UCCA, in partnership with Ping Pong Productions, is pleased to present “Performing Arts Platform Series: A Brief History of American Theater” by Henry Clarke and Cheryl Turski.

The performance offers a brief introduction to some of the major voices and artistic movements that have shaped the American stage.

In the 20th century, and now in the 21st, the diversity of voices on the American stage has helped to shape and guide our national debate. Generations of playwrights and theater artists have dug into the fundamental themes of the American experience—the struggles for civil rights, the pressures of capitalism, and the phenomenal complexity of the American dream—and have left us an artistic and historical record of the nation.

Note

*You can collect your ticket from the ticket desk 30 minutes before the event begins.

*No late entry.

Henry Clarke is an actor and writer based in Los Angeles. He has toured China twice in L.A. Theatre Works’ Top Secret: The Battle for the Pentagon Papers, and can be seen on the television program Action English on CCTV6. Clarke's television credits include Chuck, Lie to Me, House MD, and the national PBS special Evening at Pops: Brush up Your Shakespeare. Select stage credits include Venus in Fur (American Conservatory Theater), No Man's Land (American Repertory Theater), Henry V, A Midsummer Night's Dream, Richard III (Shakespeare & Co.), Hamlet (Icarus NYC), and The Most Fabulous Story Ever Told (SpeakEasy Stage). As a writer, Henry's plays have been produced at Big Dance Theater's Play Play Faster Faster Festival, the New York Cookie Workshop, Marlboro College, Smith College, and the ART Institute. He recently finished his first novel, The Beast in the Bricks. Clarke holds a BA from Harvard University, an MFA in playwriting from Smith College, and an MFA in acting from the Harvard University/Moscow Art Theater Institute.

Cheryl Turski is an actor and professor based in Detroit. She has worked at the Meadow Brook Theatre (The Constant Wife, The Game's Afoot), Tipping Point Theatre, Jeff Daniels' The Purple Rose Theatre, and in Boston at the American Repertory Theatre (The Donkey Show), Seacoast Repertory Theatre (Proof), Wellesley Summer Players (Private Lives), Foothills Theatre, and Publick Theatre Boston. She has choreographed for the ART Institute and Mainstage, with three of her productions receiving residencies at the Moscow Art Theatre-American Studio. Currently, she is an assistant professor of theater at Wayne State University, and she was formerly on the faculty at Notre Dame. Cheryl holds a BA from Notre Dame, a CMA from the Laban/Bartenieff Institute of Movement Studies in New York, and an MFA from the A.R.T./MXAT Institute for Advanced Theatre Training at Harvard University.

In March 2014, UCCA and Ping Pong Productions launched the Performing Arts Platform Series. Through a wide variety of performances, open rehearsals, performing arts workshops, master classes, arts management seminars, lectures, talks, and discussions with artists, critics, and scholars, this program series creates unprecedented opportunities for Chinese and international performing artists and audiences to meet and interact. It facilitates cross-genre and cross-cultural exploration, enriching cultural exchange and collaboration between Chinese and international artists, audiences, and students.

Ping Pong Productions is a catalyst that brings China and the world together through the performing arts. As artistic ambassadors, they engage cultures through discourse, searching for points of cooperation, mutual exchange, and understanding. They develop cultural exchange projects and facilitate creative collaborations between Chinese and international artists, scholars and audiences. With teams based in China and the United States, PPP has extensive experience providing production, consulting, management, and planning services.

http://www.pingpongarts.org/

Pacific Trans-Global Productions