an influential New York art critic is now on the scene, hell-bent on championing this formerly unknown ‘artist of the people’. Oscar Wilde meets the Marx Brothers in this screwball comedy about art, class, and censorship in 1950’s New England.

This reading will take place at The Studio Theatre, 179 Broadway, Long Branch.

by Lee Cataluna
Original story and additional material by Les J.N. Mau
directed by John FitzGibbon

Two American Asian men in their 60’s coincidentally meet in a Honolulu cemetery, visiting the gravesite of the mother of one and the husband of the other. They strike up a conversation that initially begins by sharing their experiences as primary caregivers. Howard is the caregiver for his father and Sam is still grieving over the loss of his husband Steven. Will their blossoming friendship lead to a possible relationship? Or — even though they both have love to give — are their best days behind them?

This reading will take place at The Studio Theatre, 179 Broadway, Long Branch.