mir productions news

Heart of the Dark Deep.

2008-05-07T21:51:00.001-07:00

We at Mir Productions are proud to announce that in one week, The Mary Trilogy will be up and running at Access Theater, located at 380 Broadway in Manhattan!

Come and see the last show of the 2007-08 season! Directed by Jullianne Just and written by Adrienne Dawes, The Mary Trilogy is a collection of three short plays with classical Greek stories treated with an Americana twist.

Tickets are available at www.smarttix.com, keyword "Mary Trilogy".

...And if you happen to be an urban explorer keep your eyes peeled for our Mary Trilogy Prayer Cards. These small pieces are being placed systematically through Manhattan, Brooklyn and Queens and if you can find one, bring it to a performance for free drinks! It doesn't get much better than combining free and booze, right?

More information is available at the Mir Productions website, so check us out at www.mirproductions.org and come out to support the arts. Hype hype!

Bringing Yosef Bar-Yosef to the US, April 8-10th!

2008-03-08T13:05:00.001-08:00

Hey all, been working on this project for awhile...I'll keep you updated with more details as they come in, but we hope you'll come out and enjoy this work!

Best,

Joyce Wu
Literary Manager

Mir Productions presents

a staged reading of
Difficult People
by Yosef Bar-Yosef
Translated from Hebrew by Barbara Harshav

April 8 at Hofstra University
April 9, 7:30 PM, at Columbia University
April 10 at Yale University
TBD at Princeton University

Mir Productions is pleased to present a staged reading of Difficult People by acclaimed Israeli playwright Yosef Bar-Yosef. This reading is part of the company's Unseen/Unheard Reading Series, which aims to expose audiences to the lesser-known works of established writers from around the globe. With the support of the Consulate General of Israel's Office of Cultural Affairs in the USA, the reading will tour prestigious universities on the East Coast.

Set in an English port city, Difficult People tells the story of a devoted but controlling Jewish brother who returns from a trip to Israel with a complete stranger for his spinster sister to marry. Without her consent, he has struck a deal and forces her to go along with the fibs he's concocted about her age and his own success. Dealing with the complexities of relationships as this bizarre "blind date" goes horribly wrong, the play exposes the fragility of truth and lies and what it means to be loyal to yourself and others.

The reading will be followed by a talkback with the playwright, who will be traveling from Israel expressly for the tour.

Yosef Bar-Yosef (playwright) was born in 1933 in Jerusalem, seventh generation in Israel, to an Orthodox family. He received a Jewish Orthodox education as a child and later went on to study Jewish philosophy, Kabalah and English Literature at the Hebrew University in Jerusalem. He worked as a seaman, builder, and eventually mainly as Journalist and Literary Editor. His first play, Tura, was staged at the Cameri Theatre in Tel-Aviv in 1963. Since then eleven plays of his have been produced by the major theatres in Israel, mainly by Habima, Tel Aviv's main stage. He won the President Shazar prize for drama for his play Difficult People. In 2003, he was awarded the prestigious Israel Prize for his entire dramatic body of work.

Barbara Harshav (translator) has translated over 40 works of fiction and non-fiction from French, German, Hebrew and Yiddish into English. Issued by major academic and trade publishers, these works include Only Yesterday by Nobel Prize-winner S.Y. Agnon and, with Benjamin Harshav, Yehuda Amichai, A Life of Poetry. Harshav's most recent translation is of Night Train to Lisbon by Pascal Mercier, which has sold over two million copies worldwide. She is vice-president of the American Literary Translators' Association and was awarded a silver medal from the University of Rome Tor Vergata for her achievement in scholarship and translation. A historian by profession, she lives in New Haven, Connecticut, where she is a lecturer in comparative literature at Yale.

How to be a Doll Opens March 13th!

2008-03-08T13:04:00.000-08:00

Mir Productions presents
How to be a Doll
Directed by Genevieve Gearheart
Text by Alissa Riccardelli

Featuring Carissa Cordes, Annie Harrison, Cindy Kawasaki, Ouida Maedel, Lucy McRae, Sharla Meese, Erinina Marie Ness and Aubrey Snowden

Original Music by Joseph Genden
Designed by Monica Faye Carter, Elizabeth Nielsen and E.I. Read
Produced by Julianne Just

Thursday, March 13 through Sunday, March 16 at 8:00 pm,
Wednesday, March 19 through Saturday, March 22nd at 8:00 pm
Sunday, March 23 at 2:00 pm

Access Theater – Gallery
380 Broadway, 4th floor (at White Street)
Tickets are $15.00, visit www.smarttix.com for reservations, or call 212-868-4444.

CRITICS ARE INVITED on or after March 13

Mir Productions' new piece, "How to be a Doll," is a mixture of dance, movement, and spoken word poetry created in collaboration with eight female performers from all walks of life. It is centered on the issues of young women, particularly issues of self. It speaks of women with muffled voices, of their rich inner lives and their silence on the outside. It is about the struggle between what one should be and what she wants to be and the failure to find the balance, reacting against her mother and the fear of reacting at all.

This piece addresses the questions: is a person what she projects, or what she is internally? If she is aware of herself and her perception, why is it so frightening to share it? Some search for definition through love, to allow others to sculpt them so they can put that fear into the hands of someone else. Others search through sex, looking for definition. This is a piece about fear: the fear of being alone, and above that, the fear of love - fearing good love and instead turning to bad love for safety's sake. Although the desire exists in everyone to step outside of one's surroundings, the fear of walking can be suffocating.

Auditions for "How to be a Doll" a new dance theater piece

2008-01-14T18:20:00.000-08:00

Mir Productions is seeking actors, dancers and movers for our next
original production, How to be a Doll. The show will run for two weeks
in March. Rehearsal will begin the first week of February. The show
will rehearse in the evening and occasionally in the afternoon (but
only on weekends). It is important that you are able to be at all
rehearsals - as the piece will be created by the ensemble during the
rehearsal process. A complete rehearsal schedule will be available at
auditions or upon request.

Auditions will be held on Monday, January 28th and Wednesday, January
30th (with callbacks also taking place on the 30th). If you are
interested in auditioning please email us at
involvement@mirproductions.org to schedule an appointment.

***** Please be advised that we are seeking men and women who are
interested in working with a combination of dance and theater. No
formal dance training is required, but we are interested in seeing
individuals who have experience with Viewpoints. Please memorize the
passage below for the audition and be prepared to move.

the frozen food aisle makes
me sob outloud.
frost-caked glass,
the spinach, the pancakes,
the rice.
all that quick taste.
somewhere, i am certain,
my mother pounds fresh chicken
with her fists,
somewhere she crushes plum tomatoes,
somewhere she is silent.
somewhere, i am certain,
my mother is washing
her hands.

This piece will be a mixture of dance, movement, and spoken word
poetry. It is centered on the issues of young women, particularly
issues of self. It speaks of women with muffled voices, of their rich
inner lives and their silence on the outside. It is about the struggle
between what one should be and what she wants to be and the failure to
find the balance, reacting against her mother and the fear of reacting
at all. This piece addresses the questions: is a person what she
projects, or what she is internally? If she is aware of herself and
her perception, why is it so frightening to share it? Some search for
definition through love, to allow others to sculpt them so they can
put that fear into the hands of someone else. Others search through
sex, looking for definition. This is a piece about fear: the fear of
being alone, and above that, the fear of love - fearing good love and
instead turning to bad love for safety's sake. Although the desire
exists in everyone to step outside of one's surroundings, the fear of
walking can be suffocating.

Mir Productions was founded in August of 2006. It is made up of a
diversely talented group of artists committed to creating theater that
crosses and breaks down cultural and language boundaries by supporting
new work and exploring interdisciplinary art forms.

Mir Productions is interested in integrating the elements of movement,
text, sound, film, visual art, technology and theater in a
collaborative and supportive artistic environment. Mir Productions is
open to developing new works in this manner, as well as freshly
examining traditional works from an interdisciplinary or multicultural
perspective.

The company's name derives from the root word mir, which becomes miras
(wonderment) and mirari (to wonder) in Latin, mirar or mirer (to look)
in Spanish and French, mirror (to reflect) in English, miru (to watch
or to look at) in Japanese, and mir (peace/world) in Russian. The ways
in which this one word can cross cultures and languages is at the
heart of the company's commitment to pushing past and through all
boundaries and fully exploring each work that Mir Productions does.

Casting and crew call!!

2007-10-31T08:38:00.000-07:00

Hey all,

Mir Productions is seeking male actors, designers and crew for our next original
production, Fetish. The show will run for two weeks in early January
and will begin rehearsing in early November during the evening hours.
Auditions will be held on Wednesday November 7th and 8th (with
callbacks to follow on the 8th). If you are interested in auditioning
please email us at involvement@mirproductions.org to schedule an
appointment. We will respond with a monologue for you to prepare.
If you are interested in stage management, property design, video/projection
design, house management, board op, etc. please email erinina@mirproductions.org.
The casting break-down is as follows:

Matt: late 20's, early 30's, WASPy, intelligent, handsome,
self-possessed, works in finance. He is charming and has a natural air
of confidence. He is blessed with good looks and wealth, but is
unpretentious.

Dion: late 20's, early 30's, Matt's best friend. Black, clean-cut,
charming, smart, good-looking. His confidence is less natural than
Matt's. He grew up in white suburbia and is not entirely comfortable
with himself or his role in the predominately white world of finance.

James: mid to late 20's, early 30's, White, Matt's friend and
co-worker. A little awkward, a little off. He grew up on Staten Island
and has a chip on his shoulder about having to work his way to the
top. He is intense and strange, but attempts to be social.

All roles are non-union, non-pay.

Thanks guys,

Genevieve

Bring Yosef Bar-Yosef to the United States

2007-10-01T08:53:00.000-07:00

Born in 1933 in Jerusalem, seventh generation in Israel, to an Orthodox family, he received a Jewish Orthodox education as a child.

He later went on to study Jewish philosophy, Kabalah and English Literature at the Hebrew University in Jerusalem. He worked as a seaman, builder, and eventually mainly as Journalist and Literary Editor. His first play ‘Tura’, was staged at the Cameri Theatre in Tel-Aviv in 1963. Since then eleven plays of his have been produced by the major theatres in Israel, mainly by Habima - Tel Aviv's main stage. He won the President Shazar prize for drama for his play “Difficult People”. In 2003, he was awarded the most prestigeous Prize of Israel for his entire dramatic body of work.
---

Mir Productions, a New York-based theater company is currently working with the Israeli consulate to bring Mr. Bar-Yosef, one of Israel's most respected playwrights, to the United States for a reading tour of universities along the east coast during the first two weeks of April 2008.

Please join and help make the tour a success and expose his work to new audiences across America.

---
If you are a student or faculty member at a college on the east coast and you're interested in hosting this event (Middle/Near Eastern Studies, Literature and Theater Departments especially encouraged), please contact me at joycew@gmail.com
Also, please feel free to join our Facebook Group at http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=5303163812

Best,

Joyce Wu

Welcome to the News Feed!

2007-08-01T14:13:00.000-07:00

Hello Mir Fans,

Welcome to our News Feed! This is where we'll be updating everytime we add anything new, reserve a date for a show, or just have fun side projects to share! Here's the stuff we're adding right now:

The 'M' Game is coming up in October!! We will be performing this adaptation of Shakespeare's Macbeth at the 14th Street Y Theater from October 11th-20th. Check out the calendar and mainstage shows sections on our website www.mirproductions.org, for more information. We'll post ticket sales info soon!

Mir Productions is always seeking volunteers, artists, teachers, and proposals for new projects. If you are interested in being a part of the Mir Productions family, please email me at erinina@mirproductions.org and I'll try not to overwhelm you with the many ways in which you can get involved!

Right now, Mir Productions is rehearsing The 'M' Game, setting up our 2007-2008 season and generally resting up for another exciting year. We'll be back to you soon with more fabulous parties, readings, shows and workshops than ever before!! See you soon, and Happy Summer!

Love and Peace,

Erinina