A Life
- Written by Adam Bock
- Directed by Anne Kauffman
Adam Bock is a playwright best known for A Small Fire, The Receptionist, The Drunken City, The Thugs, and Swimming in the Shallows. He writes both comedy and drama, blending whimsical surrealism with dark and painful exploration of character. Charles Isherwood described A Small Fire as “a theatrical combo plate that proves unusually satisfying ... raucous, funny and unexpectedly touching.” Adam has had more than ten plays produced at prestigious theatres including Manhattan Theatre Club, Playwrights Horizons, Soho Rep., Second Stage Uptown, Rattlestick, and Yale Rep. He has received the Obie Award, BATCC Award, Clauder Prize, Glickman Award, and Guernsey Award, and been nominated for the Drama Desk and Outer Critics Circle awards. Adam has been a resident playwright at New Dramatists and an artistic associate at Shotgun Players and Encore Theater. (As of February 2016)
Photo by Zack DeZon
Anne Kauffman (Directing Consultant) New York Philharmonic, BAM, Ars Nova, NYTW, Roundabout Theatre Company, Encores! Off-Center, Women’s Project, Playwrights Horizons, MCC, The Public, P73 Productions, New Georges, Vineyard Theater, LCT3, Yale Rep, Steppenwolf, Goodman Theater, La Jolla Playhouse, Z Space, American Conservatory Theater and Berkeley Rep. She is a Resident Director at Roundabout Theater, Artistic Associate and Founding Member of The Civilians, a Clubbed Thumb Associate Artist and co-creator of the CT Directing Fellowship, a New Georges Associate Artist, an SDC Executive Board Member, Vice President and Trustee of SDCF 2020-2023 and Artistic Director of City Center’s Encores! Off-Center 2017-2020. Kauffman’s awards include a 2024 Tony nomination for Best Director for MARY JANE, a 2023 Tony nomination for Best Revival for THE SIGN IN SIDNEY BRUSTEIN’S WINDOW, three Obies, the Joan and Joseph Cullman Award for Exceptional Creativity from Lincoln Center, the Alan Schneider Director Award, a Lucille Lortel Award, a Drama League award and the Joe A. Callaway. Co-creator of the Cast Album Project with Jeanine Tesori.
World Premiere
Nate Martin is hopelessly single. When his most recent breakup, another in a lifelong string of ill-fated matches, casts him into a funk, he turns to the only source of wisdom he trusts: the stars. Poring over astrological charts, he obsessively questions his past and his place in the cosmos. But in Adam Bock’s disarming new play, the answer he receives, when it comes, is shockingly obvious — and totally unpredictable.
Featuring
Marinda Anderson
JocelynBrad Heberlee
CurtisNedra Marie Taylor
AllisonLynne McCollough
Lori MartinDavid Hyde Pierce
Nate MartinPlaywrights Horizons: Bella: An American Tall Tale, A Life, Far From Heaven. Other Off-Broadway: Sex of the Baby (Access Theatre), Macbeth (Lincoln Center Interactive Theatre), Obama-ology (Juilliard School). Regional: Airness (Humana), A Doll’s House (Huntington), Three Sisters (Playmaker’s Rep), Lady Day at Emerson’s Bar and Grill (Berskshire Theatre Award nominee, outstanding female performance), Intimate Apparel (Dorset Theatre Festival), Fairfield (Cleveland Play House). TV: “Horace and Pete,” “Gotham.” BFA: Howard University MFA: NYU Graduate Acting Program. marindaanderson.com
(as of 8/24/17)
Playwrights Horizons debut. Off-Broadway: Small Mouth Sounds (Signature Theatre), These Paper Bullets! (Atlantic Theater), The Thugs (SoHo Rep.). Regional: These Paper Bullets! (Yale Rep and Geffen Playhouse), Noises Off (Actors Theatre of Louisville), 36 Views (Huntington Theatre). Film: A Woman, A Part; Loitering with Intent. TV: “Codes of Conduct,” “White Collar.”
Playwrights: A Life. Taylor holds an MFA from the Actors Studio Drama School. Broadway: The Book of Mormon (Eugene O’Neill), Marvin's Room (Roundabout). Off-Broadway: The House that Will Not Stand (NYTW), The Underlying Chris (Second Stage), Lost Lake (MTC). TV: series regular on Invasion (Apple TV+), Orange is The New Black, NCIS: New Orleans, Random Acts of Flyness, Jessica Jones, and more.
Playwrights Horizons debut. Off-Broadway: Angels in America (Signature Theatre), Dot (Clubbed Thumb), The Thugs (SoHo Rep.), Cavedweller (NYTW). Film: Music for People Who Can’t Go Home, The Missing Person. TV: “One Life to Live,” “Brotherhood,” “Without a Trace."
Emmy and Tony Award winner David Hyde Pierce made his professional and Broadway debut in 1982 as the waiter in Christopher Durang’s Beyond Therapy and will return to the Great White Way in the spring of 2017 as Horace Vandergelder in the revival of Hello, Dolly! opposite Bette Midler. Pierce won a Tony Award for his starring role in the musical Curtains and was also nominated for his performance in Durang’s Vanya and Sonia and Masha and Spike. Other recent New York stage credits include Broadway’s Accent on Youth (Manhattan Theater Club), La Bête (also London) and the John Kander musical The Landing (The Vineyard). He made his Playwrights Horizons debut in 1987 in Richard Greenberg’s The Maderati and also appeared in their 1989 Broadway production of Wendy Wasserstein’s The Heidi Chronicles. Other New York stage credits include Monty Python's Spamalot (Drama Desk nomination); Hamlet and Much Ado (New York Shakespeare Festival); and the Off-Broadway productions That's It, Folks!; The Author's Voice; Zero Positive; Elliot Loves; and White Rabbit Red Rabbit. Regionally, Pierce has appeared in Holiday and Camille (Long Wharf Theatre); Candida (Goodman Theatre); and The Seagull, Tartuffe, Cyrano and Midsummer Night's Dream (Guthrie Theatre); as well as Peter Brook’s The Cherry Orchard in New York, Moscow, Leningrad and Tokyo. In Los Angeles, he appeared in Terrence McNally’s It’s Only a Play (Doolittle Theatre) and Six Dance Lessons in Six Weeks (Geffen Playhouse, opposite Uta Hagen). Pierce’s film credits include Bright Lights, Big City; Crossing Delancey; Little Man Tate; Sleepless in Seattle; Wolf; Nixon; Isn't She Great; Wet Hot American Summer; Full Frontal; Down with Love; A Bug's Life; Osmosis Jones; Treasure Planet; and the Sundance Film Festival Selection The Perfect Host. His television credits include a short but happy stint on Norman Lear’s political satire “The Powers That Be,” and a long but happy stint on “Frasier,” for which he earned four Emmy Awards and the American Comedy, Television Critics, Viewers for Quality Television and Screen Actors Guild Awards. Last year, he returned to series television with a guest arc on “The Good Wife” and also reprised his role on the Netflix reboot of “Wet Hot American Summer: First Day of Camp.” Now making his mark as a director, Pierce’s credits include David Lindsay-Abaire’s Ripcord at MTC, Broadway’s It Shoulda Been You (also George Street Playhouse), the Los Angeles premiere of Vanya and Sonia… and The Importance of Being Earnest (Williamstown Theatre Festival). Pierce has worked with The Alzheimer’s Association for nearly twenty years as a board member and national spokesperson. In 2010, he was awarded the Tony Awards’ Isabelle Stevenson Award for his work with the Association. (as of June 2016)
Creative Team
Laura Jellinek
Scenic DesignJessica Pabst
Costume DesignMatt Frey
Lighting DesignMikhail Fiksel
Sound DesignErin Gioia Albrecht
Production Stage ManagerPlaywrights Horizons: The Light Years, A Life (Lortel Award, Drama Desk nomination), Marjorie Prime, Your Mother’s Copy… Broadway: Marvin’s Room. Other Off-Broadway: The Antipodes, Everybody (Signature); The Nether (MCC, Lortel nomination); Buzzer (The Public); The Wolves (Playwrights Realm). Regional: Yale Rep, Bard Summerscape, Cincinnati Playhouse, Oregon Shakespeare Festival, Williamstown, Southcoast Rep. Opera: Opera Theatre of St. Louis, Boston Lyric Opera, Opera Philadelphia, Atlanta Opera. Obie Award for Sustained Excellence in Design.
Recent theatre design projects: LITTLE BEAR RIDGE ROAD by Samuel D. Hunter directed by Joe Mantello and starring Laurie Metcalf; INHERIT THE WIND by Jerome Lawrence and Robert E. Lee, directed by Henry Godinez, at the Goodman’s Albert Theatre. THE COST OF LIVING by Martyna Majok, directed by Jo Bonney on Broadway at the Samuel Friedman Theatre; Other Broadway credits include The Roundabout Theatre Company's revival of MARVIN'S ROOM by Scott McPherson directed by Anne Kauffman starring Lili Taylor, Celia Weston, and Janeane Garofalo and THE HEIDI CHRONICLES by Wendy Wasserstein, directed by Pam MacKinnon starring Elisabeth Moss, Jason Biggs, and Bryce Pinkham.
Playwrights Horizons: The Profane, Rancho Viejo, A Life, Placebo, This, Grand Concourse, The Call, Go Back to Where You Are, She Stoops to Comedy. Other Off-Broadway: Everybody (Signature), All the Ways... (MCC), War (LCT3), Gloria (Vineyard), The Way We Get By (Second Stage), Buzzer (The Public), An Octoroon (Soho Rep., TFANA), Generations (Soho Rep.). Regional: For Peter Pan on her 70th birthday (Humana Festival 2016, Berkeley Rep).
Playwrights: A Life (Lortel Award, Drama Desk nomination). Other Off-Broadway: The Undertaking (The Civilians/BAM), World Of Extreme Happiness (MTC), Fulfillment (The Flea, Drama Desk nomination), Stupid F*#king Bird (The Pearl), The Old Man and The Old Moon (New Victory, Williamstown), My Mañana Comes (Playwrights Realm, Lortel nomination), The Elaborate Entrance of Chad Deity (Second Stage, Lortel Award). Regional: La Jolla Playhouse, Old Globe, Third Rail Projects, Center Theatre Group, Goodman Theatre. mikhailfiksel.com
Playwrights Horizons: Bella, A Life, Men On Boats, Marjorie Prime, The Christians. Broadway: Bullets Over Broadway, Matilda, Bronx Bombers, Hands on a Hardbody. Other Off-Broadway: Charm, Punk Rock, The Village Bike, The Third Story (MCC); Sundown, Yellow Moon (Ars Nova/WP Theater); Red Speedo (NYTW); Abundance (TACT); Venice (The Public); Bronx Bombers (Primary Stages). Regional: multiple productions at The Old Globe and La Jolla Playhouse, most recently the development of John Leguizamo’s Latin History for Morons. MFA: UC San Diego.
★★★★★ Critics’ Pick! Adam Bock's ‘A Life’ is exquisite in detail and throws a jaw-dropping curveball.
David Hyde Pierce brings ‘A Life’ alive!
Anne Kauffman stages with a sense of high drama.