off the WALL productions at Carnegie Stage A Pittsburgh Theater

WOMEN COUNT In case you missed the theatre industry’s gender parity movement, here’s a recap: women have been writing plays for millennia and landing productions for centuries.   Over time, they’ve also come to play key roles onstage and backstage.   But female theatre artists of all kinds still find themselves bonking their heads on a glass ceiling known as the “glass curtain.”   Even today, female playwrights, directors, and designers are atypical.   Shakespearian gender-swapping has been mooted as a partial solution; however, such theatrical “novelty” only serves to distract from the main issue – the absence of contemporary dramas reflecting the complexity of women’s lives.   Cross-gender casting fails to question the over-representation of dead and living male playwrights.   It does not address the fact that half our contemporary creative world is missing. In an essay in howlround.com, Jenny Lyn Bader writes: “We live in a world dominated by...

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...

By Elisabeth Beck When I sat down to watch The Pink Unicorn , I truly had no idea what to expect. Admittedly, I was skeptical, because I knew that the show centered heavily on the realities of diverse gender identity in today’s world, and when it comes to anything controversial or political, I’m exhausted. It seems that all we hear about these days is that diversity must be implemented, that it must be accepted and embraced, and if we don’t agree with someone’s lifestyle, we’re terrible people. My feelings on most of these subjects boil down to this: if someone wants to live his or her life a certain way, they should be able to do that. I just don’t want to hear about it all the time. I feel that I should be able to say, “That’s not for me, but that’s great for you,” to whatever someone is proposing—and that should be an acceptable answer. But usually it’s not. Amy Landis - Photo: Heather Mull So I wasn’t sure what I was going to watch when I sat down at Carnegie Stage t...

Linda Haston -  Photo by Heather Mull When Linda Haston, star of Mother Lode , a new play written by Virginia Wall Gruenert, first acted in the show in 2013, her feelings about her mother were very close to the surface. Her mother had passed away in 2011, and she describes still being very raw. “The first time we did this show it was more of a catharsis,” she said. “I was still fresh from her death, reeling from everything that we went through.” Haston describes that she felt unable to give the play the space that it needed, and that she was having trouble separating her performance from the complicated issues she was still dealing with regarding her complicated relationship with her mother. “I suggested that we do it again, rewritten, and I was much more able to get into it.” For Haston, the passage of the three years between the productions had allowed her to come to terms with some of the issues that had been holding her back before. The portrayal of her mother ...

Meet our Associate Artistic Director, Erika Cuenca  Erika graduated from Point Park University in 2002 and first started working at off the WALL as an actor in 2009 when she was cast as Lil’ Bit in Paula Vogel’s play How I Learned to Drive . She was with the OTW team when they moved their performance space from Washington, PA to the current space in Carnegie. In December of 2013, she became a part of the administrative team and continues to work both behind the scenes and on stage to select, cast, and perform in the challenging plays that epitomize off the WALL’s commitment to unique and artistically important works. Meet our Operations & Production Manager, Heidi Nagle   Sara McCown Heidi graduated from the University of Pittsburgh with dual B.A. degrees in Theatre Arts and Communications. She is the Resident Stage Manager for off the WALL Productions, a House Manager at the New Hazlett Theater, and is the Founding Co-Artistic Director of the sketch comedy tr...

The Mother-Daughter Relationship. Though words cannot really express the depth of the bond, there are countless references to this special relationship. Perform a quick Google search for ‘mother daughter relationship’ and you’ll receive not hundreds or thousands or even hundreds of thousands results. You’ll receive over 350 million results. And that doesn’t begin to account for all the books, movies and even songs on the topic. Take a look on social media, and you’ll find a plethora of posts using #MotherDaughter, innumerable quotes, pins on Pinterest and the list goes on. But as special as mother-daughter relationships are, they are often simultaneously fraught with contention. Even WebMD discusses the topic. There are as many variances within relationships as there are mothers-daughters. But even so, there are also many commonalities, as well as cultural pressures that impact every relationship. In our upcoming production Mother Lode, two independent women deal with end-of-life d...

Linda Haston - photo: Heather Mull Do you enjoy a great story?  Then our next play Mother Lode is just what you’re looking for.  Although it’s a one woman show, there are two characters: Ruth (the mother) and Linda (her daughter).  And boy can Ruth tell a story!  In fact, she’ll want to tell you her whole life story. How can we describe Ruth?  She’s animated, absolutely a storyteller at heart, joyful, uplifting, and quite simply – a hoot! Linda, on the other hand, doesn’t have time for stories. She’s too busy trying to keep everything together AND take care of her mother.  Her mother is in the final stages of her life and true to her big personality, she also has some big demands of her daughter. Linda would do anything for her mother, she wants to be there for her mother; but she has a career, she has her own bills to pay, and she has her own health to tend to.  So how does a mother-daughter navigate through such troubled waters?  We can’t...

One of our "many" goals is to introduce new voices to the performing arts. Here is an article by Elizabeth (Liz) Beck a senior at Robert Morris. She attended a recent tech rehearsal. “Sometimes it’s the dementia and sometimes it’s her.” This statement, spoken about halfway through Off the Wall’s newest venture, Mother Lode, walks a fragile line that denotes the major struggles we go through as our friends and family age. It transcends generations. It explains the crucial separation caregivers discover in the trenches of the “bad days.” There is a demarcation between the human and the disease—here in this chasm is where we find two women in Mother Lode. In the play, we meet Linda, a devoted but disgruntled caregiver to her mother Ruth, who has advanced dementia and proves to be belligerent to any type of help that does not come from her daughter. Among other things, Linda harbors resentment towards her brother who never pitches in and her absentee father who will not commi...

Lisa Ann Goldsmith, Elizabeth Ruelas Photo by Heather Mull Do you ever feel that you are not completely happy, that you are not able to feel joy in all areas of your life? Do you ever limit yourself to certain activities because you fear the break in your mundane routine? Do you limit your way of thinking for fear of feeling uncomfortable? Unless one is fully living the self-actualized life, we all have fears that we are running from in life. Some may be so small, but still affect how we think, feel, and react.  We may not even notice that these fears are affecting the quality of our lives.  Other fears are so significant, that we can’t ignore the symptoms. We feel the unhappiness, we feel the sense of inadequacy, we may even be questioning our course in life.  We may, in fact, even feel fearful. Fearful of what life is bringing our way, fearful of what might happen, fearful of what others might think, fearful of what will be if we succumb to this thing which we our...

Whether it’s peanut butter and jelly, chocolate and peanut butter or bacon and, well... anything, some things are just meant to go together!  This is also the case with theater and community. Live theater can be great entertainment, but when you combine the theater experience with dinner, drinks, dessert and/or a bit of shopping, the whole experience is enhanced.  That’s why we’re thrilled to announce that many businesses in the Carnegie community have joined with off the WALL productions so that when you attend one of our productions at Carnegie Stage, you can make a night (or afternoon) of it. There’s even some discounts for you to enjoy during other times of the week. Participating businesses : Sunset Pizza & Grille Modern Mercantile PGH The Flying Squirrel Motion on Main Carnegie Health & Wellness Center Riley’s Pour House (ticket stub) A Wards Cheesecakes Be sure to save both your ticket stub and your program booklet for disco...

Virginia Wall Gruenert, Artistic Director of off the WALL productions, recently sat with playwright, Andrea Lepcio, and director, Melissa Maxwell, to discuss the development and production of Tunnel Vision.  Ms. Maxwell gave heartfelt reasons as to why she felt this play had to be developed and Ms. Lepcio discussed why she was happy that off the WALL productions is producing her play. Having read Ms. Lepcio’s script very early in its development, Ms. Maxwell immediately felt the raw energy. She felt the undeniable truth of the story and the need to help tell the story.  We invite you to experience the same undeniable, powerful story, told through the venue of a two women play.  Be sure to scroll down to watch the full video interview. “There’s a raw energy to it that is undeniable in terms of truth, in terms of human experience, existence, emotion…  that just resonated with me.” “It was just so powerful, and so palpable, the energy and the emotion that w...

It’s no secret off the WALL Productions is a huge advocate for women playwrights. It’s a busy world we live in, and sometimes we fail to question the obvious as we go about our day-to-day lives. We accept ‘things’ for what they are. ‘Things’ become so ingrained within a culture that few bother to think about them, let alone ponder or question the reasoning behind the current status or possible solutions for change. And we get that. If you’ve been to our theater, you know we like to select productions that tell a meaningful story, productions they may in their own small way allow you to see life through the eyes of another. Another perspective per say. So when it comes to hearing the voices of women, we 100% support parity in theater. Parity as applied to playwrights would mean that 50% of the time, the audience is hearing the voice of a female playwright, and 50% of the time that of a male playwright. As it is, just one in five plays currently produced around the country are written ...

When you read the headlines in today’s newspapers, you hear quite often “A suspect has been charged in robbery, murder or kidnapping.” What is your first thought? Guilty, Guilty, Guilty! Sounds a bit prejudice or narrow minded without sorting thru all the facts and making an unbiased decision, doesn’t it? Think about the person charged. Can you imagine the mind games and pressure that individual would be subject to in order for an admission of guilt? One would need to stay focused and keep from admitting anything that could be used against them? What if you were guilty of the crime charged against you… would you use the same determination and conviction in order to persuade your peers to believe you enough to drop those charges?  What if you were innocent… would the story look much different to the observer? Poster Monday 750If you stop, think and consider the facts and possibilities, I guess it’s not as easy as just hearing the headlines and making a decision… is it? In our up...

Anne Stockton You could say that actor/playwright Anne Stockon has just the right background and experience to brainstorm our upcoming production, ‘I won’t be in on Monday.’ Why? Besides being an actor and playwright, Anne is also a practicing psychiatrist and an Actor Trainer. As an Actor Trainer, she helps the officers in the New York City Police Department’s Hostage Negotiation team train for their job. She does this by acting the part of mentally ill individuals in real life scenarios. Her skills as an actor, along with her background as a psychiatrist, is the perfect combination to provide these officers with the situational effects necessary to help them handle the situations they will encounter on the job. So you can imagine the foresight Anne brings to her new play ‘I won’t be in on Monday.’ Starring in the play, Anne uses her finesse and experience to act the part of Nikki, a love-struck young woman thrown into the throngs of a police investigation regarding the theft ...

Austin Pendleton -  2010-Thatcher-Keats Carnegie may be a small town, but we’re bringing in big talent!  In this prior blog post, we asked which actor Austin Pendleton, director of our upcoming production of Anne Stockton’s I wont be in on Monday, directed: Sofia Loren, Elizabeth Taylor, or Jane Fonda?  Well, the answer is… Elizabeth Taylor.  If that isn’t impressive enough, we’ve compiled a quick glance at some of the film work he’s been involved with as well as some of the actors. A SAMPLING OF MOVIES AND TV PERFORMANCES A Beautiful Mind     Finding Nemo     One Life to Live     My Cousin Vinny     Game Change    Wall Street: Money Never Sleeps     Law & Order: Criminal Intent    Christmas with the Kranks     Touched by an Angel     Wishcraft     Oz     The West Wing     Trial and Error     The Associate     Mr. ...

Summertime is typically the ‘off-season’ for theater. But by now you know we like to do things a little differently. That’s why we’re featuring a special off the WALL summer production!  Beginning August 13 and running through August 16th, “I won’t be in on Monday” will take to our stage for its first set of performances on our stage, or for that matter… anywhere! As part of our In Repertory program, “I won’t be in on Monday” will run again in February of 2016. Poster Monday 790There’s a lot of reasons that make this production of ‘I won’t be in on Monday’ extra special. We’ll start with a few: This first run in August will be a world premier showing. It was written by the returning playwright Anne Stockton, who wrote the successful play ‘The Speed Queen’ that ran on our stage in 2012. We booked this play sight unseen, meaning the play was still in process when we committed to it. Why? Because we know Anne Stockton will deliver and will WOW every member of the audience! W...

People are often drawn to a career that they believe will satisfy their passion. Lovers of children are drawn to teaching, lovers of animals to veterinary medicine, lovers of crime shows to forensic science, and so on. We can and should add that lovers of artistic expression are often drawn to theater. Parity (the state or condition of being equal, especially regarding status or pay) — actually the lack of parity — may be most evident in theater. Few veterinarians treat diseased animals as a side job until they can earn enough money to go full time. Few forensic scientists offer to help solve criminal cases for free of for very minimal pay until they prove they are worthy of hire. Theater, however, is a different story. Most audiences would be surprised to know that a percentage of actors, even in New York City, practice their craft for as little as five dollars per night. Some work for free, choosing to satisfy their passion without regard to compensation. Some might say that th...

Fact:Across the world, women remain underrepresented in theatre. A recap of a previous blog tells us that, as recent as 2014, women represent only 17% of all playwrights. As with most ingrained cultural practices, change doesn’t come easily. Achieving true gender parity will require a concerted effort across the entire theatre universe. Rita Anderson, an award-winning Texas playwright, in a recent article posted on tcgcircle.com recommends a push from the theatre world to achieve “50/50 by 2020.” Martha Richards, in an article for American Theater, shared a series of steps that she believes will help to eliminate the “parody of gender parity,” that poor imitation of equality. She outlines the following: Build alliances with other social justice groups. Work with women in other art forms. Teach and produce plays by women. Work with the unions to help prevent unfair labor practices. Educate political candidates about the need to increase arts funding. off the WALL Theater is ...

It’s been a wonderful run! Admission, the most recent fireWALL production on our stage, not only was an amazingly powerful dance performance, it exemplified the very existence of off the WALL (Carnegie Stage) Performing Arts Center! A central theme of our mission is to nurture, challenge, inspire and empower women theater artists, and this production did just that! TO NURTURE, CHALLENGE, INSPIRE AND EMPOWER WOMEN THEATER ARTISTS Promote women in theater and the arts: Six vibrant young women were the stars of Admission. Four were local artists, and two joined us from New York City. Provide a fair wage to working artists: An often unknown, and in some cases overlooked fact, is that theater and dance artists too often work for very low wages or no wages at all. Off the WALL believes that artists are entitled to earn a living wage. Promote empowerment: Female empowerment was the theme of Admission. The act of coming to recognize the frustrations, to overcome inhibitions as one st...