Wily West is going to outer space!

3/11/2015

ZERO HOUR:
The Mars Experiment

Would you leave everything behind, all the comforts of earthly life—friends, family, ice cream, sex—for the experiment? To live in isolation and the experience taped for a reality show for the people back home on Earth, so that you can be a pioneer, the first to colonize the planet Mars? These six humans did. They left their jobs. Some lost their families. They underwent physical and mental evaluations. They signed contracts. They trained. They made love for the last time. And at ZERO HOUR, they made peace with their decision. But that was six months and sixty-eight days ago.

Jennifer adds, "This is a story about human nature, our ability to survive in extreme circumstances, and what we are willing to do/not do to ensure it."

"These are being presented as a series of monologues. The show will be framed around the character of Isla, and we will hear from her family, some townspeople, and the government." Head Writer Jennifer Lynne Roberts explains.

"While Isla waits for the government to figure out what to do with her, she is isolated from the news and has no idea what a shit storm of chaos and incoherent stories are out there on the streets. But all she wants is to get back to her little sister. I SAW IT will be an "exploration of individual human lives changing in response to a magic/sci-fi element, rather than an investigation of the magic/sci-fi element itself."

DIRECTOR OF SUMMER SHOWS!

Director Ariel Craft

Wily West is thrilled to be working with Ariel Craft for our summer productions!

Ariel Craft is a Bay Area director and arts administrator, and founder of The Breadbox.

For The Breadbox, Ariel has directed Blood Wedding, ’Tis Pity She’s a Whore, Robot Hand, and Landscape of the Body. Ariel also maintains a freelance directing career and has worked frequently with the Custom Made Theatre Co., the San Francisco Girls Chorus, and the San Francisco Olympians Festival. Past directing credits, outside of The Breadbox, include Late: A Cowboy Song, Noye’s Fludde, How I Learned to Drive, Trans Figure, and True Love. Assistant direction credits include A.C.T.’s remount of Joel Grey and George C. Wolfe’s Tony-winning production of The Normal Heart by Larry Kramer and Phantom Limb Company’s 69°S., directed by Sophie Hunter, at the Brooklyn Academy of Music. Ariel holds a BFA with Honors from New York University, where she studied at the Playwrights Horizons Theater School.

In step with her personal mission to create work that ignites our human curiosities and explores rarely navigated territories, Ariel’s directorial interest is working closely with actors, designers, and writers to create mosaic productions rooted in the insights and peculiarities of the individuals involved, while crafting comprehensively complex experiences for audiences.

Coming up: The Pillowman (The Breadbox) and the world premiere of Rachel Bublitz’ Of Serpents and Sea Spray (Custom Made Theatre Co.)

Additionally for 2015 Wily West will be doing a series of staged readings but one of them will host a local playwright from Seattle! We will be presenting Scotto Moore's STAR CROSSED. We will keep you posted on all the details!

Wily West announces its 2015 Season!

Wily West will present two world premiere plays commissioned directly for the company and being written March 15-April 26. The 9 playwrights, led by Head Writer Jennifer Lynne Roberts will write two shows simultaneously. The two plays will be directed by Ariel Craft (Artistic Director of Bread Box Theatre) and presented at the Exit Theatre this summer.

Head Writer Jennifer Lynne Roberts elaborates, "Our concept is relatively simple: six, ordinary citizens have agreed to be part of the Mars Experiment: be the first to colonize Mars and be part of a reality show documenting the experience. It's taken 6 months to get to Mars. Our show picks up 68 days after landing. The plays we will be writing will explore human nature in desolation, isolation, and 'being trapped on a new planet with a finite community and no creature comforts, never to return home.'"

Director, Ariel Craft, describes the frame set for the show. “It'll be an exploration of human nature within an extraordinary circumstance, with some very specific other-worldly features.”

I SAW IT.
Did you? An anomalous event has occurred. A city in ruins. Some are saying it wasn’t an act of nature, but a creature, a shadow, a…something. Rumors run rampant, suspicions run high. The #ISawIt hashtag has gone viral. Unsubstantiated reports, conspiracy theories, panic! Does Isla have the answers everyone wants? The government thinks so. Inside an interrogation room, Isla is questioned while outside, a city tries to recover.

Wily West announced the team of writers it is working with for the 2015 season. They are: