off the WALL productions at Carnegie Stage A Pittsburgh Theater

Thank you for making 2018 so special As 2019 starts to gear up, we’re left remembering the many moments we’ve shared with you in 2018. It was a great year and we hope to make 2019 even better! We sincerely offer our most heartful ‘thank you’ to our creative partners, patrons, employees, and collaborators – Carnegie Stage and off the WALL surely wouldn’t be the same without every single one of you who make up our humble little community. From the bottom of our hearts, we’re happy to have you as part of our family. Erika Cuenca - Virginia Wall Gruenert Byhalia, Mississippi, May 2018 If you’d like to join the Carnegie Stage/off the WALL family, consider donating – no amount it too big or too small… and every little bit helps! With your help we are able to pay EVERY single person who works for us – there are no volunteers; only paid employees. We believe all working artists deserve to make a living doing what they love. To help support our cause, consider donating monthly or a...

A Christmas Carol unlike you’ve ever experienced... “Storytelling at its absolute finest.” - Pittsburgh City Paper “... a truly transformative evening” The Pittsburgh Current "A Christmas Carol at Carnegie Stage Gets Dickens Right" PGH Lesbian Correspondents Written by: Brianne Mueller We’re approaching week three of our run of A CHRISTMAS CAROL and it’s been a wonderful whirlwind experience. The newest version of this classic Charles Dickens tale -- performed and adapted by Mark Coffin, and directed and co-adapted by Heidi Mueller Smith -- is unlike any theatrical journey to have ever graced a stage in Pittsburgh, let alone in Carnegie. Mark Coffin - A Christmas Carol Photo by Heather Mull The 1843 novella written by Charles Dickens has been adapted from page to stage countless times and has practically become synonymous with the American Christmas season. Unlike its many predecessors, Coffin manifests all 16 or so characters in his one-man version of the pl...

March 2014         A Feminine Ending Written by Sarah Treem Directed by Matt Morrow With: Erika Cuenca*, Ingrid Sonnichsen*, Weston Blakesley*, Shaun Cameron Hall, Andrew Wind* Amanda wants to be a great composer, but she’s in a profession that only recognizes famous men. At the moment, she's living in New York City and writing advertising jingles to pay the rent while her almost-famous fiancé, Jack, pursues his singing career. Her parents are getting divorced, her first love reappears, and there's a lot of noise in her head, but none of it is music. Until the end. A gentle, bittersweet comedy about a young woman who knows what she wants but not quite how to get it. Reviews: "...the play is really a showcase for Erika Cuenca as Amanda, who, in a mammoth performance of intense focus and rock-ribbed conviction, keeps reminding us of the humanity deep inside Treem’s compelling script." - Ted Hoover - City Paper “... the electricity between them and the...

What do we want to be when we grow up?  For us this has become an existential question in more ways than one.   Let''s have a look back at the past five years and then... December 2013          Well Written by Lisa Kron Directed by: Melissa Hill Grande With: Daina Michelle Griffith* as Lisa & Virginia Wall Gruenert* as Ann Ensemble: Tony Bingham*,  Alan Bomar Jones*, Linda Haston*, Susie McGregor-Laine* Lisa Kron’s insightful 2006 Tony Award-nominated play is a cheeky, fourth-wall-smashing seriocomedy about the collision of art and life, exploring the dynamics of health, family and community. With this story of her mother’s extraordinary ability to heal a changing neighborhood, despite her inability to heal herself, Kron is left to contemplate the notion that wellness lies in our ability to embrace the complexities and contradictions of life. Well is a surprising and riotously funny play that ultimately acknowledges the hea...

Season twelve of “alternative theater for grownups” includes great plays, bold choices, and talented artists.  off the WALL Productions is excited to announce its 2018-19 season, featuring one World premiere, one U.S. premiere, and one Pittsburgh premiere in the Acting Company’s three-play program. Purchase tickets online at www.insideoffthewall.com, or call our box office at (724) -873-3576, Ext. 1. Charles Dickens’ A Christmas Carol  World Premiere                                                               Conceived, co-adapted and performed by Mark Coffin Co-adapted and directed by Heidi Mueller Smith In this adaptation of Dickens’ best-known work, with its themes of inequity and renewal just as relevant in our society today as they were in 1843, the arc of the story is experienced through the mind and heart...

What do we want to be when we grow up?  For us this has become an existential question in more ways than one. off the WALL productions (OTW) was founded July 1, 2007 in Washington County and relocated to Allegheny County in July 2012. Since 2012, OTW has produced and staged 25 productions of either new plays or regional premieres.  We have employed and paid (as per Union contracts) 25 directors and 101 professional actors. In addition, each show employed set, sound/music, lighting and costume designers, plus stagehands and front-of house-personnel, adding another 125 part-time jobs with the employees being paid a living wage of a minimum of $15.00 per hour. This we cannot sustain without your support. Our focus on diversity in theater, especially by supporting female artists, has put us on a very special list; The International Center for Women Playwrights has honored us for five continuous years with the 50/50 Applause Award. More details here But, we are also on anoth...

off the WALL productions closes their 2017-18 season with the regional #theater premiere of Byhalia, Mississippi.  Previously staged by Chicago’s Steppenwolf Theatre Company, Evan Linder’s #funny and moving salute to both down-home #decency and a troubled couple living in a see-through shack is a bittersweet story about love, class, race, family, and forgiveness. Brandon Meeks, -Erika Cuenca - Virginia Wall Gruenert All Photos by Heather Mull  - Jim and Laurel Parker are about to become new parents. They are broke. They are loud. They are "proud white trash." When Laurel gives birth to their long overdue child, she and Jim are faced with the biggest challenge of their lives.  Byhalia, Mississippi explores a couple in the midst of turmoil and a town with a racially-charged past that finds its way into the present.  Written by Evan Linder  Directed by Ingrid Sonnichsen  With: Erika Cuenca, Brandon Meeks,  Lamar K. Cheston, Hope Anth...

April 20-21, 26-28 @ 8:00 pm,  April 22 & 29 @ 3:00 pm May 3-5 @ 8:00 pm A Pittsburgh Premiere by Evan Linder Directed by Ingrid Sonnichsen With: Erika Cuenca*, Brandon Meeks*, Lamar K Cheston* Hope Anthony and Virginia Wall Gruenert* How, when, and why do you choose to forgive someone? Jim (Brandon Meeks) and Laurel Parker (Erika Cuenca) are about to become new parents.  They are broke.  They are loud.  They are “proud white trash.” When Laurel gives birth to their long overdue child, she and Jim are faced with the biggest challenge of their lives. Byhalia, Mississippi explores a couple in the midst of turmoil and a town with a racially-charged past that finds its way into the present. “ …an honest-to-goodness play. By that I mean a really good new American drama: something wise, truthful, funny and moving; a piece that other theaters should do; a script that hangs easily with shows by the leading writers of our day and a show that might brin...

Oct. 12, 13 & 14 & 8:00 pm Matinee Oct. 15 3:00 pm Written by and Starring: Anne Stockton Directed by: Austin Pendleton We are welcoming the long-awaited return of writer/actor Anne Stockton and director Austin Pendleton (The Speed Queen), in collaboration once again, to present our season opener. Nikki is being interviewed by a detective in the high level financial firm where she works about the disappearance of two very valuable rings earlier that morning. A witty look at the ways in which we are swept away by the scenarios we imagine for our lives.

The International Centre for Women Playwrights celebrate theatres promoting women playwrights in 50% of their Season! NEW YORK, NEW YORK, USA, September 20, 2017 The 2017 International Centre for Women Playwrights (ICWP) 50/50 Applause Awards celebrates gender parity for women playwrights at 58 theatres throughout The United States, Canada, Australia, Germany, United Kingdom, Singapore, and Tasmania. These 58 recipients will receive the prestigious 2017 50/50 Applause Award, for producing 50% or more plays by women playwrights in their 2016/17 season. The major criteria for the awards in 2017 were that a theatre had to have three or more productions, both male and female playwrights in their season, and at least 50% of the full-length plays and performances must be the work of female playwrights. For the 2016-17 season, approximately 32% of the qualifying theatres are repeat recipients.. Awardees range from community and college theatres to internationally renowned public theatres...

Director Robyne Parrish talks process for 4.48 Psychosis When Virginia Wall Gruenert approached me with 4.48 Psychosis, I must be honest, I was petrified. I Robyne Parrish was literally scared of the responsibility of it – of the magnitude of the subject matter – the lack of scene delineation and character breakdown and most of all, the dark place it asked the actors to go. I kind of despised the play in a way because it didn’t tell me what to do. There was no clear path. How would we get to this dark place without losing our minds? Without exhausting ourselves daily, perhaps hourly, on a psychological and spiritual basis? I was afraid of what I didn’t know. It so happened that I had begun training at the Double Edge Theatre at around the same time as Psychosis came into my life. Double Edge is an experimental company which creates original theatre through the long-term imaginative work of its ensemble and based on the teachings of Grotowski and his students. DE is nestled in...