University of Memphis Department of Theatre & Dance is proud to announce the next show of its 2021-2022 season: A Bright Room Called Day, a play by Tony Kushner. The show will feature a cast of actors who are safely distanced and wearing masks.

From Tony and Pulitzer award-winning playwright Tony Kushner comes an epic story that juxtaposes 1985 American socio-politics with 1933 Weimar Germany’s descent into Fascism. Before his groundbreaking Angels in America, Kushner’s first published play, A Bright Room Called Day, asked audiences to notice the cracks in American democracy by intentionally drawing parallels between events of the Reagan presidency and the immediate spiral of Germany’s only democracy into authoritarianism. Spanning a period of just over a year, the play primarily dramatizes the effect of the swift rise of the Nazi regime upon a progressive artist’s collective–forcing these friends to choose between fighting for their ideals or succumbing to inaction and isolation. The ’30s and the ’80s conflate through the single voice of a 1985 American activist who has called the past into existence to examine and identify the similarities between the two eras. A Bright Room Called Day asks its audiences to continue the political examination, to notice the cracks, and to “eat something indigestible…and listen to your nightmares.”

A Bright Room Called Day is directed by third-year MFA Directing candidate Jamie Warrow, with full design collaboration from Scenic Designer Brian J. Ruggaber, Costume Designer Ali Filipovich, Lighting Designer Corinne Fann, Projections Designer Natalina DeFusco, and Sound Designer Micki McCormick. Like the cast, the design team and all the students working on the show have been socially distant and wearing masks, keeping everyone safe while creating theatre during the pandemic.

Masks are strongly recommended.

 

CONTACT: Alice Berry (901) 678-3184 aeberry@memphis.edu

TITLE: A Bright Room Called Day, a play by Tony Kushner

VENUE: Mainstage Theatre, University of Memphis, Theatre Building, 3745 Central Ave.

RUN DATES: February 24-26 and March 3-5, 2022 TIMES OF SHOWS: 7:30 PM each evening

TICKETS: $25 for adults, $20 for senior citizens and non-U of M students, $5 for high school students; U of M students receive a complimentary ticket. www.memphis.edu/theatre/ 901-678-2576

 

DIRECTOR and PLAYWRIGHT BIOS

Jamie Warrow (Director)

Detroit native, Memphis creative. Third-year MFA Candidate in Theatre Direction, University of Memphis Degree pending, May 2022. Theatre Direction (selected): Trouble in Mind, University of Memphis; Evil Dead the Musical,313 Productions/Sweat Equity Studio at City Theatre, Detroit, Michigan; A Bright Room Called Day; Alabama Story, Detroit Mercy Theatre Co. at Marlene Boll Theater, Detroit, Michigan; Tender Napalm; Glengarry Glen Ross; The Motherfucker with the Hat; Angels in America Parts 1&2; When the Rain Stops Falling; Shining City, The Book of Liz, The Ringwald Theatre, Ferndale, Michigan. Theatre Performance (selected) Agatha, The Moors New Moon Theatre Company at Theatreworks (pending May 2022); Blanche, A Streetcar Named Desire (Detroit Wilde Award recipient for Best Female Performance); Bobbie Gould, Speed the Plow; Hannah Pitt, Angels in America Parts 1&2; Ivy, August Osage County, The Ringwald Theatre, Ferndale, Michigan. Grace Hardy, Faith Healer (Detroit Wilde Award Nominee Best Female Performance) Abreact Theatre, Detroit, Michigan; Liz, The Whale (Detroit Wilde Award Nominee Best Female Supporting Performance) Detroit Mercy Theatre Co., Detroit, Michigan.

Tony Kushner (Playwright)

Tony Kushner, born in July of 1956, is an American playwright and lyricist best known for his work on the play Angels in America. Angels in America is a two-part epic about the AIDS crisis in 1980’s New York. Tony Kushner has revised this great work multiple times to bring about the most current version in publication today. Kushner has also ventured into the world of musical theatre, writing the book and lyrics for the 2002 musical Caroline, or Change.

Tony Kushner has worked in film adaptations and screenplays as well. He has both co-authored and written his own screenplays as well as adapted is own theatrical works for the screen. He reworked his acclaimed play Angels in America as a film in 2003 for the network HBO.

Kushner has received many awards for his works such as Drama Desk, Tony Awards, the Pulitzer Prize for Drama, as well as the National Medal of Arts given by President Barack Obama.