Studio presents Song of the Dragons (Sep10)

Written by Young Jean Lee, one of the hottest downtown New York playwrights, Songs of the Dragons Flying to Heaven smashes the conventions of Asian-stereotypes to bits and tosses them up like confetti. A violent, explosive and hilarious theatrical event, Songs of the Dragons Flying to Heaven is an inciting and insightful play about ethnic identity.

This celebrated experimental playwright turns the Asian-identity play on its head when a coterie of Korean American women explore what it means to be Asian in a white-dominated society. Music, Korean tradition, romance and violence flood the stage. The result is a Tarantino-esque collage of monologues, dances and scenes that is as sharp as it is hilarious. The New York Times claims: “The best parodies start with great titles. So Young Jean Lee’s hysterically funny 'Songs of the Dragons Flying to Heaven' is perfect.”

Young Jean Lee caused a sensation in New York with her recent plays Lear and The Shipment. Her other plays, performed both in New York and around the country, include The Appeal, Church, Pullman, WA and Groundwork of the Metaphysic of Morals. She is a member of New Dramatists and 13P and she is the artistic director of Young Jean Lee’s Theater Company. Ms. Lee’s plays have been published in numerous publications and she was a finalist for the 2010 Susan Smith Blackburn, a recipient of the 2009 Brooklyn College Young Alumni Award, the ZKB Patronage Prize 2007 of the Zurich Theater Spektakel, a 2007 Emerging Playwright OBIE Award, a 2010 fellowship in playwriting from NYFA, and a 2010 Prize in Literature from the American Academy of Arts and Letters.
In their citation from the 2010 American Academy of Arts and Letters Literature Awards, the Academy members wrote: "Young Jean Lee's plays are fierce, challenging, brazenly theatrical, and then transcendentally lyrical. Her wit is both biting and hilarious. Her subjects big, bold, and daring, but truthful and humane...She has created a theater like none other, and with it, a fresh dramatic language for the multi-cultural American stage."

Songs of the Dragons Flying to Heaven will be directed by Natsu Onoda Power. Onoda Power was the artistic director of Chicago’s Live Action Cartoonists, where she directed SCIENCE (FICTION), are you my negative space?, performance of sleep in one long act without intermission, Stitched and The Revenge of Poisoned Ladies. She currently a visiting professor at Georgetown University where she has also directed Madness and Civilization, The T Party, Trees and Ghosts and Swimmy and Other Stories. To create the world of Songs of the Dragons Flying to Heaven, Power will be joined by Luciana Stecconi (Setting), Joyce Liao (Lighting), Elisheba
Ittoop (Sound) and Laree Ashley Lentz (Costumes)

Jiehae Park comes to The Studio 2ndStage from California. Her credits include Youth Ink at Woolly Mammoth Theatre Company, Memphis at La Jolla Playhouse and Paradise Street at Title3@the Attic. Film credits include Step Up, Parallology and A Man Walks into a Bar. New York actor, Patricia Penn makes her Studio Theatre debut. Ms. Penn’s previous experience includes The Taming of the Shrew at Shakespeare Theatre Company and M. Butterfly at Arena Stage. Television credits include The Wire. Sue Jin Song’s Off Broadway credits include Iphigenia at Aulis and Exit the King, both at The Pearl Theatre Company. Ms. Song’s film and television credits include Pipe Dream, Someone like You, As the World Turns, 24, ER, Law & Order and Spin City. Youngsun Cho received her B.A. from M.I.T., where she performed in such productions as The Internationalist, The Bear and The Vagina Monologues. She is currently a student in The Studio Theatre Acting Conservatory. Rachel Holt returns to The Studio 2ndStage after appearing in 2009’s The Receptionist. She was recently seen in The Alchemist at The Shakespeare Theatre Company and Da at the Olney Theatre Center. Brandon McCoy was recently seen in Reasons to Be Pretty at The Studio Theatre, New Jerusalem at Theater J; In the Heart of America (Helen Hayes Award nomination); and The Glass Menagerie and Hamlet at Rep Stage. Mr. McCoy is a five time Irene Ryan Award nominee.

The 2010-2011 season of The Studio Theatre 2ndStage is generously underwritten by Don and Nancy Bliss and A. Fenner Milton.

Featuring: Jiehae Park (Korean American), Patricia Penn (Korean 1), Sue Jin Song (Korean 2), Youngsun Cho (Korean 3), Rachel Holt (White Person 1) and Brandon McCoy (White Person 2).
Director and Designers: Natsu Onoda Power (Director), Luciana Stecconi (Setting), Joyce Liao (Lighting), Elisheba Ittoop (Sound) and Laree Ashley Lentz (Costumes).

SONGS OF THE DRAGONS FLYING TO HEAVEN INFORMATION Where: Stage 4 Dates: September 29–October 24, 2010 Performances: Wednesday-Saturday: 8:30pm, Sunday: 7:30pm
Ticket Prices: Preview Prices: September 29, 30, October 1: $25, Wednesday-Friday and Sunday: $30, Saturday Evenings $35 Press Opening: Sunday, October 3, 2010 Group Rates: Discounts available for groups of 10 more tickets. Call 202-232-7267 and ask for group sales.

THE STUDIO 2NDSTAGE INFORMATION:
The Studio 2ndStage, under the artistic direction of Keith Alan Baker, creates edgy, extreme and electrifying productions that complement The Studio Theatre’s season, all presented in its flexible raw space, Stage 4. The Washington Post proclaimed that 2ndStage “has long been a playground for... directors and actors (and, naturally, some of its riskier experiments)” and that a “convention-defying approach informs many 2ndStage offerings.”

DISCOUNTS Student, senior citizen (62+) and military discount: $5 off (except Saturday evenings). Student Rush: $19 tickets for full-time students are available one-half hour before curtain on a seating available basis (except Saturday evenings). Groups: for parties of 10 or more. Call the Group Sales Manager at 202-232-7267.

GENERAL INFORMATION Accessibility: All performances are fully accessible to accommodate patrons with special needs. FM listening assistive system available. Call for schedule of sign-interpreted performances. Accessible seats available by reservation. Call the Box Office at 202-332-3300 or V/TTY 202-667-8436. Location: 1501 14th Street, NW (Northeast corner of 14th and P Streets). Parking: Please call the Box Office for parking information. Metro Stops: Red Line: Dupont Circle, Orange/Blue Lines: McPherson Square, and Green Line U Street/Cardozo. Contact Information: Tickets: 202-332-3300 V/TTY: 202-667-8436 Fax: 202-332-1187
Administration: 202-232-7267 Admin. Fax: 202-588-5262 Web site: www.studiotheatre.org E-mail: studio@studiotheatre.org

Questions? Email



	Washington DC's Studio Theatre presents Songs of the Dragons Flying to Heaven Written by Young Jean Lee, one of the hottest downtown New York playwrights, Songs of the Dragons Flying to Heaven smashes the conventions of Asian-stereotypes to bits and tosses them up like confetti. A violent, explosive and hilarious theatrical event, Songs of the Dragons Flying to Heaven is an inciting and insightful play about ethnic identity. This celebrated experimental playwright turns the Asian-identity play on its head when a coterie of Korean American women explore what it means to be Asian in a white-dominated society. Music, Korean tradition, romance and violence flood the stage. The result is a Tarantino-esque collage of monologues, dances and scenes that is as sharp as it is hilarious. The New York Times claims: “The best parodies start with great titles. So Young Jean Lee’s hysterically funny 'Songs of the Dragons Flying to Heaven' is perfect.” Young Jean Lee caused a sensation in New York with her recent plays Lear and The Shipment. Her other plays, performed both in New York and around the country, include The Appeal, Church, Pullman, WA and Groundwork of the Metaphysic of Morals. She is a member of New Dramatists and 13P and she is the artistic director of Young Jean Lee’s Theater Company. Ms. Lee’s plays have been published in numerous publications and she was a finalist for the 2010 Susan Smith Blackburn, a recipient of the 2009 Brooklyn College Young Alumni Award, the ZKB Patronage Prize 2007 of the Zurich Theater Spektakel, a 2007 Emerging Playwright OBIE Award, a 2010 fellowship in playwriting from NYFA, and a 2010 Prize in Literature from the American Academy of Arts and Letters. In their citation from the 2010 American Academy of Arts and Letters Literature Awards, the Academy members wrote: "Young Jean Lee's plays are fierce, challenging, brazenly theatrical, and then transcendentally lyrical. Her wit is both biting and hilarious. Her subjects big, bold, and daring, but truthful and humane...She has created a theater like none other, and with it, a fresh dramatic language for the multi-cultural American stage." Songs of the Dragons Flying to Heaven will be directed by Natsu Onoda Power. Onoda Power was the artistic director of Chicago’s Live Action Cartoonists, where she directed SCIENCE (FICTION), are you my negative space?, performance of sleep in one long act without intermission, Stitched and The Revenge of Poisoned Ladies. She currently a visiting professor at Georgetown University where she has also directed Madness and Civilization, The T Party, Trees and Ghosts and Swimmy and Other Stories. To create the world of Songs of the Dragons Flying to Heaven, Power will be joined by Luciana Stecconi (Setting), Joyce Liao (Lighting), Elisheba Ittoop (Sound) and Laree Ashley Lentz (Costumes) Jiehae Park comes to The Studio 2ndStage from California. Her credits include Youth Ink at Woolly Mammoth Theatre Company, Memphis at La Jolla Playhouse and Paradise Street at Title3@the Attic. Film credits include Step Up, Parallology and A Man Walks into a Bar. New York actor, Patricia Penn makes her Studio Theatre debut. Ms. Penn’s previous experience includes The Taming of the Shrew at Shakespeare Theatre Company and M. Butterfly at Arena Stage. Television credits include The Wire. Sue Jin Song’s Off Broadway credits include Iphigenia at Aulis and Exit the King, both at The Pearl Theatre Company. Ms. Song’s film and television credits include Pipe Dream, Someone like You, As the World Turns, 24, ER, Law & Order and Spin City. Youngsun Cho received her B.A. from M.I.T., where she performed in such productions as The Internationalist, The Bear and The Vagina Monologues. She is currently a student in The Studio Theatre Acting Conservatory. Rachel Holt returns to The Studio 2ndStage after appearing in 2009’s The Receptionist. She was recently seen in The Alchemist at The Shakespeare Theatre Company and Da at the Olney Theatre Center. Brandon McCoy was recently seen in Reasons to Be Pretty at The Studio Theatre, New Jerusalem at Theater J; In the Heart of America (Helen Hayes Award nomination); and The Glass Menagerie and Hamlet at Rep Stage. Mr. McCoy is a five time Irene Ryan Award nominee. The 2010-2011 season of The Studio Theatre 2ndStage is generously underwritten by Don and Nancy Bliss and A. Fenner Milton. Featuring: Jiehae Park (Korean American), Patricia Penn (Korean 1), Sue Jin Song (Korean 2), Youngsun Cho (Korean 3), Rachel Holt (White Person 1) and Brandon McCoy (White Person 2). Director and Designers: Natsu Onoda Power (Director), Luciana Stecconi (Setting), Joyce Liao (Lighting), Elisheba Ittoop (Sound) and Laree Ashley Lentz (Costumes). SONGS OF THE DRAGONS FLYING TO HEAVEN INFORMATION Where: Stage 4 Dates: September 29–October 24, 2010 Performances: Wednesday-Saturday: 8:30pm, Sunday: 7:30pm Ticket Prices: Preview Prices: September 29, 30, October 1: $25, Wednesday-Friday and Sunday: $30, Saturday Evenings $35 Press Opening: Sunday, October 3, 2010 Group Rates: Discounts available for groups of 10 more tickets. Call 202-232-7267 and ask for group sales. THE STUDIO 2NDSTAGE INFORMATION: The Studio 2ndStage, under the artistic direction of Keith Alan Baker, creates edgy, extreme and electrifying productions that complement The Studio Theatre’s season, all presented in its flexible raw space, Stage 4. The Washington Post proclaimed that 2ndStage “has long been a playground for... directors and actors (and, naturally, some of its riskier experiments)” and that a “convention-defying approach informs many 2ndStage offerings.” DISCOUNTS Student, senior citizen (62+) and military discount: $5 off (except Saturday evenings). Student Rush: $19 tickets for full-time students are available one-half hour before curtain on a seating available basis (except Saturday evenings). Groups: for parties of 10 or more. Call the Group Sales Manager at 202-232-7267. GENERAL INFORMATION Accessibility: All performances are fully accessible to accommodate patrons with special needs. FM listening assistive system available. Call for schedule of sign-interpreted performances. Accessible seats available by reservation. Call the Box Office at 202-332-3300 or V/TTY 202-667-8436. Location: 1501 14th Street, NW (Northeast corner of 14th and P Streets). Parking: Please call the Box Office for parking information. Metro Stops: Red Line: Dupont Circle, Orange/Blue Lines: McPherson Square, and Green Line U Street/Cardozo. Contact Information: Tickets: 202-332-3300 V/TTY: 202-667-8436 Fax: 202-332-1187 Administration: 202-232-7267 Admin. Fax: 202-588-5262 Web site: www.studiotheatre.org E-mail: studio@studiotheatre.org Home \| News \| Calendar \| Directory \| Plays \| Library/Storefront \| Timeline Copyright 2010, Roger W. Tang Questions? Email

Washington DC's Studio Theatre presents Songs of the Dragons Flying to Heaven