RAT Girl's Guide Press Release

[brad rothbart <scrdchao@nni.com>]

 Please forward, copy and post at your discretion.


*  Press release
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE  FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

Theatre Double is proud to announce  the opening of its new,
National-Level Reading  Series:
Underground Voices

 The series will begin  with    A Girl's Guide to the Divine Comedy,
written by Shelley Berc with newly composed original music  by Temple
University Doctoral Student Susan Burkey. To quote Bonnie Marranca
regarding the subject matter of Girl's Guide, "...In this epic poetic drama
in search of the sublime, the great theme of love is still esteemed as the
striving for virtue, and visibility remains the divine measure of earthly
things, but dante writes in a disappearing ink that challenges the Thomist
assumptions of classic wisdom, for now art and the miraculous supersede
nature and reason... " The  cast includes  Nicole Billman as THE GIRL
DANTE, Loic Barnieu as BEATRICE, and Brian Campbell as VIRGIL. The  chorus
is comprised of  Ia Ioannidou , Chetana Jois, Lisa Norton and Jim Stieber.
The reading will take place at Theatre Double Salon, 1619 Walnut Street
in Philadelphia on 1  November 1999 at 8 pm. Doors will open at 7:30.  The
reading is  for one night only.  Admission is pay-what-you-can, and the
space is wheelchair accessible.


SHELLEY BERC (author) is a playwright and novelist. Her plays include A
Girl's Guide to the Divine Comedy, Dual Heads, Burn Out, Shooting Shiva,
and Stations. Rameau's Nephew, based on Diderot and  jointly written with
director Andrei Belgrader, was performed in 1990 at CSC Rep which also
premiered their version of Scapin. The American Repertory Theatre has
produced her adaptations of Lulu and Servant of Two Masters and
commissioned her to write a new musical, Ubu Rock,  based on Alfred Jarry's
Ubu Roi. Her plays and adaptations have been performed at CSC Repertory in
New York, Yale Repertory, The American Conservatory Theatre in San
Francisco, American Repertory Theatre at Harvard, St. Louis Repertory, and
the Odyssey Theatre. In Europe, her work has been seen at the Festival
d'Avignon, Festival d'Autumn, BITEF Festival, Edinburgh Festival and the
Riverside Theatre in London. Her awards include a McKnight Playwriting
Fellowship, Rockefeller/Bellagio Fellowship, NEA Opera/Music librettist
fellowship, an Outer Critics Circle nomination for best off-Broadway play
and two Lila Wallace/Readers Digest grants to create a new musical version
of  King Stag for the American Conservatory Theatre in San Francisco.
Berc's recent novel, The Shape of Wilderness, was published in full by
Coffee House Press in 1995. The New York Times called it "a vividly
imagined parable...a strange and potent book...a fantastical world of
unusual sensuality and invention". Her plays and essays on theatre have
been published by Performing Arts Journal, Johns Hopkins Press, Yale
Theater Magazine and The Drama Review, among other publications and
presses. She has lectured on American drama, experimental playwriting and
given workshops in creative expression all over the US, Europe, and Asia.
Berc is University Playwright in Residence at the International Writing
Program of the University of Iowa where she is also Professor of Theatre.


SUSAN BURKEY (composer) (b. 1957) holds  undergraduate and master's degrees
in composition from
Cleveland State University, where she studied with Edwin London and Dennis
Eberhard. She  Is presently  working on her doctorate  at Temple
University's Esther Boyer School of Music, where she is studying with
Matthew Greenbaum and Maurice Wright. Published in Poetry Works, by Modern
Curriculum Press, Ms. Burkey's work has also been performed by the Columbus
Women's Orchestra and commissioned by Western State College of Colorado.
She is currently revising an opera for performance next year.