Tennessee by John Patrick Shanley (Summer 2022 Re-Release)

In Tennessee by John Patrick Shanley (Doubt, Outside Mullingar), a small-town, wannabe musician seeks an escape plan from the town's resident psychic. The audio play stars Oscar nominee Timothée Chalamet (our audio production of Misadventure, Dune, Beautiful Boy, Call Me By Your Name, Lady Bird, and Shanley's Prodigal Son on Broadway) and Caitlin FitzGerald (“Succession,” “Masters of Sex," It's Complicated). 

Stay tuned after the play for a behind-the-scenes conversation with playwright/director John Patrick Shanley, Caitlin FitzGerald, Timothée Chalamet, and founder and consulting director Claudia Catania. Tennessee was recorded and co-presented in front of a live audience at The Jerome L. Greene Performance Space at New York Public Radio.

Listen on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, Podbay, Player FM, subscribe to our RSS feed, search ‘Playing on Air’ in your favorite podcasting app – or just stream below! [24 Minutes 18 Seconds]

BITE THE HAND by Ara Watson (Summer 2022 Re-Release)

In this week's summer re-release, we're doing a bit of time travel. It’s a balmy night in the post-WWII Ozarks, and a young woman is leaving behind her life as a "lady of the evening" for an offer of marriage. Then a client shows up with some jaw-dropping news.

Oscar-winner Chris Cooper (A Doll’s House, Part 2, Adaptation, American Beauty), Emmy-winner Margo Martindale (“The Good Wife”, "The Americans," "Justified") and Broadway’s Liv Rooth (SURE THING, To Kill a Mockingbird, Venus in Fur) star in BITE THE HAND, Ara Watson’s (A Different Moon) potent classic, directed by Tony Award-winner Doug Hughes (SOMETHING I'LL TELL YOU TUESDAY, Doubt). Stay tuned after the performance for an animated conversation with Watson and the cast moderated by Playing On Air founder and consulting director Claudia Catania.

Listen on iTunes, Apple Podcasts, Podbay, Player FM, subscribe to our RSS feed, search ‘Playing on Air’ in your favorite podcasting app – or stream below! [31 Minutes 40 Seconds]

YOU BELONG TO ME by Daniel Reitz (Summer 2022 Re-Release)

This week's summer re-release features Daniel Reitz's (NAPOLEON IN EXILE) affecting one-act YOU BELONG TO ME, featuring Amy Ryan (Oscar nominated for Gone, Baby, Gone, "The Office," "Only Murders in the Building," and a five-time Playing On Air MVP) and Michael Stuhlbarg (a recent Emmy nominee for "Dopesick," "The Staircase," "Boardwalk Empire," A Serious Man, and four-time Playing On Air veteran), as former lovers--who've gone very separate ways in the intervening years--having a chance meeting on the subway. Stay tuned after the performance for a spirited conversation between Reitz and the play’s director, Playing on Air founder and consulting director Claudia Catania.

Download on Apple Podcasts, iTunes, Podbay, Player FM, subscribe to our RSS feed, search ‘Playing on Air’ in your favorite podcasting app – or stream below! [ 17 Minutes 58 Seconds]

CELL by Cassandra Medley (Summer 2022 Re-Release)

Starring Tony winner Tonya Pinkins (Jelly's Last Jam, Caroline, or Change), Tony nominee Condola Rashad (Saint Joan, Ruined, “Billions”), and Melanie Nicholls-King ("The Wire," "Rookie Blue"), CELL tells the riveting story of three African American women working at an immigrant detention center. When a jaded guard arranges jobs for her sister and her niece Gwen, the family erupts into a battle over home and homeland security. As Gwen races to save a detained child, CELL paints a searing picture of the secrets we keep in order to survive.

This powerful piece by Cassandra Medley, directed by Victor Lirio, “deftly explores the dirty antidemocratic secret of institutionalized racism” (New York Times). After the play, Medley joins Pulitzer Prize-winning immigration journalist Julia Preston, Broadway producer Cheryl Wiesenfeld, and host Claudia Catania to move beyond headlines and explore the real lives that inspired CELL. 

Cell was supported in part by Cheryl Wiesenfeld Productions.

Download on Apple Podcasts, iTunes, Podbay, Player FM, subscribe to our RSS feed, search ‘Playing on Air’ in your favorite podcasting app – or stream below! [52 Minutes 53 Seconds]

REVELATIONS by JuCoby Johnson

Mahalia, a Black trans woman, returns to her hometown of Minneapolis during the tumultuous summer of 2020. Against a backdrop of fire and protest, she and her father tentatively rekindle a long-dormant bond.

REVELATIONS is written by JuCoby Johnson (How It’s Gon’ Be) and directed by Goldie E. Patrick (Paradise Blue). It stars Lady Dane Figueroa Edidi (Klytmnestra: An Epic Slam Poem), John Douglas Thompson (Public Theater’s Julius Caesar), and Lynnette R. Freeman (Ensemble Studio Theatre).

Download on iTunes, search ‘Playing on Air’ in your favorite podcasting app – or stream below! [25 Minutes 23 Seconds]

NAPOLEON IN EXILE by Daniel Reitz (Re-Release)

“I felt I really had given birth ... rebirth ... to Napoleon.”

“So wait. Am I Napoleon? Or do I need to look for a job?”

Everyday life is a battlefield for single mother Evelyn and her adult son Corey, who has ASD (Autistic Spectrum Disorder). But underneath their sparring over Minecraft and job applications, a game-changing crisis is bubbling.

Directed by Golden Globe winner Marsha Mason (“Grace and Frankie,” The Goodbye Girl), NAPOLEON IN EXILE by Daniel Reitz (New Dramatists, Ensemble Studio Theatre) is a moving, unexpectedly funny portrait of a family on the brink. Emmy nominee Jane Kaczmarek (“Malcolm in the Middle,” Good People) and Will Dagger (HBO’s “I Know This Much Is True,” PoA’s The Press Conference) star as mother and son. After the performance, the artists join host Claudia Catania to discuss writing for actors and bringing theater chops to the world of sitcom TV.

Download on iTunes, search ‘Playing on Air’ in your favorite podcasting app – or stream below! [39 Minutes 23 Seconds]

BIRD by Rachel Bonds

The year is 2030. On the snowy outskirts of DC, an underground musician (Tony winner Julie White) and her pragmatic teenage daughter (Erin Wilhelmi) battle the forces, seen and unseen, that threaten their survival.  

Directed by Adrienne Campbell-Holt (Colt Coeur, PoA’s 52nd to Bowery…), Bird is a world-premiere recording and, in partnership with the Axe-Houghton Foundation, a Wordsmith Duo commission.

After their previous run as mother and daughter in Broadway’s A Doll’s House, Part 2, White (Gary: A Sequel to Titus Andronicus, “Alpha House”) and Wilhelmi (To Kill A Mockingbird, The Crucible) reunite in this final episode of the 2020 Fall Season. After the play, they join Rachel Bonds, Campbell-Holt, and host Claudia Catania for a behind-the-mic interview.

Download on iTunes, search ‘Playing on Air’ in your favorite podcasting app – or stream below! [26 Minutes 32 Seconds]

THIRD GRADE by Dominique Morisseau

THIRD GRADE continues Playing on Air’s yearlong celebration of MacArthur ‘Genius Grant’ winner Dominique Morisseau (The Detroit Project, Pipeline, Ain't Too Proud — The Life and Times of the Temptations). 

Elementary school teacher Kai is dedicated to helping her students thrive. But when one of her third-graders is brutally bullied, Kai must unexpectedly go to battle with the boy’s father over how best to protect his son. 

J. Alphonse Nicholson (Starz’s “P-Valley”, A Soldier’s Play) stars alongside playwright-performer Morisseau. Directed by Stori Ayers (The Last O.G., Chautauqua Theater Company), THIRD GRADE is a searing look at the impossible choices that parents and public school educators are making to protect America’s kids. Later in the episode, the artists join host Claudia Catania to discuss their own third grade experiences and the need to ”go deep.”

Download on iTunes, search ‘Playing on Air’ in your favorite podcasting app – or stream below! [30 Minutes 52 Seconds]

SCRAPS AND THINGS by Melis Aker

At a laundromat in Istanbul, a chatty seamstress (Carol Kane) and a guarded, young academic (Melis Aker) discover that they're linked, and haunted, by the myth of the same man.

Written by, starring, and featuring original music by Melis Aker (Kilroys List, Ars Nova Play Group), SCRAPS AND THINGS also marks the PoA return of legendary Oscar nominee Carol Kane (The Princess Bride, “Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt,” PoA’s Hedgehog Years) and is directed by Neil Pepe, Artistic Director of the Atlantic Theater Company. After the play, host Claudia Catania joins the artistic team to discuss personal legacies and how artists divulge their deepest secrets through their work.

SCRAPS AND THINGS was originally commissioned by Atlantic Theater Company as part of their 2018 Middle Eastern MixFest.

Download on iTunes, search ‘Playing on Air’ in your favorite podcasting app – or stream below! [31 Minutes 31 Seconds]

CLEAN SLATE by Rajiv Joseph

CLEAN SLATE by Rajiv Joseph (Bengal Tiger at the Baghdad Zoo, Guards at the Taj) is Part Two of a thriller that begins with last week’s episode, Doug Wright’s FAKE NEWS. Listen to Part One here.

Special Agents Angie Mallinson and Vince Lazar just want to assure you that nothing horrible has happened at the KLWP News Hour. You may have heard rumors about a band of Kabuki-masked killers. You may have heard whispers about a mysterious vigilante group.  Ignore them — no matter what you think you saw. 

Oscar nominee Amy Ryan ("The Office," PoA’s Fifth Planet) and Eden Marryshow (Broadway's Ink, PoA’s Night Vision) join Jeremy Shamos, Eisa Davis, and director Mark Brokaw from last week’s FAKE NEWS. After the show, host Claudia Catania joins the artists to talk about what gives them hope and how they think this story really ends.

CLEAN SLATE by Pulitzer finalist and Obie winner Rajiv Joseph is a world premiere through Playing on Air and Axe-Houghton Foundation’s annual Wordsmith Duo Project, which invites two extraordinary playwrights to explore a shared theme or story through original, partnered plays. 

Download on iTunes, search ‘Playing on Air’ in your favorite podcasting app – or stream below! [24 Minutes 41 Seconds]