The Year of Magical Thinking

JOAN DIDION

Playwright

JOAN DIDION (Playwright) won the 2005 National Book Award for The Year of Magical Thinking, one of 13 books she has written. Her other books include Play It as It Lays, Democracy, Slouching Towards Bethlehem, The White Album, Salvador, Miami and Political Fictions. With her husband, John Gregory Dunne, she wrote the screenplays for The Panic in Needle Park with Al Pacino, True Confessions with Robert De Niro and Robert Duvall, A Star Is Born with Barbra Streisand and Up Close & Personal with Michelle Pfeiffer and Robert Redford. She received the 2005 Gold Medal in Nonfiction from the American Academy of Arts and Letters, 1996 Edward MacDowell Medal, 1999 Columbia Journalism Award and 2002 George Polk Book Award. She contributes to various periodicals, most frequently The New York Review of Books.

GAYE TAYLOR UPCHURCH

Director

GAYE TAYLOR UPCHURCH (Director) is thrilled to be making her Arena Stage debut. She directed the world premiere of Clare Lizzimore’s Animal (Studio Theatre, Helen Hayes nomination). She directed the Off-Broadway productions of Nancy Harris’ Our New Girl and Simon Stephens’ Harper Regan and Bluebird with Simon Russell Beale (Atlantic Theater Company), Bethany with America Ferrera (Women’s Project Theater) and Lucy Thurber’s Stay (Rattlestick, Obie Award for play cycle The Hill Town Plays). Other regional highlights include the world premieres of Anna Ziegler’s The Last Match (Old Globe), Melissa Ross’ Of Good Stock (South Coast Repertory) and An Iliad (Hudson Valley Shakespeare and West Point Military Academy). Her production of As You Like It (Hudson Valley Shakespeare) will be reimagined for Folger Theatre this winter. Gaye Taylor is an alumna of The Drama League and University of NC School of the Arts.

DANIEL ZIMMERMAN

Set Designer

DANIEL ZIMMERMAN (Set Designer)’s New York credits include Fashions for Men (The Mint, Drama Desk nomination), Kill Floor (LCT3), Suicide, Incorporated (Roundabout Theatre Company), Friend Art (Second Stage), You Got Older (Page 73 Productions) and Be a Good Little Widow (Ars Nova). Daniel has also worked with The Play Company, The Pearl, Cherry Lane, Colt Coeur and Lesser America. Regional credits include Dallas Theater Center, Actors Theatre of Louisville, Humana Festival, Center Stage, Trinity Repertory, Milwaukee Repertory, TheatreWorks Palo Alto, Portland Stage Company, People’s Light and Pioneer Theater Company. Daniel is also an affiliated artist with Clubbed Thumb.

KATHLEEN GELDARD

Costume Designer

KATHLEEN GELDARD (Costume Designer)’s Arena Stage credits include Love in Afghanistan. Recent regional credits include Peter and the Starcatcher (Actors Theatre of Louisville); Mad River Rising (Cincinnati Playhouse); Ironbound (Round House); and A Raisin in the Sun, Invisible Man and Ruined (Huntington). Additional regional credits with Signature Theatre, Woolly Mammoth, La Jolla Playhouse, Berkeley Repertory, Center Stage, Kennedy Center, Studio Theatre, Imagination Stage, Flashpoint Theatre Company, Folger Theatre, Vineyard Playhouse, Studio Arena Theater, Children’s Theatre of Charlotte and Liz Lerman Dance Exchange. Awards include 2012 Bay Area Critics Circle nomination for Ruined (Berkeley Repertory), 2012 IRNE nomination for Ruined (Huntington) and 2009 Helen Hayes nomination for The Neverending Story (Imagination Stage).

Jesse Belsky

Lighting Designer

JESSE BELSKY (Lighting Designer) makes his Arena Stage debut. Recent D.C.-area productions include The Mystery of Love and Sex (Signature Theatre); A Midsummer Night’s Dream (Folger Theater); Animal (Studio Theatre); and Deathtrap, Blithe Spirit and Outside Mullingar (Everyman Theatre). Regionally his work has been seen at Yale Repertory, Asolo Repertory, Playmakers Repertory and Triad Stage. New York designs include The Body Politic (59E59), puppet works Lysistrata and Women of Troy (La MaMa Annex) and My Trip Down the Pink Carpet starring Leslie Jordan. Additional credits include Lee Breuer’s opera Antigone (Athens, Greece) and his new play Glass Guignol (Provincetown Theater Festival). Jesse taught lighting design at Connecticut College and UNC Greensboro, received his M.F.A. from Yale School of Drama and is a member of USA 829. www.jessebelsky.com

ROC LEE

Original Music / Sound Designer

ROC LEE (Original Music and Sound Designer) is a D.C.-based composer and sound designer. Arena Stage credits include Mother Courage and Her Children (Helen Hayes nomination). Additional credits include Dial M for Murder (Olney Theatre Center); Our Town (Faction of Fools); The Revolutionists (Catholic University); Romeo and Juliet (We Happy Few); In the Red and Brown Water, Insurrection, Begotten and Visible Impact (Georgetown University); and Sleeping Beauty (Pointless Theatre). Upcoming credits include Charm (Mosaic Theater Company), Fickle Fancy Farce (Olney Theatre Center) and In the Heights (Gala Hispanic Theatre). He holds a Master of Music in stage music composition from CUA. www.roclee.net

KURT HALL

Stage Manager

KURT HALL (Stage Manager) is thrilled to be working with Kathleen again after doing Mother Courage and Her Children and Red Hot Patriot: The Kick-Ass Wit of Molly Ivins. Other Arena Stage credits include Born for This: The BeBe Winans Story, All the Way, Sweat, Destiny of Desire, The Blood Quilt, Our War, The Shoplifters, Smokey Joe’s Café, Maurice Hines is Tappin’ Thru Life, Good People, The Normal Heart, Red, Ruined, every tongue confess starring Phylicia Rashad, Duke Ellington’s Sophisticated Ladies, Looped starring Valerie Harper, Next to Normal starring Alice Ripley, Awake and Sing! and The Goat, or Who is Sylvia. Additional regional credits at the Kennedy Center, Roundabout Theatre Company, McCarter Theatre Center, Shakespeare Theatre Company and Signature Theatre. Thanks to his family for all their support.