Readings

  • The Word at the Road Reading

    The Word at the Road

    As part of our mission to foster the development of new plays, The Road hosts readings on Mondays at 8pm that are open to the public and tickets are pay what you can. Readings are followed by a talkback with the playwright. Check back often for new additions to the lineup and make sure to follow us for updates and reminders.
    • Jan 21st

      Sexual Healing

      The reading will be held at 8pm at The Road on Magnolia.

      Playwright: Peter Lefcourt.

      Director: Terri Hanauer

      Featuring: Tina Carlisi, Bart Tangredi, Brian Ibsen, Avery Clyde, Rahul Rai, Kaitlin Huwe, Carissa Pinckney, and Scottie Nevil.

      A very dark comedy in which four alleged perpetrators of sexual abuse do their court-appointed time at the Happy Valley Sexual Wellness Center, a rehab facility in the Arizona desert, where they do battle with their demons and with one another.

    • Jan 28th

      Harmony Park

      The reading will be held at 8pm at The Road on Magnolia.

      Playwright: Daniel Damiano

      Director: Justin Lord

      Featuring: Dan Martin, Adam Duarte, Leandro Cano, and Jeff LeBeau.

       

      Set on the construction site of a soon-to-be public park in Queens, NY, the friendship between a black foreman and a younger white landscaper is tested when a newly hired crew member’s past is revealed.

    • Feb 4th

      Tale of the White Rabbit

      The reading will be held at 8pm at The Road on Magnolia.

      Playwright: Jim Geoghan

      Director: Jonathan Levit

      Featuring: Brian Graves, Chet Grissom, Stephen Tyler Howell, Allan Wasserman, Lizzy Kimball, and Christine Joelle.

       

      There are predators, there are victims, and there are those who bare witness.

    • Feb 18th

      From White Plains

      The reading will be held at 8pm at The Road on Magnolia.

      Playwright: Michael Perlman

      Director: Ryan McRee

      Featuring: Jesse Einstein, Christian Prentice, Blake Young-Fountain, Ray Paolantonio.

       

      In an emotional Academy Awards acceptance speech, Dennis Sullivan publicly denounces Ethan Rice, the high school bully Dennis believes pushed his best friend to suicide and who, 15 years later, inspired the screenplay that garnered the Oscar. As the speech goes viral, Ethan must confront what he did as a teenager and Dennis finds himself in the position of crusader. They are both forced to grapple with difficult questions: how do our present selves account for actions that we or others have taken in the past? In the court of public opinion, who has the power to forgive?

    • Mar 18th

      Williston

      The reading will be held at 8pm at The Road on Magnolia.

      Playwright: Adam Seidel

      Director: Ann Hearn Tobolowsky

      Featuring: TBA.

       

      The year is 2013 and the domestic energy boom is in full swing. Larry and Barb, two veteran reps with a small oil company, travel to Williston, North Dakota to secure drilling rights on the last untouched parcel of oil-rich land when the arrival of a newbie shakes things up. It’s not business as usual in this boomtown. Williston is a play about generational conflict, the quest for legacy, the social and environmental impacts of industry on small communities, and asks: how far would you go to close the deal?

    • Mar 25th

      For Nina

      The reading will be held at 8pm at The Road on Magnolia.

      Playwright: Robert Emmet Lunney

      Director: Kenneth Meseroll

      Featuring: Stephanie Erb, Leon Russom, Paris Perrault, Taylor Nichols, Geoffrey Wade, Kara Hume, and Amy Tolsky.

       

      Nina Dalton, a movie star too old for Hollywood, has returned to the stage in a new play by her much older, Pulitzer Prize-winning novelist husband, Brian Bartov.  Brian is waging a dual battle against early-stage Alzheimer’s Disease and the temptation to rewrite Nina’s part for a young starlet in the play’s film version. Their bold-faced world is unsettled and challenged by the return of Gar Jackson, Nina’s first love, who re-appears after a twenty year absence. He comes with a commitment to Art over Commerce, and a play of staggering beauty and epic proportions, written especially for Nina.

    • Apr 8th

      The Book of Leonidas

      The reading will be held at 8pm at The Road on Magnolia.

      Playwright: Augusto Amador

      Director: Taylor Nichols

      Featuring: Paris Perrault

       

      Lenny is a hustler selling loosies on the same street corner in Queens that his father, Leonidas, used to rule over as legendary crime lord in the ’70’s.  From his loosie profits he supports and lives with his repressive mother who derides him for not living up to Leonidas’ criminal legacy. Lenny finds an escape while working on his graphic novels until he stumbles into love with a pretty white girl, Lindsay.  As their relationship deepens, the pressure of who he wants to be and who he was meant to be, careen into a final conclusion.

    • Apr 22nd

      Stuck

      The reading will be held at 8pm at The Road on Magnolia.

      Playwright: David Doubt

      Translator & Director: Pavel Cerny

      Featuring: Allison Blaize, Brian Graves, Stephen Tyler Howell, Karrie King, and Allan Wasserman.

       

      STUCK tells the story of five people who are searching for a way out from being “stuck” in their lives.  Symbolized here by being stuck on the 23rd floor of a high rise. The idea for the comedy/psychodrama translated (from the Czech ZASEK) as STUCK, was developed years ago by a group of actors, dramaturges, and directors of the leading Prague stage. Pavel Cerny (previously at The Road with Terrence McNally’s “And Away We Go”) has translated the play from Czech.

    • June 3rd

      Eureka Day

      The reading will be held at 8pm at The Road on Magnolia.

      Playwright: Jonathan Spector

      Director: Darin Anthony

      Featuring: Tisha Terrasini Banker

       

      At forward-thinking Eureka Day School, all decisions are made by consensus and everyone’s opinion is valued. But when a crisis puts their children in danger, it turns out that Eureka Day parents have different definitions of safety. The debate over vaccinations hits home in this comedy of liberal manners, as the school community confronts the central question of our era: how do you find consensus when you can’t agree on the facts?

  • Playwrights Festival | July 28th-Aug 4th

    The Road Theatre’s annual Summer Playwrights Festival has been held every summer since its inception in 2010. This year marks our 10th anniversary and SPF10 will take place from July 28-August 4, 2019. SPF mounts 30-40 staged readings of new plays in 8 exciting days. The festival is now the largest staged reading festival in the nation with playwrights from around the country and around the world participating. Each reading is followed by a talk-back with the playwrights, directors and casts and a reception featuring food, drink and live music in our gallery space and cantina. Readings are held in both our Historic Lankershim Arts Center Theater and Gallery and in our 77-seat theater in the NoHo Senior Arts Colony. Although we receive hundreds of submissions for our festival, new and established playwrights are encouraged to submit.

    Past playwrights have included D.L. Coburn, Lisa Loomer, Sharr White, Marisa Wegrzyn, Craig Wright, Wendy Macleod, Lucy Thurber, Mo Gaffney, Keith Huff, Brett Neveu, Scooter Pietsch, Craig Pospisil, Julie Marie Myatt. Guest artists have included Bryan Cranston, Laurie Metcalf, Kathy Baker, Jennifer Tilly, Perry King, Rondi Reed, Tom Irwin, Nancy Travis, Gregory Harrison, Gale Harold, Robert Pine, Michael O’Neill, Harold Gould, and many, many others.

    Click here for SPF10 submission info.

  • Photo Credit: Alex Portenko

    Common Ground

    Started in 2018, Common Ground is a new performance series that showcases the talent of our diverse company as they perform original short stories on themes central to our mission. Common Ground is free to the public.