Once confined only to heated discussions amongst doctoral students, the New York Neo-Futurists unleash O'Neill's stage directions from their dissertation prison, transforming O'Neill's eloquent yet obsessive and often controlling stage directions into rip-roaring physical comedy (that runs under 100 minutes).

Now a Broadway mainstay, Eugene O'Neill was once considered an experimental, downtown playwright. His plays defied the melodramatic conventions of the day and much of his work premiered with the Provincetown Players on MacDougall Street. The New York Neo-Futurists return O'Neill to his experimental roots with THE COMPLETE & CONDENSED STAGE DIRECTIONS OF EUGENE O’NEILL, VOLUME 1: EARLY PLAYS/LOST PLAYS.  This first in a series chronicles O'Neill's early stage directions (1913 - 1917), and include two of his “sea plays” (including Bound East for Cardiff) as well as more obscure early works such as his first play, the one-act A Wife for a Life, as well as his epic farce Now I Ask You.

The New York Neo-Futurists transform O'Neill's eloquent yet obsessive and often controlling stage directions into rip-roaring physical comedy (that runs under 100 minutes). This first in a series chronicles O'Neill's early stage directions (1913 - 1917), and include two of his “sea plays” as well as more obscure early works such as his first play, the one-act A Wife for a Life, as well as his epic farce Now I Ask You.

A transformation of O'Neill's eloquent yet obsessive and often controlling stage directions into rip-roaring physical comedy. This first in a series chronicles O'Neill's early stage directions (1913 - 1917), two of his "sea plays" as well as more obscure early works such as his first play, the one-act A Wife for a Life, as well as his epic farce Now I Ask You.

Nicole Gehring, Tour Manager
nicoleg@horsetrade.info
(212) 777-6088

Danny Burnam (Performer) is an amateur boxer. He was, most recently, a participant in
St. Ann's Warehouse's Labapalooza, a mini festival of new puppet theater.

Brendan Donaldson (Performer) is a founding member of The Gift Theatre Co. in
Chicago. New York: Prophecy (with Kathleen Chalfant, NYTW/dir. Karen Malpede). The
Luck of the Ibis" (Shelby Company). Chicago credits include: The Wooden Breeks
(Lookingglass Theater); The Violet Hour (Steppenwolf Theatre); Streamers; Three Sister; Long Days Journey into Night; Pavilion (The Gift Theatre). Film credits include: The Hunter and The Swan Discuss Their Meeting (Sundance-Accepted Short), Audience Award Winner, The Amityville Horror, The Ice Harvest. TV: Law & Order: SVU. Training: The School at Steppenwolf, Indiana University. XO L.

Cara Francis (Performer/Set Designer) is a New York Neo-Futurist, writing for and
performing in Too Much Light Makes The Baby Go Blind, The Soup Show and (un)afraid. Cara has performed and had her work produced at The Old Vic, The Public, HERE, The Flea, The Bushwick Starr, Galapagos Art Space and The Bowery Poetry Club and was a Spring 2009 Short Form Artist at the Ontological-Hysteric. Cara is half of Fantasy Grandma, has an alter-ego named Maxine Thunderfuss who has done shows at PS122 as part of III with The Human Company and as part of Terranova Collective's Ones at Eleven. Cara played Amber in the film Welcome To Nowhere, with Temporary Distortion. Cara loves to make things.

Connor Kalista (Performer) 1972 – First haircut completed without incident. 1973 –
Birth of sister. 1974 – Bananas enjoyed for last time. 1975 – Meets best friend, Matt.
1976 – Decides to trust maternal grandfather after day spent at zoo.1977 – Fall in love
with (chases) Anna, a kindergarten classmate. 1980 – Python escapes from local zoo,
found in neighbor’s back yard. 1984 – Reads 1984. 1985 – Buys and wears ugliest shirt
he will ever own.1989 – Hides in closet at friend’s house during failed attempt to have
party. 1991 – Helps roommate hide in dorm room closet to avoid ROTC duties. 1992 –
First snowball fight. 2003 – Purchases luxurious feather pillow. 2004 – Receives New York Public Library Card. 2006 – Updates bio.

Jacquelyn Landgraf (Performer) has been a member of the New York Neo-Futurists
since 2005, and has performed Too Much Light Makes the Baby Go Blind in NYC,
Chicago, New Orleans, and Washington D.C. Recent acting credits include The
Caucasian Chalk Circle (Pipeline Theater Company), a workshop of Edward Albee’s All Over (with Marian Seldes) with The Common Tongue Theater, Psych (Cake
Productions), The Maids  (WOW Cafe Theater), Suzan Lori Parks’ 365 Plays/365 Days (The Public Theater), The Treachery of Image (BRIC Studios). She recently travelled to Berlin to work on an upcoming production of Koffi Kwahule's Blue-s-cat. Jacquelyn directed the New York premiere of the musical Strega Nona at The Atlantic Theater and has also directed works at the Atlantic Acting School, The Kraine, and Nuyorican Poet’s Cafe. For two years she curated the hotINK International Playreading Festival at NYU. Jacquelyn currently teaches acting in the NYU and Conservatory programs at The Atlantic Acting School. B.F.A. Drama, NYU/Tisch School of the Arts.

Erica Livingston (Performer) has been a Neo-Futurist for five years. She just finished
working with St. Ann’s Warehouse in The Puppet Lab for their 2010-2011 season. Her
play Interference and Collapse, performed at St. Ann’s in their annual Labapalooza!
Festival. She also recently wrote for and performed in Catch .45, the rebel-outlaw
edition, a multi-faceted, multi-disciplinary performance series-event. In the works is
her piece Falling, a collaboration of movement and text that she is developing with
Lauren Sharpe, Jeffrey Cranor and Jillian Sweeney that will premiere at LaMama in the
fall of 2012.She is a member of the Network of Ensemble Theaters, Fractured Atlas,
A.R.T./New York, and The League of Independent Theaters. Erica graduated from The American Musical and Dramatic Academy. She loves her daughter, her dog and naps, to name a few.

Lauren Sharpe (Performer/Movement Coach) has been making theater in NYC for a little while now, having made the move from Chicago in 2008. Since arriving, she has been lucky enough to join the New York Neo-Futurists, performing in their long- running show, "Too Much Light Makes the Baby Go Blind" as well as directing the critically acclaimed full-length piece, "The Soup Show."  Lauren has also worked with The Chicago Neo-Futurists and has written for/performed in "Roustabout: The Great Circus Train Wreck!," "Picked Up" and "Fake Lake," a play performed in and around a Chicago Park District pool.  She is a teaching artist at The New Victory Theater and a pediatric hospital clown with Big Apple Circus Clown Care.  She is glad you're here. Love to B.

Christopher Loar (Adapter/Director/Sound Designer) is an active ensemble member of New York Neo-Futurists and has been writing, performing, directing and designing short plays for Too Much Light Makes The Baby Go Blind (30 Plays in 60 minutes) since 2009. Also for the Neos: Sound Design for (un)afraid (IT award nomination) Other
recent work includes performing in Reid Farrington’s Gin & It (Under The Radar/ Wexner Center/PS 122) as well as his upcoming Dickens: The Unparalleled Necromancer (Abrons Arts Center) and Everywhere Theater Group’s Dead People. (3LD) 

Christine Cullen (Stage Manager) has worked behind the scenes (in technical and administrative roles) at arts organizations including: McCarter Theater, The Juilliard School, Metropolitan Opera, New York Philharmonic and, most recently, Irish Arts Center.  In college, she dreamed of staging performance pieces inspired by F.T.Marinetti (author of the Futurist Manifesto) and creating agit-prop theatre with struggling NY artists.  NYNF has brought her one step closer to fulfilling that dream.  Christine is most grateful for this opportunity.

Mikell Kober (General Manager/Assistant Director) is making her New York theater debut as the Company Manager and Assistant Director for The Complete and Condensed Stage Directions of Eugene O’Neill. She earned her Bachelor of Arts degree in Theatre Arts Studies from Florida State University, where she served on the board for the Student Theatre Association and directed Bare and Born Under Punches.

Rob Neill (Managing Director) is a founding ensemble member of the New York Neo- Futurists. He trained at the London Academy of Music and Dramatic Art, the National Theater Institute, Improv Olympic and Grinnell College. Proud to be a Neo-Futurists, he has performed Too Much Light Makes The Baby Go Blind in both New York and Chicago since 1995 and he has taught Neo-Futurist workshops around the country. His work has been seen at The Roundabout, The Ontological, P.S. 122, HERE, BB Kings, Cherry Lane & The Kraine, as well as in Chicago, London and Los Angeles.