CAST

	GILBERT CRUZ* (Luis/Pastor Tom) is very excited to get out of NYC for the summer and spend it here at Barrington Stage. Previously he was seen at the Hangar Theatre in Little Women. Other appearances: Roundabout, Ensemble Studio Theatre, Intar, Classical Theatre of Harlem, HERE Space. Regionally: McCarter, Seattle Rep, Old Globe, Alliance, Shakespeare Theatre, Geva Theatre and others. Film/TV: recently finished up at Dr. Ebersole on The Walking Dead: World Beyond, Pose, Elementary, Blacklist and of course, Law & Order and its cousins. Sex and the City (feature), Change In the Air, Daughter of God.
	APRIL ORTIZ* (Janet/Louise) New York: Principal Standby, In the Heights (Richard Rodgers Theatre); Inez in Tio Pepe (Somewhere) (The Public); Rita Mae in The View Upstairs (Culture Project); Marina in Children of Salt (NYMF); Mama in Castronauts (The Zipper Factory); April in A Woman’s Work (Flatiron Playhouse); Narrator in Transformations (Homespace); Betty Still-Smoking in Distant Thunder (Amas). National Tours: Daniela, In the Heights (first national tour); Demeter in Cats (National Shubert Theatre LA); Swing in La Cage aux Folles (National Pantages Theatre LA). Regional: Camila, In the Heights (Theatre Under the Stars); Daniela, In the Heights (Pittsburgh CLO); Luz in Sunsets and Margaritas, Lola in Barrio Babies (Denver  Center); Stepmother in Medea/Macbeth/Cinderella (Yale Rep); Denise in Bright Ideas (Laguna Playhouse); Lady Anne in Richard III (Alexander Rep). Awards: 2016 NYMF Award for Individual Performance (Children of Salt). Film/TV: Father of the Bride, The Majestic, Frame of Mind, Kink Inc., Elementary, Instinct, Braindead, Law & Order: CI, Everybody Loves Raymond, ER, Down and Out in Beverly Hills, The Golden Girls, Coach, Empty Nest, many others. Video Game: Grand Theft Auto V.
	DEBRA JO RUPP* (Susan/Iris) BSC: Mother’s Day; Three Viewings; Time Flies and Other Comedies; The Cake; Love Letters; Kimberly Akimbo; Dr. Ruth, All the Way; To Kill a Mockingbird; Ring Round the Moon; Project Laramie. Broadway: Cat on a Hot Tin Roof with Kathleen Turner. Off Broadway: The Cake, MTC (Nom: Drama League); Becoming Dr. Ruth (Nom: Drama Desk, Outer Critics, Conn Critics Cir); A Girl’s Guide to Chaos; Frankie and Johnnie in the Claire de Lune, The Butcher of Baraboo (Judith Ivey, Second Stage). Recent regional: The Cake (LA Stage Ovation Award, LA Drama Critics Circle Award), Deathtrap (Berkshire Theatre Group), Madagascar (Chester), Annapurna (Rob Ruggiero, TheaterWorks Hartford), True West, A Flea in Her Ear (John Rando, Williamstown). Film credits include Big, Clockwatchers, Sgt. Bilko, She’s Out of My League and over 200 television appearances, most notably: Wandavision, This Is Us, The Ranch, That ‘70s Show, Seinfeld, Friends, NCIS: LA, Elementary.
	KENNETH TIGAR* (Mo/Bruce) BSC: 10×10 (2020), Uncle Vanya. Broadway: Fish in the Dark; Vienna: Wir Spielen Frieden (in German); Old Wicked Songs. Regional: Alley Theatre; Cleveland Playhouse; Syracuse Stage; co-founder Chester Theatre; four productions of Freud’s Last Session (Geva, Hartford Theaterworks, Le Petit/New Orleans, Cape Playhouse); winner of LA Drama Critics Circle, Dramalogue and South Florida’s Carbonell awards. Film: The Avengers; Lethal Weapon 2&3; Primal Fear. Television: The Man In the High Castle; Hunters; Evil; The Resident; Dopesick; House of Cards; The Good Wife; Bull; The Blacklist; Blindspot; Barney Miller. Director: Tosca; Don Giovanni; La Bohème; Threepenny Opera. Published translations of Wedekind and Büchner.
	PEGGY PHARR WILSON* (Elaine/Barbie) Associate Artist. BSC: America v. 2.1: The Sad Demise & Eventual Extinction of The American Negro, Gaslight, His Girl Friday, The Crucible, To Kill a Mockingbird, Guys & Dolls, Carousel, The Laramie Project: Epilogue and 10×10 New Play Festival (all 10 years!). Great Barrington Public: Dad. BAT: Doubt (Best Actress nominee BroadwayWorld). Shakespeare & Co: Leap Year. New York: Six Women with Brain Death (co-author, and performed it also in Chicago, Dallas and Kansas City). Regional: 10 seasons with Creede Repertory Theatre in Colorado performing over 50 roles, including Mrs. Lovett in Sweeney Todd (Best Actress Ovation Award Denver Post), Shirley Valentine, Josie in A Moon for the Misbegotten and Mac in Three Viewings. Many other regional including: Dallas Theatre Center, Theatre 3, Kansas City Rep, Unicorn, KC Lyric Opera, Berkshire Playwrights Lab, White River in Vermont and Rose Theatre in Chicago.
	ROBERT ZUKERMAN* (Marty/Rabbi Wolberg) BSC: If I Forget, His Girl Friday, The Crucible, Ring Round the Moon, The Importance of Being Earnest, Thief River, The Collyer Brothers at Home, 10×10 (‘12, ‘14, ‘15, ‘18, ‘19, ‘21). Other regional work includes Pittsburgh Public Theater, Florida Studio Theatre, Firehouse Theatre (VA), Triad Stage (NC), Franklin (NY) Stage, Penguin Rep, Hubbard Hall, Arena Stage, Colorado Shakespeare Festival, Berkshire Theatre Group. Two dozen plays Off Broadway at Irish Rep, Atlantic, CSC, TFANA, the Pearl, etc. Narration: Talking Books (Library of Congress). Tour: USAF bases in Greenland for the USO. Former Theatre Program Director at the NY State Council on the Arts.

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CREATIVES

JESSICA PROVENZ (Playwright) BSC: On the Rocks (10×10 2021); Stay, Please (10×10 2020). Productions and workshops include A Wake on Chappaquiddick (Cape Cod Theatre Project, New Georges, Irish Rep), True Art (Pioneer Theatre, Directors Company), Andromeda (Barrow Group, Berkshire Playwrights Lab), Better than Chocolate (Juilliard). Jessica received commissions from Araca Group, Killer Films and BSC which led to Boca, to be produced at GableStage in 2022. She has been a regular contributor to Berkshire Magazine and, for New York Magazine, wrote a feature about serving as Anthony Weiner’s Policy Director. A two-time recipient of the Lecomte du Nouy Award, she received a B.S. from Northwestern University and was Artist-in-Residence at Juilliard. She is BSC’s Director of Development (for which she travels to Florida every year — with a few days in Boca). She lives in Lenox with her son Rhys and their dog Zeus.

JULIANNE BOYD† (Director) is the Founder (1995) and Artistic Director of Barrington Stage Company (BSC) where she has directed many productions, including the critically acclaimed West Side Story (2018) and the 2017 hit production of Company, starring Aaron Tveit. She also directed the world premiere of Christopher Demos-Brown’s American Son, which won the Laurents-Hatcher Award for Best New Play by an Emerging Playwright in 2016. Other productions include the world premieres of Mark St. Germain’s Dancing Lessons, The Best of Enemies and Dr. Ruth, All the Way and the critically acclaimed revival of Goldman and Sondheim’s Follies. In 1997 she directed BSC’s smash hit production of Cabaret, which won six Boston Theater Critics Awards and transferred to the Hasty Pudding Theatre in Cambridge for an extended run.

Boyd conceived and directed the Broadway musical Eubie!, a show based on the music of Eubie Blake which starred Gregory Hines and garnered three Tony nominations. She also co-conceived and directed (with Joan Micklin Silver) the award-winning Off Broadway musical revue A…My Name Is Alice (Outer Critics’ Award) and its sequel A…My Name Is Still Alice.

In 2000 Ms. Boyd created the Playwright Mentoring Project, BSC’s underserved youth program that won the prestigious Coming Up Taller Award in 2007. In 2015, the Playwright Mentoring Project also won the Commonwealth Award for Creative Youth Development. From 1992 to 1998 Ms. Boyd served as President of the Society of Stage Directors and Choreographers, the national labor union representing professional directors and choreographers in the U.S.

She and her husband Norman have three grown children.

BRIAN PRATHER (Scenic Designer) Associate Artist. BSC: Into the Woods; Time Flies and Other Comedies; The Glass Menagerie; A Doll’s House, Part 2; Typhoid Mary; Ragtime; American Son; Breaking the Code; Dr. Ruth, All the Way; Freud’s Last Session; A Streetcar Named Desire; The Burnt Part Boys and many others. Recent Off Broadway: Daniel’s Husband, Widowers’ Houses, A Christmas Carol, Becoming Dr. Ruth, The Memory Show, Freud’s Last Session, Nymph Errant, The Burnt Part Boys. International: Chung-mu Hall (South Korea). Regional and other: Alley Theatre, Goodspeed Musicals, Virginia Rep., Broad Stage, Mercury Theatre, Delaware Theatre Co., Shakespeare on the Sound, Capitol Rep. Regional Emmy nominee, Jeff Award and multiple BTCA Award winner. Resident Designer at TheaterWorks Hartford. brianprather.com

DAVID LANDER (Lighting Designer) Associate Artist. BSC: Who Could Ask for Anything More? The Songs of George Gershwin, Harry Clarke, Fall Springs, Gertrude and Claudius, West Side Story. Broadway: The Lightning Thief: The Percy Jackson Musical, Torch Song with Michael Urie and Mercedes Rhuel, The Heiress with Jessica Chastain, The Lyons with Linda Lavin, Master Class with Tyne Daly, Bengal Tiger at the Baghdad Zoo with Robin Williams (Drama Desk Award; Tony and Outer Critics Nominations), 33 Variations with Jane Fonda (Tony and Outer Critics nominations), I Am My Own Wife (Drama Desk and Outer Critics nominations), among others. Off Broadway: The Public Theater, Roundabout Theatre, Signature Theatre, The Vineyard Theatre, among others. Regional: Arena Stage, Goodman Theatre, Guthrie Theater, Hartford Stage, Huntington Theatre, Kennedy Center, Mark Taper Forum, among others. International Theatre and Opera: Dublin, Delhi, London, Melbourne, Mumbai, Singapore, Sydney, Tokyo, among others.

ALEXANDER SOVRONSKY (Sound Designer) BSC: The Supadupa Kid 2, Harry Clarke, The Glass Menagerie, The Cake, Typhoid Mary, 10×10 New Play Festival (2017–2021). Original Music/Sound Design credits include: Broadway: Cyrano de Bergerac (starring Kevin Kline). Off Broadway: Mother of the Maid (The Public); Bottom of the World (Atlantic); Women Beware Women (Red Bull Theatre); King Lear, Three Sisters (Classical Theatre of Harlem); As You Like It (Happy Few Theatre Co); Cyrano de Bergerac (Resonance Ensemble). Regional: Arena Stage, KC Rep, Baltimore Center Stage, Seattle Rep, Shakespeare & Co., Berkshire Theatre Group, Hartford Stage, Actors’ Shakespeare Project, Wharton Salon, Connecticut Repertory Theatre, Shakespeare Theater of NJ, Pennsylvania Shakespeare Festival, Off-Square Theatre Co., WAM Theatre. AlexanderSovronsky.com

MARY SCHILLING-MARTIN (Wig Designer) BSC: Eleanor, Fall Springs, Time Flies and Other Comedies, The Royal Family of Broadway. She is the former Wig Master for La Jolla Playhouse, Marriott Theater in Lincolnshire, Cleveland Play House and Arizona Theatre Company. Her regional credits include: Berkshire Theatre Group, Northern Stage, Great Lakes Theater, Idaho Shakespeare Festival, Lake Tahoe Shakespeare Festival, The Goodman Theatre, Denver Center Theatre Company, San Diego Repertory Theatre, Arizona Theatre Company. Mary along with her daughter, Caitie, is co-owner of Wigs and Whiskers.

DAVID D’AGOSTINO* (Production Stage Manager) BSC: Who Could Ask for Anything More? The Songs of George Gershwin, The Hills Are Alive with Rodgers & Hammerstein, BSC’s Holiday Getaway, American Underground. In the past decade, his work has taken him to every continental state and several Canadian provinces, working on a variety of national tours and regional productions. Favorite credits include the revival of Pippin, Finding Neverland, Million Dollar Quartet, Cabaret, The Producers, Memphis: The Musical and Man of La Mancha. David has previously worked with the Finger Lakes Musical Theatre Festival as manager of “The PiTCH!” playwright workshop, working on and facilitating several new plays and musicals. Love to Mom, Dad, and Alex!

MCCORKLE CASTING LTD; PAT MCCORKLE (Casting) (C.S.A.) Casting actors for Barrington Stage for 19 years. Pat McCorkle is pleased to be an Associate Artist at BSC. Broadway: Over 50 productions including On the Town, Amazing Grace, End of the Rainbow, The Lieutenant of Inishmore, Cat on a Hot Tin Roof, One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest, Amadeus, She Loves Me, A Few Good Men. Off Broadway: highlights — Clever Little Lies; Sheer Madness; Tribes; Our Town (Barrow Street); Freud’s Last Session; Toxic Avenger; Almost, Maine; Driving Miss Daisy. Feature film: Premium Rush, Ghost Town, The Thomas Crown Affair, Die Hard with a Vengeance, School Ties, etc. Television: Twisted, St. George, Sesame Street, Hack, Californication, Max Bickford, Chappelle’s Show, Strangers with Candy, Barbershop, etc. mccorklecasting.com

CHARLIE SIEDENBURG (Berkshire Press Representative/Associate Artist) (17th Season) joined the BSC family in 2005 and has represented over 130 BSC productions. His work has led to features in The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, The Boston Globe, USA Today and American Theatre Magazine. His many PR credits include the Metropolitan Opera (Live in HD), Paper Mill Playhouse (1999–2004), George Street Playhouse, Hartford Stage, Goodspeed Musicals, Long Wharf Theatre, Surflight Theatre and Two River Theater Company. He serves as Press Rep for Wagner College Theatre, The Minty Awards, Ghostlight Productions and In The Wings Productions. Charlie is a 1995 Theatre/Arts Administration graduate of Wagner College on Staten Island, where he currently teaches Theatre Appreciation. Last year he was appointed Director of Alumni Relations for his alma mater, Moore Catholic High School.

THE PRESS ROOM (National Press Representatives) Broadway: Hamilton, The Book of Mormon and upcoming productions of The Brothers Size, Chasing Rainbows, Born for This, Paradise Square and Working Girl: The Musical. Recent Broadway credits: The Waverly Gallery, Three Tall Women, Farinelli and the King. Off Broadway: Gloria: A Life, Beyond Babel. Other clients include: Vineyard Theatre, The Wooster Group, Shakespeare’s Globe, Theatre Row, Rosie’s Theater Kids, Hunter Theater Project, NY Classical Theatre, Southern California’s 3-D Theatricals, the award-winning web series “Indoor Boys,” actor/pianist Hershey Felder, Why Not Theatre’s Mahabharata for the Shaw Festival, and Miami New Drama’s world premiere musical, A Wonderful World.

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Meet The Playwright: Jessica Provenz

What’s your writing process been like for BOCA?

I started writing the play in March and I wrote as fast as I could type (we had an opening set in August, after all)! I started with a premise: well-to-do seniors living in a retirement community in Boca Raton. I know these people, and I love these people. I then dreamed up situations that could happen in my fictional Boca community and outlined 12 scenes – which are still the 12 scenes that appear in the play. My process is to think about a scene for a couple of days – when I’m showering, driving, cooking. And then when I have some of it in my head, I try to get the words on the page quickly. Just get it out.

And then I rewrite and I rewrite and I rewrite. For me, 75% of playwriting is rewriting. I learned an important lesson from Stephen King’s brilliant book On Writing. To be a great writer, you must kill your darlings, you must sacrifice moments or lines that you love, if it gets in the way of telling the story, and I have taken that to heart. I love rewriting, it’s a challenge.

For me, with BOCA, when the writing process was really working I would laugh out loud as I type. And that is very rewarding (and maybe a little unnerving for the people I live with).

Was there a character that you worked really hard to get right?

I believe all is fair in love and playwriting. By which I mean, my plays are populated by characters I know, real people I’ve met, and inspired by stories I’ve picked up over dinner, walking my dog, even sitting by the pool. If you share a delicious anecdote with me, it may find its way into a script.

I moved to the Berkshires when I was 36. My parents had retired here and I ended up hanging with the retired set a few decades before my time. And why not? My retired friends are well-read, see tons of theatre, enjoy art, dance. They are opinionated, kind, loving. Some are New York Jews – as I am. Most have much more money than I do (not a bad trait in a friend)! Many of my retiree friends are winter birds who fly to Florida for half the year – a good number of them go to Boca Raton.

There are 12 characters in BOCA and they are all composites. No character is based on any one person, instead they have aspects of all of my friends. There’s a character Mo, so named because I’ve befriended Mo Levitt (who recently passed away and is survived by the amazing BSC Board member Rhoda Levitt – this play is dedicated to Mo Levitt) and Moe England (who is the unofficial Mayor of Kimball Farm). Both Mos are among the warmest, kindest, most big-hearted men I know. Both have smiles that light up a room. Both can tell a great story and make you feel good, just by being around them. And so there is a Mo at the center of the play, and he incorporates traits from both of my real life Mos (although the Mo in the play dresses like Jimmy Buffet and smokes a lot of pot – something I made up to explain why Mo is so happy all the time).

What’s it like to be seeing a fully-realized production of all these characters you know and love?

The actors all bring so much thought and insight and inspiration to every second they are on stage. “I think my character would have this accent,” or “this posture.” Suddenly, characters that were in my head are standing before me – alive! I nearly cried with joy when I learned that my pot-smoking grandpa is being given an awesome Hawaiian shirt and ponytail. It’s brilliant! Of course Mo has a ponytail – but I never would have thought of it. I wrote a scene that takes place in a spa, and one day at rehearsal, we have spa music, lounge chairs, and I am transported – this is better than the place I was dreaming of when I wrote it. So for me, the rehearsals are a series of moments where the characters I’ve drawn and their situations become animated.

What do you hope audiences will take away from BOCA?

If the play has a theme or a message, it’s the importance of community. Of showing up for one another. Of being present. I think this past year taught us a lot about isolation, I believe we are social creatures and we need one another.

This past year tested us all and reminded us of what a complicated and challenging world we live in, and so I really hope that BOCA gives audiences a chance to laugh – because we all need a laugh! Perhaps you’ll recognize yourself in one of the characters, or see a loved one, or just enjoy, plain and simple. The world is a serious and challenging place, but for the two hours you are in BOCA, I hope you’ll laugh – without masks – and celebrate the joy of a theatre experience. What could be better? 

More about Jessica Provenz

BSC: On the Rocks (10×10 2021); Stay, Please (10×10 2020). Productions and workshops include A Wake on Chappaquiddick (Cape Cod Theatre Project, New Georges, Irish Rep), True Art (Pioneer Theatre, Directors Company), Andromeda (Barrow Group, Berkshire Playwrights Lab), Better than Chocolate (Juilliard). Jessica received commissions from Araca Group, Killer Films and BSC which led to BOCA, to be produced at GableStage in 2022. She has been a regular contributor to Berkshire Magazine and, for New York Magazine, wrote a feature about serving as Anthony Weiner’s Policy Director. A two-time recipient of the Lecomte du Nouy Award, she received a B.S. from Northwestern University and was Artist-in-Residence at Juilliard. She is BSC’s Director of Development (for which she travels to Florida every year — with a few days in Boca). She lives in Lenox with her son Rhys and their dog Zeus.