Three Sisters

3/8/17-4/23/17

WRITTEN BY ANTON CHEKHOV
TRANSLATED BY PAUL SCHMIDT
DIRECTED BY JACKSON GAY
PRODUCED IN ASSOCIATION WITH NEW NEIGHBORHOOD

Stuck in a backwater town, three sisters and their brother search for meaning amidst missed opportunities and misplaced dreams in the everyday clutter of lackluster birthday presents, pushy in-laws, and underwhelming suitors. Three Sisters pitches the sublime against the ridiculous, the romanticized past against an idealized future, and the individual against the unknowability of life itself in Chekhov’s tragicomic masterpiece about life’s heartbreak and absurdity.

Play Name

Show Information

Runtime: Approximately 3 hours with one 15 minute intermission.

Three Sisters is generously underwritten
by Bobbi and Ralph Terkowitz.

Multimedia

The Artists

Cast

Production Team

SET DESIGNER

Daniel Conway

Daniel Conway has designed more than two dozen plays for Studio Theatre including Three Sisters and No Sisters, The Aliens, and his Helen Hayes Award-winning design for Hand to God. His recent work on Macbeth for Chicago Shakespeare Theater and The Scottsboro Boys for Signature Theatre was featured in the 2019 Prague Quadrennial of World Stage Design and Performance Art. He is currently designing Singin’ in the Rain for Olney Theatre Center. Other regional credits include work for Arena Stage, Signature Theatre, Ford’s Theatre, Woolly Mammoth, Cincinnati Playhouse in the Park, The Cleveland Play House, Shakespeare Theatre Company, South Coast Rep, Milwaukee Rep, A.R.T., The Kennedy Center, and Boston Lyric Opera.  Daniel is the designer for the performance artists/magicians Penn and Teller. Awards include 14 Helen Hayes nominations and four awards for Outstanding Set Design, nominations for the Los Angeles and Boston Critics Awards, and The Anderson-Hopkins Award for Sustained Contributions to Theatre in Washington DC.

(As of August 2019)

LIGHTING DESIGNER

Jesse Belsky

Jesse Belsky previously designed P.Y.G. or The Mis-Edumacation of Dorian Belle, The Remains, The Effect, Three Sisters, No Sisters, and Animal at Studio Theatre. Regional credits include The Magic Play at Portland Center Stage, Syracuse Stage, and Actors Theatre of Louisville; Lydia and Rough Crossing at Yale Repertory Theatre; and The Year of Magical Thinking at PlayMakers Repertory Company. DC designs include Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf? at Ford’s Theatre; J.Q.A. and The Year of Magical Thinking at Arena Stage; Oslo, Handbagged and Book of Will at Round House Theatre; The Mystery of Love & Sex at Signature Theatre; Henry IV P1, Winter’s Tale, Sense & Sensibility, and A Midsummer Night’s Dream at Folger Theatre; Labour of Love, The Invisible Hand and The Magic Play at Olney Theatre Center. Jesse holds a BA from Duke University and an MFA from the Yale School of Drama, and he has taught lighting design at Connecticut College and UNC Greensboro.

(As of December 2019)

COSTUME DESIGNER

Jessica Ford

Jessica Ford makes her Studio debut with Three Sisters / No Sisters. Other DC projects include The Gaming Table and Orestes: A Tragic Romp at Folger Theatre, and The Fantasticks at Arena Stage. Ms. Ford has designed for numerous New York City and regional theatres and companies across the United States, including The Rattlestick Theatre Company, The Debate Society, The Long Wharf Theatre, Syracuse Stage and Baltimore CenterStage, to name a few. She received LA and CT Critics Circle awards and a Drama Desk nomination for These Paper Bullets! at Geffen Playhouse, Yale Repertory Theatre, and Atlantic Theatre Company. She holds an MFA from Yale School of Drama.

(As of March 2017)

SOUND DESIGNER

Christopher Baine

Christopher Baine returns to Studio for Three Sisters / No Sisters after designing Cloud 9 and Water by the Spoonful. He recently composed the music for When She Had Wings (Helen Hayes Award) and The BFG with Imagination Stage (Helen Hayes Award nomination). Some recent designs include The Critic & The Real Inspector Hound and Heir Apparent with Shakespeare Theater Company and Guthrie Theater, Colossal with Olney Theatre Center (Helen Hayes Award), Wonderful World of Dissocia at Theatre Alliance (Helen Hayes Award), Fetch Clay, Make Man at Marin Theater Company, Detroit at Woolly Mammoth Theatre Company, and Romeo and Juliet (Helen Hayes Award nomination) and Taming of the Shrew (Helen Hayes Award nomination) at the Folger Theatre. He also designed The Elaborate Entrance of Chad Deity (Helen Hayes Award nomination), Gruesome Playground Injuries and A Bright New Boise (Helen Hayes Award) with Woolly Mammoth Theater Company, and Gift of Nothing and Jason Invisible at The Kennedy Center Theatre For Young Audiences. Other regional credits include Everyman Theatre, Forum Theatre, dog & pony dc, Adventure Theatre MTC, Children’s Theater Charlotte, Synetic Theater, and Theater Alliance. He has been a guest artist with The University of Maryland, Catholic University, UMBC and American University. Mr. Baine has been the Resident Sound Designer for Imagination Stage since 2009, and was a Kenan Fellow at the Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts in 2012.

(As of March 2017)

COMPOSER

James Barry

James Barry makes his Studio debut in Three Sisters / No Sisters as well as his debut as a theatrical composer. As a performer, Mr. Barry has played Carl Perkins in the first national tour and in several regional productions of Million Dollar Quartet. A New Neighborhood company member, Mr. Barry originated the role of Pedro in These Paper Bullets which ran at Yale Repertory Theatre, The Geffen Playhouse, and Atlantic Theater Company. He was in the original cast of Bloody Bloody Andrew Jackson at The Public Theater and on Broadway. His album of original rock music, “Embrace Yourself Tonight”, is available on iTunes, Spotify, and on pink vinyl LP through Etsy.

(As of March 2017)

DRAMATURG

Lauren Halvorsen

Lauren Halvorsen is in her ninth season as Studio’s Associate Literary Director. Her dramaturgy credits here include Doubt, P.Y.G. or the Mis-Edumacation of Dorian Belle, Admissions, Kings, If I Forget, Vietgone, The Wolves, Skeleton Crew, The Father, Three Sisters, The Hard Problem, Hand to God, Moment, Between Riverside and Crazy, Chimerica, The Wolfe Twins, Belleville, Water by the Spoonful, Tribes, The Real Thing, The Motherfucker with the Hat, The Aliens, Bachelorette, The Big Meal, and Time Stands Still. Previously, Lauren spent three seasons as Literary Manager of The Alley Theatre. She was the Artistic Associate of the WordBRIDGE Playwrights Laboratory for six years and has worked in various artistic capacities for The Kennedy Center, City Theatre Company, Eugene O’Neill Theater Center, First Person Arts Festival, and The Wilma Theater. Lauren is a graduate of Bryn Mawr College.

(As of December 2019)

PRODUCTION STAGE MANAGER

Keri Schultz

Keri Schultz returns to Studio for Three Sisters after stage managing Hand to God, The Pillowman, and Red Light Winter, and serving as Assistant Stage Manager for Take Me Out. Recent local stage management credits include Hunting and Gathering, Circle Mirror Transformation, and Venus In Fur at Rep Stage, and Bad Dog, The Price, and Avenue Q at Olney Theatre. Ms. Schultz has also stage managed at theatres including Mosaic Theatre, Imagination Stage, Kennedy Center Theatre for Young Audiences, and Round House Theatre. Additionally, she has been an assistant stage manager at theatres including Arena Stage, Folger Theatre, and Center Stage. Regionally, she has worked with Trinity Rep, the Chester Theatre Company, and the Contemporary American Theatre Festival, and spent three summers as the prop master for the National Playwrights Conference at the Eugene O'Neill Theatre Center.

(As of March 2017)

ASSISTANT DIRECTOR

Victoria Gruenberg

Victoria Gruenberg has previously appeared at Studio assisting Michael Kahn on Cloud 9, Shana Cooper on Straight White Men, Matt Torney on The Hard Problem, and Jackson Gay on Three Sisters. Princeton main stage directing credits include Anouilh’s Antigone, Annika Bennett’s Spackle, and Johnna Adams’ Gidion’s Knot. Main stage acting credits include Cloud 9; Uncle Vanya; Kiss Me, Kate; and Sunday in the Park with George. She has worked under John Rando, John Doyle, and Tim Vasen, as well as several South African directors during her time with ASSITEJ South Africa and Cape Town Edge. Ms. Gruenberg is a recipient of the Frances LeMoyne Page Prize for Outstanding Achievement in the Creative Arts, and a recent graduate of Princton University's English and Theatre programs.

(As of April 2017)

Press

even seasoned Chekhov fans will find new revelations from a drama we think we know by heart.
DC Metro Theater Arts
bold, brassy, unhinged
DC Theatre Scene
a thoroughly engrossing and quite funny, if not freshly revealing, take on a classic
Metro Weekly
as audacious as it is ambitious
The Weekly Standard

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