New City Stage Company is thrilled to announce the 2007-08 season of contemporary works, after an exciting inaugural season featuring the world premiere play “Angel, a Nightmare in Two Acts” by Jo Davidsmeyer. This new season consists of three provocative plays by acclaimed and local playwright William Mastrosimone. This Rutgers M.F.A. graduate has produced a body of work that truly speaks to the local Philadelphia community in addition to modern American society. In keeping with our mission to produce works by local playwrights, we have chosen three of Mr. Mastrosimone’s most provocative plays, including a Philadelphia premiere.

This is what M.E. Comtis, founding head of the Playwriting Program at Rutgers University, has to say about William Mastrosimone:

“William Mastrosimone’s plays are audacious. This is not all they are of course, but they challenge us, sometimes to recoil in shock or at least become unsettled … his grasp of the potential of the stage is clear and masterful … he has an open-eyed and open-hearted vision of humanity.”

We are thrilled to bring this collection of intriguing theatre by one of own local contemporaries this coming season.

New City Stage Company’s 2007-08 Season of William Mastrosimone

Sunshine *Philadelphia Premiere*
Directed by Neill Hartley
September 18 - October 7, 2007
Walnut Street Theatre, Studio 5

Two lost souls come together in this compelling play from one of America's premier playwrights. Sunshine works in a peep show booth. Nelson is a paramedic. Isolated by their professions, they have lost the capacity to care for others and both desperately seek care themselves. When their paths unexpectedly cross, the emotional walls that surround them dissolve in an unexpected and powerful way. “Sunshine is gutsy, touching and true – a smoothly paced dance of suspicion and attraction.” -- The New York Times

Extremities
Directed by Bill Roudebush
January 3 – 20, 2008
Mumpuppet Theatre

An explosive melodrama about a would-be rape and a woman’s stark revenge. Alone in a rural New Jersey farmhouse, Marjorie is accosted by an intruder but manages to narrowly escape and turn the tables on him. By the time her roommates come home, she has taken the law into her own hands. This Outer Critics Circle Award-winning play deals with the pathology of rape, the inequities of the justice system, and the unlikely relationship between victim and attacker. “A white knuckle psychological thriller.” -- USA Today

The Woolgatherer
Directed by Neill Hartley
May 21 – June 1, 2008

Set in South Philadelphia, Mastrosimone’s debut work is about an unlikely couple of half-crazy loners looking for love in a world gone mad. Rose, a shy cashier prone to daydreaming, meets Cliff, a rough-edge trucker with a solitary life. These two lonely souls are drawn to each other despite their mutual fear of commitment. As the skeletons in their closets are revealed, they somehow manage to find comfort in each others’ uniqueness. “A touching duet that travels from defensiveness and distrust, parrying and deception, to real contact!” -- The New York Times

William Mastrosimone (b. 1947) made his debut with The Woolgatherer in 1981, which later won the L.A. Drama Critics Award for Best Play of 1982. His play Extremities won the New York Outer Critics Circle Award for Best Play of 1982-83, the John Gassner Award for Playwrighting, and later became a feature film of the same title (screenplay also written by him) starring Farrah Fawcett. His play NANAWATAI! opened in Bergen, Norway at Den Nationalscene, and later became a film called The Beast directed by Kevin Reynolds, which won several film festival awards. He wrote the five-hour mini-series Sinatra, which won the Golden Globe for Best Mini-Series in 1982. His most recent mini-series, Into the West, which was produced in 2005, was nominated for 9 Emmys. He has also written several screenplays, including Chico, about the life of Brazilian hero Chico Mendes, and With Honors for Warner Brothers. His other plays include A Tantalizing, Shivaree (Warner Communications Award), A Stone Carver, The Undoing, Sunshine, and Cat’s Paw. He also wrote Bang Bang You’re Dead, which was inspired by the Columbine High School shootings and can be downloaded off of the internet and performed by students for no fee. His most recent play is Sleepwalk, a story that also focuses on the traumas of modern teenage society in the United States.

Mr. Mastrosimone was born in New Jersey where he attended the Pennington School and received his M.F.A. in playwrighting from Rutgers University. He also is a recipient of the New Jersey Governor’s Walt Whitman Award for Writing and an Honorary Doctorate of Humane Letters from Rider University.

Our mission:
New City Stage Company is dedicated to presenting high quality professional theatre that engages audiences on a variety of levels; not only entertaining them but also encouraging awareness of issues relevant to the community. We draw our season from contemporary and classical works, with a special focus on including Philadelphia premieres from playwrights whose work and stories are not normally found in the region.

Our history:
New City Stage Company came onto the Philadelphia theatre scene in September of 2006 with the world premiere of “Angel, A Nightmare in Two Acts” by Jo Davidsmeyer. This controversial play depicted the life of real life Nazi War criminal Irma Grese, who worked as a guard in the S.S. at the Auschwitz concentration camps and had an illicit affair with the notorious Dr. Joseph Mengele. The playwright attended and gave two talk back nights, and the play received several reviews.

New City Stage Company is a 501(c)3 not for profit producing company that employs both union and nonunion actors, directors, and crew.

We commission and create fully mounted productions of plays that come from a variety of sources – classical works, contemporary plays, reader’s theatre, literature, film, and works-in-progress.

We start the employment process in the region first, in order to utilize many of our local artists and technicians.

We strive to bring as many Philadelphia and World premiers to the stage as possible, as well as presenting well known pieces in ways that are unexpected, unique, or nontraditional.

Our productions are accessible to many facets of the community, with a special emphasis on bringing schools and universities in contact with our work.

Press information: Ginger Dayle, 215-563-7500 or info@newcitystage.org. Ticket information: 215-563-7500 or www.newcitystage.org