Theater 183
Theater 183: Poetry On The Menu
Theater 183 — Open-Door Playhouse
In January 1967, writer/participatory journalist George Plimpton dreamed up a publicity stunt for heavyweight champion Muhammad Ali. He arranged for him to meet Marianne Moore, a decorated American poetess – a showman who creates doggerel rhymes, together with one of the finest true poets in the history of the English language. The pair couldn’t be more opposite – He a gigantic, athletic man of color, at his physical peak, age 25, not formally educated, a Muslim, loud, charismatic, a showman with the burgeoning edge for social causes and advocacy; She, elderly, age 80, pasty white, doggedly Presbyterian, incredibly well educated, shy, frail and a kind of dowager spinster. Ali’s poems, so called, which predicted his fights, were little more than expanded limericks. Moore’s balletic verses and images won her the Pulitzer Prize, the National Medal in Literature and almost the Nobel Prize. Their host that day, Toots Shor, was a rough New York man of Jewish descent, who rubbed elbows, hosted, drank with, and incurred the wrath of entertainment giants of the first two-thirds of the 20th Century: Frank Sinatra, Charlie Chaplin, Ernest Hemingway, Joe DiMaggio, Marilyn Monroe, etc. The meeting only lasted a few minutes and produced a short poem, “On the annihilation of Ernie Terrell,” Ali’s next title foe. The playwright has expanded the meeting in a deeper way, as a one-act play, using snippets of
Moore’s poetry to frame the time, Ali’s immediate and lasting appeal through his pithy quotes uttered over two decades and foreshadowing his thoughtful future self.
Writer
James Anthony Merolla
James Anthony Merolla is a lifetime journalist and an ancient playwright who decided to devote the last quarter of his life to telling dramatic stories to reflect and preserve the human condition. He has had five separate careers, school teacher, 17 years as a social worker for the disabled (ongoing), 40 years as a newspaper and magazine writer (still writing four stories a week in Rhode Island), too many years as a restauranteur (although he came away with the knowledge of making the finest margaritas on the East Coast of America) and now the dream to hear his words spoken by professional performers in front of a yearning audience who might want to hear them. He has directed more than four dozen plays and musicals in high school, college and local community theater and reviewed more than 400 plays as a theater arts writer in New England newspaper and magazines. If you Google “James Merolla,” “James A. Merolla” or “Jamie Merolla” you may find a hundred of his stories or more online, including various theater reviews
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Director
Bernadette Armstrong
Bernadette Armstrong moved to Los Angeles to work in film in the late 1990’s and after her first two films went to festivals, she took a short hiatus from writing until she fell in love with small theater. Since 2008 she has had several successful theater projects produced in No Hollywood. Her play The Reading Group was named Pick of the Week by LA Weekly Magazine and in 2017 her play Simple Lives was nominated for Outstanding Writing of an Original Play or Musical by the Valley Theater Awards (the only woman nominated).
Actors:
Omari Williams
Goreti da Silva has had the pleasure of working on several of Bernadette Armstrong’s plays: Dark Stage, Unheard Voices, Simple Lives and Joan. Goreti has won The Michael Grossman Most Inspirational Award for her work in the Desert, and the Valley Theatre Award for for her work in “Park Plays: Portland”.
Anne Cooper
Anne Cooper has acted under the direction of influential Film and TV directors such as Sam Raimi, Paul Schrader, and Kat Coiro. She has performed with Angela Lansbury, Mary Beth Hurt, William Hurt, Danny DeVito, Lee Remick, and Geraldine Page and most recently in the new film MARRY Me with Jennifer Lopez and John Bradley of House of Thrones. Anne studied acting under Uta Hagen, Herbert Berghof and Michael Schurtleff, and attended London Academy of Music and Dramatic Art. She has a BA from EMU. In addition to her acting career, She has directed and developed plays both in NYC and LA. She is a theatre consultant to LA GOA, which provides services for adults with developmental disabilities. Anne is on the summer acting faculty at Interlochen Center for the Arts. She has dual citizenship from USA and Italy and speaks fluent Italian. She currently lives and works in Los Angeles and New York. She is a big fan Bernadette Armstrong as a writer and director, and was in her production of SIMPLE LIVES and feels lucky to again be working with Bernadette.
Gary Reed
Gary B. Lamb has appeared as an actor in more than 50 plays and musicals as well as on TV and film. He recently completed a National Tour of EVITA as Juan Peron and the title role in MACBETH for Shakespeare @ The Castle in Ohio. He can be heard on the recently released podcast DREAMLAND as Bruce. He has also been behind the camera directing several films including; THE BOX (over 5 million hits on youtube); THE BUG A CREEPY COMEDY; ROOMMATE RULES and most recently FITZWATER & MUTTON, A BUDDY FILM. His Voice-Over work includes several animated series and dubbing on several Columbian Novellas. Gary has been a stage actor/director/producer for most of his life. Repair at www.GBLambMusic.com. Available on iTunes and Amazon.
Justice Davis
A graduate of North Carolina Central University, Justice Davis is an actor based in Los Angeles, California. Beginning his acting career during the pandemic, he has experience both on-camera and in voice-over. Previously in Hands from the Fire and Metro, Whitesville, Breakable, The Final Battle, Garage Invasion, and Fat and Fiction.
