2017 - 2018
2016-2017 Season
A Runaway, a Soldier, and a Snowball Fight.
by Leah Lawler
The culminating production of the PDC@IronAge residency. and world premiere, A Runaway, a Soldier and a Snowball reveals the tense, comedic surreality in Boston, 1770 in the days leading up to the Boston Massacre. Crispus Attucks, runaway slave, engages Sam Adams, a bumbling British soldier and a barkeep named Fergus each with a different agenda. Lauded as a martyr of the American revolution, sometimes history glorifies unfair murder as an act of defiance. History's first black casualty of political oppression, A Runaway, a Soldier and a Snowball fight mixes comedy and tragedy to drive home a message about the dangers of racism, the need for love and the indiscriminate nature of violence.
One of Deb Miller's Top 15 picks for the 2016 Fringe.
Featuring
JaRon C Battle and Ned Pryce
Stage Manager Abby TOll
9/14-9/24 2016
At Fergie's Pub
Tickets: http://fringearts.com/event/runaway-soldier-snowball-fight/
The Return of Fringe Wraiths
At various Venues around the Fringe in September 2017
Short videos that compliment Fringe Productions
Watch the videos on lineby following this link
Playlist of 2016 Fringe Wraiths
2015-2016 Season
DOGFALL by Caleb Lewis
Directed by John Doyle
featuring
Luke Moyer
Adam Altman
Jenna Kuerzi
photo by Josiah and Steph Photography
I can picture in my mind a world without war, a world without hate. And I can picture us attacking that world, because they'd never expect it.
It starts in the Somme, 1916. Two men fight to survive the war whole, but the battle keeps shifting and the enemy changes. And then the dogs begin to fall… Over one hundred years, Will and Jack hold post in a bunker fighting a never-ending war. From the Somme to Stalingrad, Vietnam to Abu Ghraib, the play depicts a world gone mad, where outside the sky rains cats and dogs, men behave like beasts, and death is all around.
Costume Design by Rory Zummo
Sound Design by Ben Levan
Fight Choreography by AJ Gagliardi
Props by Avista Custom Props
Reviews
An ambitious story of tremendous sweep and scope. impeccably delivered, superbly written with controlled power and insight, Dogfall exceeds all expectations.
Adelaide Theatre Guide
Complex themes, sympathetic characters and an absurd plot that avoids the traditional body count by concentrating on falling dogs. This makes for a tense, riveting play about the ironies of war and the deadly games soldiers play.
Aussie Theatre Guide
The scenario is a war-time convention. The wonder is Lewis’s imaginative insight. He arrays wars past and present like tin cans in a rough-shot shooting gallery till we end up bogged down in mud, mired in oil and blood with the dying and the dead.
Realtime
This play is extraordinary - imaginative, lyrical and heartfelt with a nightmarish imagery that suggests Ionesco at his most absurdly bleak and Donny Darko at its most cogent.
The Adelaide Review
Lewis's script is stunning, lyrical and frightening, yet it escapes total blackness by touching and often funny moments of humanity. As horror is piled upon horror and the absurdity of man is mirrored by the heavens, this emotional rollercoaster escalates to its frightening climax, leaving you breathless. This is the best thing I've seen in a very long time.
City Messenger
A GREAT WAR
An unbreakable soldier. An unwinnable war.
by James Christy Jr.
On the 100th anniversary of World War One, Iron Age Theatre presents the dynamic premiere of the remarkable journey of a German Jewish soldier who survives the deadliest battles of the Great War, only to learn the devastating truth about its origins.
at The MAAS Space
1325 N Randolph St Philadelphia
PERFORMANCES
Thursday Sept 10 - Sun Sept 27 2015
2014 Season
A Lesson Before Dying
by Romulus Linney Based on a novel by Ernest J. Gaines
Directed and Designed by Randall Wise and John Doyle
featuring
Walter DeShields
Richard Bradford
Liz Priestley
Damien Wallace
Lenny Daniels
Eric Wunsch
Dave Fiebert
Jefferson, an innocent young man, is condemned to death in Louisiana in 1948. At the trial his lawyer, trying to save his life, called him no more a human being than a hog. In prison, Jefferson says will be dragged like that hog to his death in the electric chair. His godmother asks a schoolteacher to teach him to die like a man. The teacher struggling with his own identity in the South, faces both Jefferson and himself as execution day arrives. Ernest J. Gaines' celebrated novel makes an engrossing, moving and finally devastating play for the stage.
NOVEMBER 2014
Up from the Ashes
by Kate McGrath
World Premiere
PCD @ Iron Age Residency
Directed and Designed by John Doyle
featuring: Isa St. Clair
Up From The Ashes takes the audience right to the fire. And not just to the Triangle Shirtwaist Factory fire of 1911 itself, but smack into the daily lives of those immigrant teengers who had to decide whether to burn or to jump...and helps ussee thru the eyes of the factory owners, the feisty union organizers, the witnesses to the infamous tragedy... A myriad of characters from history are played by Philadelphia favorite Isa St. Clair in a theatrical whirlwind, asking t he question: what has changed, and what has remained the same when it comes to workers rights? This new play by Kate McGrath, Philadelphia Dramatist Center playwright in residence this year, uses sound, music and projections to bring this ever-evolving issue to life and to bring you right into those moments of life-changing decision that haunt each and every one of us.
JANUARY 2014
Buried Child
by Sam Shepard
Directed and Designed by Randall Wise and John Doyle
featuring
Dave Fiebert
Eric Wunsch
Gina Martino
Michelle Pauls
Luke Moyer
Chuck Beishl
and Ray Saraceni.
MARCH 2014
The Toughest Boy in Philadelphia
by Andrea Kennedy Hart
Directed and Designed by John Doyle
featuring
K.O.DelMarcelle
Gina Martino
Michelle Pauls
Susan Giddings
Colleen Hughes
Sound Design by Luke Moyer
June 2014
The Gender Bending True Story of A Philadelphia Gangster
A new play about identity, ambition, and authenticity. Jack rises in the Irish Mob with a secret hidden under his smart suits and spats. Explore his daring adventures, his deep loves and his struggle to find acceptance. Celebrate Gay Pride month with this forgotten hero of the LGBT past.
MANA
by Ray Saraceni
A World Premiere
Directed and Designed by Randall Wise and John Doyle
with Laurie Norton, Adam Altman, Mark Cairns
November 2013
at The Centre Theater and at Off Broad Street in Philadelphia
Mysterious Easter Island is about as far away from civilization as possible. Thousands of miles of the Pacific Ocean have helped keep the secrets of the huge statues from the world. Why they were built and what happened to the people is an enigma that has obsessed people since the island was discovered. �Mana� the new play by Ray Saracen explores the haunting, often terrifying experiences of the first archaeologists on the island.
Based on the true events of Katherine and Scoresby Routledge�s "Mana" expedition to Easter Island in 1914, the play tears apart the thin fa�ade of British nobility as the proper British researchers come face to face with the bloody reality of life on the island. Even darker secrets are buried in the island�s history, and their own past.
Haunted by ghosts of her own ancestors and the spirits of the island, Katherine struggles to solve the mysteries of the giant statues before war engulfs the island and the world.
Iron Age is proud to present this world premier by Ray Saraceni, the author of last year�s huge hit show about the early days of football "Maroons, The Anthracite Gridiron."