Zoomlets

January 2021 / No Comment

Frozen Foods by Ian August – Zoomlet

FROZEN FOODS

By Ian August
Directed by Michael Moran
A San Francisco Playhouse Zoomlet

Original air date: January 25, 2021

Featuring Heather Konowal and Dawn L. Troupe

Linda finds Carol in the middle of the frozen foods aisle of the Superfood Market having an existential crisis. Can she snap her friend out of it or will she be sucked into the never-ending cycle of despair?

PLAYWRIGHT

Ian August
Ian August is a NJ based playwright and lyricist, whose works have been performed across the U.S., as well as in Canada, Australia, the UK, South Korea and Bermuda. His plays have been developed at the Powerhouse Theatre Festival (Vassar / New York Stage and Film), the Great Plains Theatre Conference, Ashland New Plays Festival, Red Mountain Theatre Company, Orlando Shakespeare Theatre, New Jersey Repertory Company, Wordsmyth Theatre Company, the Garry Marshall Theatre, UC Davis Dept. of Theatre and Dance, the Philadelphia Artists Collective, the Williamstown Theatre Festival, the NY, Philly, and Edinburgh Fringe Festivals, and elsewhere. Mr. August is a founding member of the Princeton-based playwright collective, The Witherspoon Circle, and a graduated member of PlayPenn’s playwriting lab, The Foundry. Several of his short plays have been published by Sam French Inc., Smith and Kraus Publishing, the One-Act Play Depot, and Pipeline / Applause Books. He was a 2019 Playwright in Residence at the William Inge Center for the Arts in Independence, Kansas, and graduate of Goddard College’s Creative Writing MFA Program. He will begin teaching Playwriting at Stockton University in Stockton, NJ, in Spring 2021. Mr. August lives at a boarding school with one husband, two cats, and forty-six teenage daughters.

DIRECTOR

Michael Moran
Born and raised in the East Bay, Michael Socrates Moran is an actor, director, and the Executive Director and Co-Founder of the award winning, Oakland Theater Project. With a BFA from Boston University and an MFA from UCSD in Directing, Michael Moran has led the Oakland Theater Project to produce over 36 productions all across Oakland in non-traditional sites, personally directing 22 of them, including world premiers by some of the most celebrated playwrights in America. The San Francisco Chronicle hails the Oakland Theater Project as “one of the most exciting young theater companies in the Bay Area in recent years.” The Oakland Theater Project is the winner of the Theatre Bay Area’s Best Production in 2015, the San Francisco Bay Area Theater Critics Circle Best Production in the East Bay in 2016 and SFBATCC winner for best overall production in the entire Bay Area in 2017. Favorite directing credits include: West Coast Premiere Dance of the Holy Ghosts by Marcus Gardley, World Premiere Pool of Unknown Wonders by Philip Kan Gotanda, West Coast Premiere TO THE BONE by Lisa Ramirez, Hamlet, in which he both starred and directed, by William Shakespeare, Grapes of Wrath by Frank Galati and Death of a Salesman by Arthur Miller.

ACTORS

Heather Konowal as Linda
Heather Konowal is a Los Angeles based artist who holds a PhD (UCSD), an MA (Cal State, Northridge), and a B.F.A. (NYU). Select theatre credits: Grounded (Oakland Theater Project/ San Diego Rep), Dutchman (OTP), Missionaries (BAM), Doonesbury Flashbacks (La Mama Theatre Annex), The Emperor’s New Clothes (Playwrights Horizons), Fiddler on the Roof, 1776, Look Homeward Angel, Mountain Days: The John Muir Musical (Willows Theater), Angels We Have Heard on High, exonerated (Playhouse West) The House of Bernarda Alba (UCSD), Missionaries. The House of Bernarda Alba (UCSD). Her dissertation is titled Performing Black Rock City: Theatre of Affect and Burning Man. She is a founding member of the Oakland Theater Project.

Dawn L. Troupe as Carol
Dawn L. Troupe is excited to be joining this very timely reading and discussion. Dawn will be appearing next as Patrice in As Much As I Can at Joes Pub this fall. Her most recent credits include: Off-Broadway: A.R.T. Debut: Moby Dick Concert (and upcoming A.R.T. production in of Winter 2019-2020). Brothers ParaNormal (Delia); Anne of Green Gables (Mrs. Lynde), Year of The Monkey (Igloo). Regional: Black Oddysey (Alsendra/Carib’dis/Diana Ross; BATCC nominee), Pool of Unknown Wonders (Principal), Sister Act (Delores Van Cartier; BATCC nominee), Death of a Salesman (Linda Loman), Spunk (Blues Speak Woman), Aida (Aida), Ragtime (Sarah), Memphis (Emsemble), Color Purple (Shug Avery), Big River (Maid), Once On This Island (Mama Euralie), Caroline or Change (Radio 2). Workshops; Memphis, Little Princess, Funkentine Rapture, The Giver, Rebel Genius, Anne of Green Gables, Moby Dick.