On Stage

Spark

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A special Veterans Day reading of the new play Spark by OBIE-award winning playwright Caridad Svich, followed by an expert panel discussion on the experience of women veterans facing trauma and assault while serving.

Produced by Gloria Mann, TECL / Mannatee Films, in collaboration with NoPassport, the cast includes Louis Cancelmi (Blasted, Soho Rep), Marin Ireland (Tony Award nominee, reasons to be pretty), Jocelyn Kuritsky (Woodshed Collective, 13P), and Gloria Mann (Ashes to Ashes, Walkerspace), and Peter Jay Fernandez. Scott Schwartz (Golda’s Balcony) will direct the reading.

Spark centers on a family of sisters in North Carolina, one of whom is a returning veteran from a recent war. Along with hosting the event, after the reading, Tony Award-winning actress Kathleen Chalfant will participate in a distinguished panel on the role of women in the US military, psychological and physical health for veterans, and the role of art in the healing process.
 
Moderated by Omega Institute program strategist Michael Craft, the panel will also feature one of America’s leading physicians working with military trauma, former Air Force Major Nisha Money MD; acclaimed documentary filmmaker, JulieHera DeStefano, whose new film, Journey to Normal: Women of War Come Home, recounts the unprecedented story of women who have served in Iraq and Afghanistan; and Gulf War veteran Susan Lynch, Executive Director of There and Back-Again (www.thereandback-again.org), a nonprofit supporting active service-members and providing reintegration support services to combat veterans of all conflicts. The Cherry Lane evening for Spark is sponsored, in part, by Oliver Kita Chocolates and Michael Boris Clothing.

Spark is the third play in Caridad Svich’s American quartet of plays addressing national issues/global concerns that include 2012 Edgerton Foundation New Play Award-winning Guapa and The Way of Water. Spark will receive dozens of readings, including the Cherry Lane Theatre event, across the United States and internationally throughout November 2012. Among the additional national venues that are participating in the national reading scheme are Bristol Riverside Theatre in Pennsylvania, Profile Theatre in Portland, Stages Repertory Theatre in Houston, The Playwrights Center of Minneapolis, Theatre Project and Bump in the Road in Baltimore, and Tricklock Theatre in Albuquerque.

November 11