Unique adaptation uses Shakespeare comedy to explore refugee experience.
October 8 - 28 at Baruch Performing Arts Center
New Feet Productions presents ARDEN/EVERYWHERE, co-presented with Baruch Performing Arts Center (BPAC). This adaptation of Shakespeare's As You Like It is conceived and directed by Jessica Bauman. Previews begin October 8 at Baruch Performing Arts Center with press opening slated for Sunday, October 15.
ARDEN/EVERYWHERE re-imagines Shakespeare’s As You Like It as a story about refugees. It unlocks this beloved comedy’s deepest heartbeat to tell a distinctly contemporary story – one that looks into a world of dislocation and exile to discover resilience, reconciliation and love. Performed by a diverse cast of actors whose origins extend from Russia to Liberia to Sri Lanka to Ohio, it unleashes theater’s unique ability to awaken empathy, locating our common humanity in the face of a seemingly incomprehensible global catastrophe.
ARDEN/EVERYWHERE stars Anthony Cason Jr., Helen Cespedes (The Cripple of Inishmaan on Broadway), Kenneth De Abrew (Measure for Measure with Theatre for a New Audience), Kambi Gathesha (Our Lady of Kibeho at Signature Theatre Center, The Rivals with The Pearl Theatre Company), Dennis Kozee, Tommy Schreider (War Horse on Broadway), Dikran Tulaine, and Liba Vaynberg (Bekah Brunstetter’s Oregon Trail). It also features a group of immigrant actors who will play the refugees who live in Arden, creating a unique world that includes numerous languages, music and the international language of soccer. This ensemble includes Ali Arkane (Lebanese-American), Murodilla Fatkhullaev (Uzbekistan), Ale Mesa (Cuban-American), Denisse Jimenez (Colombia), Anton Kurdakov (Russia), Jorge Pluas (Ecuador), and George Tarr (Liberia).
The production team for ARDEN/EVERYWHERE includes Gabriel Hainer Evansohn (set), Christina Watanabe (lighting), Nicole Slaven (costumes), Matt Otto (sound design), Brandon Powers (movement director), Judy Bowman (casting director), Kristine Schlachter (stage manager), Lico Whitfield (producer), and Lisa Dozier-King (general manager).
Jessica Bauman is a theater and film director and teaching artist. She has been developing ARDEN/EVERYWHERE for almost three years. During that time, she has taught theater workshops for immigrant actors at Baruch, to resettled refugee children in New York City at the IRC- run Refugee Youth Summer Academy, and for refugees at Kakuma Refugee Camp in Kenya. She is the founding Artistic Director of New Feet Productions, where she directed Into the Hazard (Henry 5) as well as world premieres of several other plays. She was instrumental in the development of WordPlay Shakespeare electronic books, a revolutionary new way to read Shakespeare combining text and video. For WordPlay, she directed multi-camera video productions of the complete texts of A Midsummer Night’s Dream, Macbeth, and Romeo & Juliet. She is a long time Affiliated Artist and Board Member with New Georges, a Usual Suspect at New York Theater Workshop, an alum of the Lincoln Center Directors Lab and the Drama League Directors Project.
ARDEN/EVERYWHERE runs October 8 - 28 on the following schedule: Friday & Saturday at 8pm; Sunday, Monday & Thursday at 7pm. (Note: Thursdays Oct. 19 is at 12:30pm.) Baruch Performing Arts Center is located at 55 Lexington with an entrance on 25th Street between Lexington & 3rd Aves -- accessible from the 6,N,R,F,M,1,C,E, or PATH trains at 23rd Street. Tickets are $35 available at 212-352-3101 or www.ardeneverywhere.com or baruch.cuny.edu/bpac.