New Dramatists: Jason Grote

	Jason Grote c/o Bret Adams, Ltd. 448 West 44th St. New York, NY 10036 (212) 765-5630 (212) 265-2212 fax Agent Email: morsini@bretadamsltd.com Email: Jason@jasongrote.com

Jason Grote's plays include 1001 (Boston Court, Contemporary American Theater Festival, Denver Center, Mixed Blood, The O'Neill, Page 73, Soho Rep Lab, University of Wisconsin), Maria/Stuart (Soho Rep Lab, Woolly Mammoth), Box Americana (The O'Neill), Hamilton Township (Salvage Vanguard, Soho Rep Mainstage), This Storm Is What We Call Progress (Rorschach, Soho Rep Lab), and Darwin's Challenge. His work has also been produced or developed at The Atlantic Theater, Baltimore Centerstage, chashama, Circle X, CUNY’s Prelude Festival, The Edmonton Fringe, The Flea, The Frontera Fest at Hyde Park Theater, The Glej Theater (in Ljubljana, Slovenia), HERE, The Lark, The Lincoln Center Directors' Lab, New York Theatre Workshop, The 92nd Street Y’s Makor/Steinhardt Center, The NY Fringe, NYU’s hotINK Festival, The Orchard Project, Playwrights’ Horizons, The Playwrights' Foundation, Portland Center Stage, Theater J, Theatre of NOTE, and The Williamstown Theater Festival workshop. He has been commissioned by The Denver Center, Clubbed Thumb, Ensemble Studio Theatre, and The Working Theater. Honors include an Ovation Award from The Denver Post; the Page 73 Fellowship; nominations for The Pushcart Prize, The Kesselring Prize, and The Weissberger Award; an NEA Grant via Soho Rep; a NYSCA Grant via Clubbed Thumb; and "Best New Play" (for 1001) from Denver's alternative weekly, Westword. 1001 was also included in critics’ year-end top ten lists in Time Out New York, The Rocky Mountain News, and The Boulder Daily Camera. Three of his Greek-inspired short plays have been published as a collected edition by Playscripts, Inc. He teaches at Rutgers University, is a member of PEN, and a contributor to Comedy Central's "Indecision 2008" blog. He is currently developing a weekly radio play program for WFMU (91.1 FM Jersey City, wfmu.org). Visit him at jasongrote.com.

1001 BOX AMERICANA: A WAL-MART RETAIL FANTASIA HAMILTON TOWNSHIP MARIA/STUART, or PLATZANGST MOLOCH AND OTHER DEMONS THE NEW JERSEY BOOK OF THE DEAD THIS STORM IS WHAT WE CALL PROGRESS ASSORTED SHORT PLAYS
_{jason grote} 1001 Comedy/Drama, 100 Minutes, No Intermission 4M, 2W (multiracial cast, playing multiple roles) No set required--this is a trunk show, using hand props and small costume pieces. If there is a set, it should invoke mazes, the impossible architecture of an MC Escher drawing, the view-from-above of the staircase on Hitchcock's Vertigo, or the labyrinthine back alleys of East Jerusalem or Cairo. 1001 spins themes and variations from the classic "A Thousand and One Arabian Nights" by way of philosopher Edward Said. The play combines savage wit, political insight, and Borgesian time-warping to explore the incarnations of love, sex, religion, cruelty and war from ancient Baghdad to the post-9/11 era. Premiered at Denver Center Theater (January 2007); subsequently produced at the Contemporary American Theater Festival (Shepherdstown, WV), P73/Stuart Thompson Productions (NYC), and ACT (Seattle). Originated in the Soho Rep Writer/Director Lab (NYC); developed and/or read in a Soho Rep "Phase 2 Lab;" Denver Center Theater's Colorado New Play Summit; Baltimore Centerstage's First Look Reading Series; Theater @ Boston Court (Los Angeles); part of P73 fellowship; and Eugene O'Neill Theater Conference.
_{jason grote} BOX AMERICANA: A WAL-MART RETAIL FANTASIA Comedy/Drama, 90 Minutes 3M, 3W (some doubling) Set: None/Very Basic The decomposing corpse of Sam Walton is resurrected to sing the praises of consumer Utopia. Located at the economic epicenter of Sprawlville, USA, the play takes place at a moment when the world's largest employer is defending itself against the largest class-action lawsuit in American history. It follows two sales associates of Wal-Mart #242128--Kelly, a pathological cheerleader for the Wal-Mart ideology, and Danae, a desperate mother escaping her violent and impoverished past--as they seek the Promised Land of retail abundance. Commissioned by The Working Theater (NYC); workshop production with the Working Theater in June 2006. Additional development at the Millay Colony for the Arts, The Lark Play Development Center (NYC), and Portland Center Stage's JAW/West Festival (Oregon). To be read in The Fire Dept.'s "Salon Series," (NYC).
_{jason grote} HAMILTON TOWNSHIP Drama, 75 Minutes, No Intermission 2M, 1W, 1 either Unit Set Representing a Suburban "Family Room" Based on a true story, Hamilton Township is a play about adolescence and the cycle of violence in suburban New Jersey. As a disastrous storm rages outside, a mysterious, nameless man has sent Jason to the home of a comatose old woman, where a prostitute named Babydoll waits for him. The man arrives with a present for Jason--a gift-wrapped box that smells like meat. A suspense play in the mold of Pinter, Hitchcock, or David Lynch, Hamilton Township is a Lacanian autobiography about choosing between unthinkable options. Originated in the Soho Rep Writer/Director Lab; further development in Soho Rep's "Phase 2" Program.
_{jason grote} MARIA/STUART Comedy/Drama, 100 Minutes 1M, 5W Unit set representing two suburban kitchens, one in Bergen County, NJ and one in Bucks County, PA Stuart fights to keep the lid on his mother’s and aunts’ simmering angst. But the family’s secrets channel themselves into a bizarre shapeshifter that guzzles soda and chatters German verse. Friedrich Schiller’s classic tale of warring queens inspires a macabre romp into all that suburban America tries to repress. Written in Soho Rep's Writer/Director Lab. World Premiere at Woolly Mammoth Theater, (Washington, DC), 2008. Written in the Soho Rep Writer/Director Lab. Readings at NYU's hotINK Festival and Portland Center Stage.
_{jason grote} MOLOCH AND OTHER DEMONS Drama, 120 Minutes 3M, 2W (some doubling) Set: None/Very Basic Paradise Lost meets Jarhead meets Fast Food Nation in this fable of a late-capitalist Hell. Mahu works in a meat plant that turns undesirables into fast food consumed by Moloch, an elder-demon. When an invasion from Heaven shatters his family, his daughter Dawn escapes--only to encounter Hobbididence and Modo, two AWOL soldier-angels hiding at the edge of a nuclear blast zone. Workshop productions in the American Living Room @ HERE and The Hell Festival at The Brick (2004); developed with Circle X and Salvage Vanguard.
_{jason grote} THE NEW JERSEY BOOK OF THE DEAD Drama, 90 Minutes 3M, 4W Unit Set Representing an Office Space in Jersey City, NJ Single mom Diana tries to unionize her workplace (a call-center in Jersey City), but faces OMNIVORE-- a powerful computer surveillance program so powerful that it invades her personal life and her dreams. Premiered at The Bloomington Playwrights Project, 2004; subsequent production at the Vestige Group (Austin, TX). Developed at The Flea, Coe College, and The Playwrights' Center of San Francisco.
_{jason grote} THIS STORM IS WHAT WE CALL PROGRESS Comedy/Drama, 120 Minutes 1M, 2W Unit Set Representing a Dusty Recording Studio in Manhattan A young man stumbles into a dusty old recording studio run by an enigmatic old woman and her beautiful assistant. Here he is drawn into an ancient and powerful world of Jewish mysticism and Kabbalistic ritual and discovers that he may be something more than he had ever imagined. Slated to premiere at Rorschach Theater (Washington, DC). Written in the Soho Rep Writer/Director Lab; developed with Manhattan Ensemble Theater, The Playwrights' Center (Minneapolis), Studio 42 (NYC), Theater J (Washington, DC), and P73.
_{jason grote} ASSORTED SHORT PLAYS Various, 5-20 minutes (Anti)gone: 3M, 2W, 1 either. Cats: 2 either. The Island of Never Giving Way on Your Desire: 3M, 1W. In His Bold Gaze My Ruin Is Writ Large: 2M, 3W. All You Can Eat: 3M, 3W. Prometheus Rendered: 1M, 3 either. Kawaisoo (The Pity of Things), 1W. No sets, for any. Contact playwright for descriptions.


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