A Public Reading of an Unproduced Screenplay About the Death of Walt Disney

Photo by Marisa Viola

Aided by a pack of cigarettes, a bottle of vodka, three actors, and a pile of dead lemmings, Walt Disney will read to you a screenplay he wrote about his final days on earth.

Artists Involved: Written by Lucas Hnath; directed by Sarah Benson; featuring Reed Birney, Michael Chernus, Thomas Jay Ryan, and Heidi Schreck.

Lead Artists: LUCAS HNATH’s recent plays include A Public Reading of an Unproduced Screenplay about the Death of Walt Disney, Red Speedo, Hillary and Clinton, Sake Tasting with a Séance to Follow, The Courtship of Anna Nicole Smith, Odile’s Ordeal, Tonguetied, and Three Attempts at Corrective Eye Surgery. A resident playwright at New Dramatists since 2011, Lucas’ work has been produced at Actors Theatre of Louisville, University of Miami, The Culture Project, Target Margin and Ontological-Hysteric Theater. Additionally, his plays have been developed at Ensemble Studio Theatre, Rattlestick Playwrights Theater, and Cleveland Public Theatre. He has also enjoyed playwriting
residencies with The Royal Court Theatre and 24Seven Lab. Most recently his play Death Tax premiered in the 36th Annual Humana Festival of New American Plays. Lucas is a two-time winner of the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation Grant for his feature-length screenplays, The Painting, the Machine, and the Apple and Still Life. He is also a recipient of an EST/Sloan Project commission for his play, Isaac’s Eye. He is currently working two commissions for Actors Theatre of Louisville. Lucas received both his BFA and MFA from NYU’s Department of Dramatic Writing and is a lecturer in NYU’s Expository Writing Program.

SARAH BENSON has been the Artistic Director of Soho Rep since 2007. For Soho Rep: David Adjmi’s Elective Affinities (site-specific); Sarah Kane’s Blasted (OBIE award, Drama Desk nomination); Gregory Moss’ Orange, Hat & Grace. Upcoming: Richard Maxwell’s Samara. Her body of work has been recognized with six Obie awards, three Drama Desk nominations, and The New York Times Outstanding Playwriting Award. Benson moved to New York from London on a Fulbright Award. She is editing the upcoming anthology: The Methuen Drama Book of New American Plays (2013). She has served as a mentor in the directing programs at NYU and Yale, and was the co-curator of PRELUDE from 2005-2006.