210215_MCC_TTAAU_Header_v01

by SUSAN SOON HE STANTON
directed by ELLIE HEYMAN

THE THINGS ARE AGAINST US
A new play from playwright SUSAN SOON HE STANTON and director ELLIE HEYMAN

AN MCC VIRTUAL EVENT
NOW AVAILABLE TO STREAM

Lorca. One claw-foot bathtub, two sisters, and a young man’s journey to unearth the dark secrets of his grandfather’s past. All roads lead to a mysterious house with a mind of its own. Are there bones in the basement and passive-aggressive shadows in the corners? The Spreckle house invites you to spend the night.

#THETHINGSAREAGAINSTUSMCC

This virtual event is a part of MCC’s LIVELAB series. We began our life at MCC almost 35 years ago with the One-Act Festival, so as we embark on another beginning – MCC Virtual Events – we wanted to pay homage to our roots, by hosting a series of One-Act play readings. Act readings will be between 25 – 45 minutes in length and will be read and live-streamed and will feature a talkback with the cast and creative team following the performance.

JOIN US FOR A PANEL DISCUSSION: UNEARTHING THE PAST

FRI MAR 5 @ 5:30PM ET on our YOUTUBE CHANNEL

Secrets are revealed. Stories are told and connections to the past are made. Join us for a panel discussion about family and folklore .

An evening discussion about lingering spirits, flights of inspiration, replanting what has been uprooted. We will uncover the process behind the creation of THE THINGS ARE AGAINST US and look at our individual connection to people, places and things of the past and the power that inhabits them. If matter is never destroyed but only changes, what becomes of what was?

Playwright SUSAN SOON HE STANTON, Director ELLIE HEYMAN, are joined by Intuitive Reader Victoria Libertore and Ghost Tour Guide, Christian Cagigal and Executive Director of The Order Of the Good Death, Sarah Chavez.

REGISTER

CAST & CREATIVE TEAM

SUSAN SOON HE STANTON

Playwright

SUSAN SOON HE STANTON

Playwright

Susan Soon He Stanton (Playwright) is a writer for theatre, film, and television from ‘Aiea, Hawai‘i. Susan is a producer and writer on the BAFTA, Golden Globe and Emmy award winning HBO Succession, for which she has also won WGA and Peabody Awards. Upcoming television work includes Amazon’s Modern Love, BBC / Element Pictures’ Conversation with Friends adapted from the novel by Sally Rooney. Plays include we, the invisibles (Actors Theatre of Louisville Humana Festival), Today Is My Birthday (Page 73), Takarazuka!!! (Clubbed Thumb and East West Players), Solstice Party! (Live Source), Cygnus (Women’s Project Pipeline), Moana Jr. (book) for Disney Theatrical Group, Navigator (Honolulu Theatre for Youth), and more. She is a Sundance Theater Lab Resident Playwright and was awarded Leah Ryan FEWW, the Venturous Playwrights Fellowship at the Lark, and is a member of New Dramatists and MaYi’s Playwright’s Lab, and was an alumni of Primary Stage’s Dorothy Strelsin New American Writers Group, the Public’s Emerging Writer’s Group, and SoHo Rep’s Writer Director Lab. Commissions include Yale Repertory, American Conservatory Theater/Crowded Fire, South Coast Repertory, and Ensemble Studio Theatre, among others. In film, she received a Feature Film Development Grant from the Sloan Foundation. Her film Dress won the audience award at the Hawaii International Film Festival. BFA: NYU Tisch’s Dramatic Writing, MFA from Yale School of Drama. www.susansoonhestanton.com

ELLIE HEYMAN

Director

ELLIE HEYMAN

Director

Ellie Heyman (Director) is a director of theater and film. Recent credits include: The Great Work Begins: Scenes from Angels in America (amfAR); Adrienne Truscott’s (Still) Asking For It (Joe’s Pub/The Public Subscriber Season 2019-2020); A$AP Rocky’s Lab Rat, ThisTree (Here Arts, Protype), Jason Craig & Dave Malloy’s Beardo (Drama Desk Nomination; Pipeline Theater), Erin Markey’s Boner Killer (Under the Radar), Becca Blackwell’s They, Themself and Schmerm (Under the Radar); THIS (Bessie Nomination for Outstanding Production; NYLA), Jupiter’s Lifeless Moons (PS122/COIL);  The Traveling Imaginary with Julian Koster (Neutral Milk Hotel) rated “Top 5 shows of the year” by NPR; The Orbiting Human Circus (Of the Air), rated #1 on Apple Podcasts and downloaded 5 million+ times; and “cult classic” Dreamboy (Night Vale Presents). She is a graduate of Northwestern University and Boston University, and a Drama League and WP Theater Time Warner Directing Fellow Alumni. ellieheyman.com

JUAN CASTANO

Lorca/Carlo/Baba

JUAN CASTANO

Lorca/Carlo/Baba

Theatre:  TRANSFERS (MCC, Lucille Lortel Award – Best Lead Actor in a Play), OEDIPUS EL REY (The Public, Drama League Award nomination),  PARALLELOGRAM (Second Stage), TV: WHAT/IF (Netflix), TALES OF THE CITY (Netflix), THE OA (Netflix).  Juan received the Drama Desk’s highly coveted Sam Norkin Award for Excellence in Off-Broadway Theatre.

EMILY DAVIS

Tessa

EMILY DAVIS

Tessa

Emily Davis was last seen on stage in the critically-acclaimed run of Is This A Room at the Vineyard Theatre, which earned her an Obie Award, The Lucille Lortel Award for Outstanding Lead Actress in a Play, and a Drama Desk nomination for her starring performance. Emily co-stars in the short film White Wedding which will premiere at Sundance in 2021. Other NY theatre credits include Singlet (The Bushwick Starr), Of Government (Clubbed Thumb), My Old Man and Other Stories (Dixon Place), and O, Earth!  (The Foundry Theatre). Emily has worked with the theatre company Half Straddle for over a decade, performing in the U.S. and abroad in their original plays, including Ancient Lives, The Seagull (Thinking Of You), In The Pony Palace/Football, and Family. Her film and television credits include The Plagiarists, Almost Family, Gwen in Corpus and “High Maintenance” on HBO.

SUSANNAH FLOOD

Solange

SUSANNAH FLOOD

Solange

Susannah Flood (Solange) Broadway: The Cherry Orchard. Select Off-Broadway: Make Believe, Will Arbery’s Plano, The Effect, Tribes, Ivo Von Hove’s Scenes From A Marriage, Love & Information, Mr. Burns, The Sonic Life of a Giant Tortoise, Fulfillment, As You Like It, Baby Scream Miracle. On TV: Kate Littlejohn in “For The People”; “Law & Order: SVU”, “Chicago Fire”, “Deadbeat”, “Daylight Daycare”, and Amy Schumer’s upcoming “Love, Beth”. Radio: Julian Koster’s Orbiting Human Circus… (Night Vale Presents/WNYC). BA: UC Berkeley. MFA: Brown/Trinity. Go Bears.

BABAK TAFTI

Bashir/Yusef

BABAK TAFTI

Bashir/Yusef

Babak Tafti received outstanding reviews for his role as “Cassio”  in The Public Theater’s production of OTHELLO at Shakespeare in the Park. He will next be seen in Sylvia Khoury’s SELLING KABUL at Playwrights Horizons. Other recent stage credits include AGAINST THE HILLSIDE at EST; THE PROFANE for Playwrights’ Horizons; and SMALL MOUTH SOUNDS for Ars Nova and the Signature Theatre, directed by Rachel Chavkin. Recent TV credits include recurring arcs on SUCCESSION and LEGACIES, as well as guest stars on RAMY, BULL, MURPHY BROWN, NEW AMSTERDAM, QUANTICO and ELEMENTARY. He also starred in the independent feature SWALLOW which premiered at the 2019 Tribeca Film Festival. He is a graduate of the Yale School of Drama. 

DANNY WOLOHAN

Casper/Response/Claus

DANNY WOLOHAN

Casper/Response/Claus

Danny Wolohan (Casper/Response/Claus) was Officer Krupke in West Side Story on Broadway. He was also Boo Radley in Broadway’s To Kill a Mockingbird. Off-Broadway credits: An Octoroon, What the Constitution Means to Me, The Low Road, Assassins, The Flick, Pocatello, Verité, and Gnit. Television: “When They See Us,” “The Blacklist,” “Orange Is the New Black,” “Law & Order: SVU,” “Elementary,” “Veep”.

associate director ASHLIN HATCH
associate director MORGAN RIELLY

DESIGNERS

PAUL DEPOO III
Projection Designer

Paul Tate dePoo III is a Cuban-American scenic, projection, production designer and a fifth-generation island native of Key West, FL. dePoo has worked internationally in Seoul, South Korea, Bogota, Columbia, Toronto, Canada, and Vienna, Austria. He recently won the 2020 Helen Hayes award for ‘Outstanding Scenic Design’ for his production of Grand Hotel at Signature Theatre. dePoo has collaborated extensively with director Ellie Heyman; he recently served as the Creative Director for their production of The Great Work Begins: Scenes from Angels In America, benefitting amfAR’s Fund to Fight Covid-19 and was included within The New York Times’s top 10 productions of 2020. dePoo has collaborated with directors and choreographers Marc Bruni, Savion Glover, Michael Greif, JoAnn Hunter, Dennis Jones, Lorin Latarro, Kathleen Marshall, Josh Rhodes, and Eric Schaefer. dePoo serves as the resident scenic and projection designer for The Kennedy Center’s Broadway Centerstage Series, whose productions include The Music Man, The Who’s Tommy, Footloose, and Next to Normal. dePoo plans to open Pucchini’s Turandot this summer on the world’s largest outdoor opera stage in Vienna, Austria directed by Thaddeus Strassberger. www.pauldepoo.com

 

HEATH SAUNDERS
Sound Designer and Composer

HEATH SAUNDERS is an actor, composer, multi-instrumentalist, director, music director and diversity dramaturg. All of their free time (in the past) was devoted to readings, workshops, and new works, and their new world is mostly populated by aural experimentation. They were featured on the original (MCC!) cast recording of Duncan Sheik and Steven Sater’s new musical Alice By Heart. They spent much of 2018 involved in Jesus Christ Superstar, at the Lyric Opera of Chicago, as Jesus, and in Jesus Christ Superstar Live in Concert on NBC. They made their Broadway debut in Great Comet, and their musical Newton’s Cradle won Best in Fest at NYMF 2016. Their EP “Does Not Play Well With Others (I Hope You’re Not ‘Others’)” can be heard wherever you stream music, except maybe Tidal–they don’t know, they don’t have an account. thesaunderscollective.com @feeltheheath

MARY ELLEN STEBBINS
Lighting Designer

Mary Ellen Stebbins (Lighting Design) Recent credits include Shakespeare Theatre Company, Florentine Opera, Working Theater, Northern Stage, Talking Band, Prototype, Harvard University. She is a member of Sightline Arts and the Resident Designer for HOWL ensemble and Third Space.  She is a 2020 Bessie Award nominee, a 2019 Opera America Tobin Finalist, a 2016 Henry Hewes Award nomination, a 2014 Live Design Young Designer to Watch, the 2011 USITT Barbizon Lighting Design Award winner, and a 2009 Hangar Theatre Lab Company Design Fellow.  She is a proud member of USA 829.  MFA, Boston University; AB, Harvard College.  Mary Ellen currently teaches lighting design at the Carnegie Mellon School of Drama.   www.maryellenstebbinsdesign.com

LiveLabs: THE THINGS ARE AGAINST US STREAM NOW

Want access to our full 2023/24 season? 

 

YES! 

 

Click to YES to learn more about all the exclusive benefits for
SUBSCRIBERS & PATRONS

THE ROBERT W. WILSON MCC THEATER SPACE

 

Our new home in Hell’s Kitchen allows us to deepen our mission and encourage greater collaboration among all of our ARTISTS, STUDENTS, and AUDIENCES.

Learn More