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Thursday–Saturday @ 8pm
Sunday @ 7pm
July 6, 27; August 24
Sunday Matinees @ 2pm
July 13, 20
August 3, 10, 17 & 31
Friday evenings for $15
July 17, 23, 31
July 10, 11, 16; August 15
Wed/Thurs/Fri: $25.00
Sat/Sun: $30.00
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The Odyssey Theatre Ensemble presents
ROSE
Olivier Award - Best New Play (nomination)
Written by Martin Sherman
Judy Chaikin (Odyssey Production)
Produced by Ron Sossi & Beth Hogan
Set Design Hans Pfleiderer
Lighting Designer Christian Epps
Production Stage Manager Julie Simpson
Graphic Designer Dane Martens
San Francisco production directed by Joan Mankin
(Original Traveling Jewish Theatre Production)
Starring:
Naomi Newman co-founder of San Francisco's Traveling Jewish Theatre
“Rose is an exercise in pure storytelling.” –The Washington Post
“Naomi Newman is a force to be reckoned with.” –L.A. Times
Theatre Trailers created by dcignoni@groundhero.com.
"Go! Playwright Martin Sherman (/Bent/) and actor Naomi Newman combine forces to tell the tale of Rose, born in an obscure shtetl near Chernobyl. The solo piece opens in Miami Beach in 2000, where 80-year-old Rose reflects on her spectacularly checkered past. Though a fictional character, she’s endowed with an almost documentary reality and a life story that embraces many of the 20th century’s major events. After losing her family in the destruction of the Warsaw Ghetto, Rose endures two years hiding from the Nazis in the sewers of Warsaw. Her subsequent travails include internment in Displaced Persons camps, being a passenger on the beleaguered ship /Exodus/ as it attempts to reach Palestine, and finally marrying an American before becoming the manager of hotels in racially volatile Atlantic City and Miami Beach. She outlives three husbands, a daughter, and a young lover, and bears a son, who immigrates to Israel. All this is told by Rose as she sits Shiva for a young Palestinian girl, shot by her Israeli grandson in the embattled West Bank — mirroring the fate of her daughter in Warsaw years before. The piece is intimate and epic, compassionate and tough, tragic and funny. Newman plays it with magnificent eloquence, passion and restraint." –LA Weekly
 MARTIN SHERMAN - Playwright
Martin Sherman was born in Philadelphia, educated at Boston University, and presently resides in London. An award-winning writer, he has seen his plays produced in more than 45 countries. Bent, presented with Ian McKellen at the Royal Court in London, transferred to the West End, went to Broadway, starring Richard Gere, and won a Tony nomination for best play. It was revived at the National Theatre with Ian McKellen again in the lead, and most recently played at Trafalgar Studios, starring Alan Cumming. In 1999 it was made into a film starring Clive Owen, Lothaire Bluteau and Mick Jagger. Sherman’s other West End plays include Messiah, starring Maureen Lipman, When She Danced, starring Vanessa Redgrave and Frances de la Tour, A Madhouse at Goa, also starring Vanessa Redgrave, and a new version of Pirandello, Absolutely! (Perhaps), starring Joan Plowright. His play Rose premiered at the National Theatre with Olympia Dukakis, and transferred to Broadway. Sherman’s book for the hit musical, The Boy From Oz, which opened on Broadway in 2003 starring High Jackman, earned him a second Tony nomination. That same year his screenplay adapted from the Tennessee Williams novella, The Roman Spring of Mrs. Stone, was filmed, starring Helen Mirren, Oliver Martinez and Anne Bancroft. Sherman’s latest screenplay, Mrs. Henderson Presents, which was BAFTA-nominated (British Academy of Film and Television Arts), was directed by Stephen Frears and starred Judi Dench and Bob Hoskins. Other screenwriting credits include Callas Forever, directed by Franco Zefferelli, and Alive and Kicking, starring Anthony Sher and Dorothy Tutin. His recent adaptation of E. M. Forster’s A Passage to India earned him rave notices when it played at the Riverside Theatre and New York’s Brooklyn Academy of Music. He also directed Ruby Wax Live, Ruby Wax’s stage show, which toured the UK, Australia and New Zealand. He recently wrote an adaptation of Chekov’s The Cherry Orchard, which premiered in Los Angeles with Annette Bening and Alfred Molina in the leads
 NAOMI NEWMAN - Rose
Naomi is a co-founder of San Francisco-based A Traveling Jewish Theatre, where her work as writer, performer, director and artistic director has helped to bring the company international recognition and critical acclaim. In 2007 she was named Best Actress in the Bay Area for her performance of Rose. The San Francisco Museum of Performance and Design has honored Ms. Newman by having her life and work documented for its Oral History Program. The publication of her legacy book in the fall of 2008 will coincide with the celebration of ATJT’s 30th anniversary.
Newman’s solo play, Snake Talk, has extensively toured the U.S., earning praise from both audiences and critics. Crossing the Broken Bridge, a theatre piece on Jewish/Black relations, which she created and performed with John O’Neal of Junebug Productions, also enjoyed five years of successful touring. In the early 70’s she directed two improvisational theatre companies (The Committee Workshop and The Synergy Trust) in Los Angeles. Ms. Newman’s work in television includes appearances in two original Star Trek episodes. “It’s a great joy to come back to Los Angeles and to be performing on an Odyssey stage. Ron Sossi and I have been theatre pals for years. Our companies came into being around the same time in the 70’s when theatre artists were inspired to be visionary and experimental. It is indeed a miracle that both have survived while remaining faithful to creating and producing theatre that makes a difference.”
 JUDY CHAIKIN - Director of the Odyssey Theatre’s production of ROSE.
After twelve years of performing in theatre and film, Judy Chaikin turned to directing with The Roxy Theatre’s production of Womanspeak, which starred Jane Fonda and Dianne Ladd. Judy was then invited to participate in the AFI Directing Workshop for Women, where she directed the comedy short, Dear Norman. For five years Judy directed the improv company The Groundlings, working with such comedy talents as Paul Reubens, Lisa Kudrow, Julia Sweeny and Jon Lovitz. At the Mark Taper Lab, she directed the musical, True Romances, by playwright Susan Yankowitz, starring Tom Skerritt and Peter Riegert, and on Broadway at the New Duke Theater she directed the one-woman show, Excuse Me I’m Talking, featuring Seinfeld regular, Annie Korzen.
Her short romantic-comedy film, Cotillion ‘65, won many film festival awards, including Best Short, Best Comedy Short, Best Comedy Director and Audience Choice Awards. Judy has also directed and written numerous documentaries and is an Emmy Nominee, for the documentaries, Legacy of the Hollywood Blacklist and Building on a Dream. She has directed episodes of FBI: Untold Stories, American Families, America’s Most Wanted, Too Good to Be True and the Nickelodeon comedy pilot, On the Television, starring Taylor Negron and George McGrath. Judy is currently in post-production on a feature-length documentary about women jazz musicians, The Girls in the Band.
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