Basking in the love-glow,  we selected plays for Sheherezade and finalized our directors for the show in December.  In January we had a table reading and finalized the cast.  SHEHEREZADE 14 will run in June and features short works from Jennifer Roberts, Terry Anderson, Madeline Puccioni, Madeleine Butler, Steve Koppman,Vonn Scott Bair, and Jim Norrena.  I am really excited about the selections this year with some interesting and captivating material that will be funny and devastating, sweet and poignant.  (I'll blog about that in April). Wes Cayabyab  who has been in the last five Sheherezade's is switching to a Director's role with Amy Crumpacker who joins us for the first time. While Jason Jeremy, who used to be a regular player in Sheherezade back in the day, is returning to acting in the show.   The cast also includes Philip Goleman coming off a string of roles with Ross Valley Players - including ARMS AND THE MAN playing now, Catherine Ludtke - who is busy being amazing in Custom Made's TOP GIRLS, Leontyne Mbele-Mbong who has been garnering audience and critical raves in African American Shakespeare Co's MEDEA, which closes this weekend.  Also joining the cast are Rick Homan who composed and played music in our production of Patricia Milton's BELIEVERS in 2012,Cameron Galloway who you can see at DivaFest's DIVAS TELL ALL, and Gareth Tidball who will be here for her summer break from New York University's theatre program.

We also kicked off our collaborative writing project for what became SUPERHEROES where 8 playwrights - The Playmaker's League - wrote as many short plays as they could in 6 weeks around a facilitated central theme.   Jennifer Lynne Roberts served as Head Writer and provided weekly inspiration and sub-topics for the writers. This creative storm resulted in 114 scripts, which were narrowed down to just 29 for a hilarious marathon reading back in February.  In February we also did private readings of all of the plays for the season, finalized the Superheroes line-up (11 plays between 1 and 10 minutes each), and casting for the show.  We have Alicia Coombes and Chelsey Little directing plays by Bridgette Dutta Portman, Jennifer Lynne Roberts, Karl Shackne, Laylah Muran de Assereto (moi),  Morgan Ludlow, Patricia Milton, Rod McFadden, and Susan Jackson and live music written and performed by Kat Downs from local band Sit Kitty Sit (whose band was at SXSW this March).  We are thrilled to have performers Barrett Courtney (with his SF debut), Brian Flegel (most recently in PCSFs 24 Hour Fest, and a frequent player with Pear Avenue's reading series), Dan Wilson (of Radio Star Improv), Jenna May (recently returning to the Bay Area from Seattle), and Karen Offereins (most recently of Custom Made's THE PAIN AND THE ITCH and returning to us from last year's SHEHEREZADE 13) and actor Shelley Lynn Johnson completes the cast. I can't wait to see them take on our superheroes; their woes, predicaments, and foes.  Look for the trading cards!

We are *this* close to finishing up the casting for Stuart Bousel's EVERYBODY HERE SAYS HELLO! which will be directed by Rik Lopes and will run in rep with SUPERHEROES in July/August.  The short list is pretty impressive and exciting for this multilayered character piece.  

We recently finished casting our fall shows running in October, and also in rep, with Krista Knight's UN-HINGED and Morgan Ludlow's DROWNING KATE and will both be directed by Wesley Cayabyab.  These two shows will share some cast members and like the whole season, includes a fantastic group of actors.   UN-HINGED will feature Rick Homan, Cameron Galloway, Genevieve Purdue Smith, and Scott Cox.  

DROWNING KATE will feature Colleen Egan, Scott Cox, and Genevieve Purdue Smith.

Quinn Cayabyab and Ellen Chesnut along with our directors have been conjuring magical and amazing design concepts for all of the shows, which will feature some pretty cool things that will be dynamic and interesting to see up on stage.

We've also been taking the opportunity before we are ensconced in rehearsals to go to shows!  Associate artist Kat Kneisel is performing with the multi-talentedDiana Brown in COLLECTED STORIES for Expressions Productions.  This play about mentorship, storytelling, trust, betrayal, literary success, and loss is well worth seeing.  We are especially proud of Kat's terrific portrayal of the mentee who outgrows her mentor with heartbreaking emotional fall out.  Quinn Cayabyab, myself and friends caught the show on Sunday March 23rd and Jennifer Roberts along with Jim Norrena, Patricia Milton, and Bridgette Dutta Portman caught the show Friday March 28th.

Jason and I went to see Cutting Ball's RISK IS THIS series closer EX MACHINA on Saturday the 29th.   And various company members have theatre dates to see TOP GIRLS, MEDEA, RAT GIRL,  ARMS AND THE MAN, THE CRUCIBLE, DIVAS TELL ALL and more!  

The company is also looking forward to going to the gala in May to support Morgan Ludlow and Ryan Hayes for their Bay Area Theatre Critics Circle nominations for last summer's GORGEOUS HUSSY!

Say hi when you see us around and have a great spring!

Laylah Muran
Executive Producer
Wily West Productions

What most excites you about this production?

I'm incredibly excited to see how the special effects and intense physical action of the play come together -- there's so much visual theatricality in the play, and that can never fully be realized in a staged reading.  Also, it's exciting to be working with such a creative and talented cast -- right from the initial read-thru, I could see how much depth they were bringing to the characters.   

How did Hope's Last Chance start?  What was the inspiration?  And what was the process you went through to get this play finished?

I set out to write a scary 10-minute play for a Halloween showcase.  It began with a married couple hearing screams at a bed-and-breakfast in the night.   But 7 or 8 pages into it, I knew there was a lot more story opportunity than would fit in a short play, so I began to explore the history and the mystery of what happened in this haunted B&B.   Since fright and laughter are both cathartic, I wanted to have a play that was funny and scary at the same time.   The play had two staged readings during its one-year development, and the audiences responded well to the simultaneous sensations of fear and fun, sort of like on a roller coaster.   

What guidelines or principles of playwriting help you the most to finish a play?

Hope's Last Chance has two clear questions that propel the play forward:  "will Stan and Angela survive?" and "what the heck happened to cause the haunting"?   Because the answers to these questions are related, they almost act as one.  I felt my main job as playwright was keeping the characters focused on pursuit of the answer, and this helped me keep the plot tight throughout.  But I also wanted the characters to have some strong inner (sometimes secret) needs, so that they could make additional discoveries about themselves as they unravelled the larger supernatural  mystery.
 
What influenced you most as a writer?  Was it another playwright?  A teacher?  A work of art?  

For Hope's Last Chance, there was definitely some influence from Japanese horror movies, because they often have creepy little ghost children in them.  But also plays like Blithe Spirit, or  Arsenic and Old Lace, where a character like Mortimer can still make funny quips in the middle of a murderous situation.  I like that 1940's romantic comedy feel, but then layering on a more sinister element of danger, so the audience is always a little off-balance as they take it all in.
 

If you look at your body of work as a whole (so far) what do you think are themes or genres or stories you most try to write toward?  What subjects excite you the most to write about?

I guess I'm drawn strongly to the theme of personal risk and trust -- that is, characters overcoming the innate tendency to self-protect at the cost of experiencing life.  I don't consciously set out to explore this theme, but it shows up in alot of my plays.  The other theme I often explore is Secrets and Honesty  -- how characters hide and/or reveal themselves from others.   Sometimes this leads back to the other theme of trust, so maybe its all one.  In Hope's Last Chance, both these themes are key elements of the characters and the story. 

What do you hope audiences will take from this production?

I want audiences to leave feeling entertained and a little exhilarated.  Do I care if they're discussing any deep themes or truths that the play inspired?   There are a few philosophical messages in the play, so it's a bonus if the audience thinks they're worth discussing.  But it's essential that they leave thinking they had a great time.  

ROD MCFADDEN (PLAYWRIGHT) Rod has received awards in national playwriting competitions for his plays, Love Birds, Counting on Love, and Getting the Message, and was chosen as the People’s Choice award at the 2012 inspiraTO Festival in Toronto.  After receiving his BA in English literature and Playwrighting from UCLA in 1982, Rod McFadden embarked on a tragically successful career as a retail executive which lasted 26 years.   But in 2009, Rod McFadden returned to writing plays full-time.  In addition to successful productions at theatres around the country,  Rod’s plays have been well-received by Bay Area audiences of Broadway West, The Playwrights Center of SF, Wily West Productions, The Eugene O’Neill Foundation, Fringe of Marin, the Masquers, and PlayGround SF. Hope’s Last Chance is Rod’s second full-length play, and he is thrilled to be working with the talented people of Wily West Productions.