THE WORLD PREMIERE PRODUCTION OF
“SWEET, SWEET MOTHERHOOD”

written by                                                    
JEREMY KAREKEN

in collaboration with
PROF. LEE M. SILVER

directed by
MICHAEL BIGELOW DIXON


PERFORMANCES BEGIN JULY 8 at HERE

(New York, June 10, 2010) The world premiere production of “SWEET, SWEET MOTHERHOOD,” by Jeremy Kareken, in collaboration with Professor Lee M. Silver, a comedy with scientific issues and moral dilemmas, will begin previews on Thursday, July 8, at HERE (http://www.here.org), 145 Sixth Avenue (enter on Dominick Street, one block south of Spring Street). The production will be directed by Michael Bigelow Dixon, and will officially open on Sunday, July 11 at 3:00 p.m. (Performances will run through Saturday, July 31.)

In “SWEET, SWEET MOTHERHOOD” Shelley McCann (Caroline Cooney) is a bitingly intelligent undergraduate student at a top university. Although Shelley covets a spot in a top graduate program, she would rather party than build up a respectable GPA. Professor Henry Stein (Michael De Nola) is an eminent biotechnology researcher and professor at Shelley’s university. One afternoon, Shelley stumbles into Stein’s office to propose a senior thesis. No ordinary research proposal, Shelley’s ideas lay bare the ethical and moral quandaries associated with biotechnology today.

The play is the hybrid child of its own experiment, the Two-Headed Challenge, where the Guthrie Theater and the Playwrights Center commissioned playwright Jeremy Kareken to collaborate on a play with molecular biologist Lee M. Silver, author of the controversial Challenging Nature and Remaking Eden: How Genetic Engineering and Cloning Will Transform the American Family.

Jeremy Kareken is a writer, actor, and the researcher for Inside the Actors Studio. He has won fellowships to the William Inge Center for the Arts, the Sewanee Writers Workshop and the Hamptons International Film Festival Screenwriters’ Conference. He is a member of the Ensemble Studio Theatre Playwrights Unit and the Actors Studio. He teaches writing at NYU’s School for Continuing and Professional Studies. Dr. Lee M. Silver is a professor at Princeton University in the Department of Molecular Biology and the Woodrow Wilson School of Public and International Affairs. He received a doctorate in biophysics from Harvard University, postdoctoral training in mammalian genetics at the Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center, and training in molecular biology at Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory. Silver was elected a lifetime Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science and was a recipient of an unsolicited National Institutes of Health MERIT award for outstanding research in genetics. Silver has published over 180 research articles in the fields of developmental genetics, molecular evolution, population genetics, behavioral genetics, and computer modeling. He is the lone author of three books: Mouse Genetics: Concepts and Applications (1995), Remaking Eden (1997) and Challenging Nature (2006). Silver is also coauthor, with Nobel Laureate Leland Hartwell and genomics pioneer Leroy Hood, of the advanced undergraduate textbook Genetics: From genes to genomes. He has also published essays in The New York Times, The Washington Post, Time, and Newsweek International and has appeared on numerous television and radio programs including the Charlie Rose Show, 20/20, 60 Minutes, PBS, NBC and ABC News, Nightline, NPR, and the Colbert Report.

Michael Bigelow Dixon has directed numerous world premieres, contemporary works and classical plays at The Guthrie, Actors Theatre of Louisville, Florida Stage, Illusion Theatre, Mixed Blood, and the Magic Theatre, among many others. At The Playwrights’ Center in Minneapolis, he worked on new plays by Catherine Filloux, Carson Kreitzer, Lee Blessing, Elaine Romero and others. He was Dramaturg/Literary Manager and then Associate Director of the Actors Theatre of Louisville for 17 years. He has edited 35 volumes of plays and criticism, and as a playwright has written 20 produced and published plays.

Caroline Cooney (Shelley) has performed in many plays at The Guthrie where she worked with Joe Dowling, Ethan McSweeney, Josh Hecht, and David Esbjornson. At the Tennessee Williams Festival in Provincetown, MA, she was seen in the World Premiere of Williams’ The Enemy: Time as Rose Finley. In Minneapolis she has also worked at the Gremlin Theater and at PlayLabs at The Playwrights’ Center. Michael De Nola (Professor Stein) has been an Albanian drug lord on Law & Order, an Israeli jeweler on Law & Order: SVU, a Serbian professor in the soon-to-be-released feature film Pussyfoot, and a Hasid in the upcoming feature The Nattows. His New York theater credits include Pieces on the Board (3 Dollar Bill Productions), Good Fences Make Good Neighbors (NY International Fringe Festival), The Bronx Balmers (Turtle Shell Theater) and I Wish I Was Woody Allen (Theater Studio Inc.)

The set design will be by Ray Neufeld, the costume design by Kari Love, the lighting design by Christopher Brown, the sound design by Bruce Ellman, and the visual design by Zoe Woodworth. The production stage manager will be Emily James Durning. Matthew Kreiner will serve as producer and Sarah Bisman will serve as associate producer.

This production is being presented through HEREstay, HERE’s curated rental program, which provides artists with subsidized space and equipment, as well as technical and administrative support. Since 1993, the OBIE-winning HERE has been a premier arts organization in NYC and a leader in the field of new, hybrid performance work. Under leadership of Founding Artistic Director Kristin Marting and Producing Director Kim Whitener, HERE has served over 12,000 emerging to mid-career artists developing work that does not fit a conventional programming agenda. Work presented at HERE has garnered 16 OBIE awards, including the 2009 Ross Wetzsteon Award, an OBIE grant for artistic achievement, three Drama Desk nominations, two Berrilla Kerr Awards, three NY Innovative Theatre Awards, an Edwin Booth Award and a Pulitzer Prize nomination. HERE proudly supports artists at all stages in their careers through full productions, artist residency programs, festivals and subsidized performance and rehearsal space. Work at HERE is curated based on the strength and uniqueness of the artist’s vision. HERE’s Artist Residency Program (HARP) provides development, commissions and full production for up to 20 artists over one-to-three years. In 2005, with the support of the FJC, a foundation of donor advised funds, Lower Manhattan Development Corporation and the City of New York, HERE purchased its long-time home as part of a five-year “Secure HERE’s Future” campaign. With full-scale renovations to the space concluding in June 2008, thanks to generous support from the City of New York, HERE is poised to continue and expand its role as a downtown haven for the finest emerging art. Offering a comfortable, eclectic setting for artists and audiences alike, HERE features a café and two state-of-the-art performance spaces.

The complete schedule for “SWEET, SWEET MOTHERHOOD” (July 8 through July 31) will be: Thursdays thru Saturdays at 8:30 p.m., and Sundays at 3:00 p.m. All tickets will be $18.00. (The first preview on Thursday, July 8 includes a party and is priced at $25.00.) To reserve tickets, please visit http://www.here.org or call 212-352-3101.