Above - InterAct's inaugural staff and acting company outside the Annenberg Center on the Penn campus, summer 1988. Back Row (l to r): Terry Dixon, Seth Rozin, Judy Greenblatt, Terry Franceschi, Bob Stephenson, Luke Hardt. Second Row: Ed Shockley, Brad Rosenstein, Bill Janczewski, Lillian Rozin, Elizabeth Cutthrell, Frank Wood, Erica Schwartz-Hall. Front Row: Grace Gonglewski, Bruce Robinson, Eric Marshall, Monica Helm, Amy Kitts
Below left: Frank Wood (standing), Bruce Robinson, Grace Gonglewski and Lillian Rozin rehearse for Edward Albee's Seascape at the Annenberg Center, before leaving for Ireland. Below right: Robinson and Rozin took a promotional stroll through an Irish town in costume as the lizard-like characters "Leslie" and "Sarah." (Inset: the company's wrecked rental car, after it was towed back to Sligo.)
As Seth tells us in the podcast episode, Edward Albee himself came down to see the production, and to lead a VERY uncomfortable feedback session with the cast. Below, Albee and Grace Gonglewski in the rehearsal room. (Photo courtesy InterAct Theatre Company)
Above - A photo from a newspaper story, during rehearsals for Thomas Gibbons's play 6221. Seth Rozin (left) direct actors Bruce Robinson (playing former Philadelphia mayor Wilson Goode) and Vincent Yates (as MOVE leader John Africa). Below - a production photo and a poster of the 1993 production of the play, courtesy InterAct Theatre.
Above - Lonely Planet, by Stephen Dietz (1996). Produced by InterAct at the Arts Bank Theatre on South and Broad Streets.
In Lonely Planet, actor Frank X played a man named Carl, who acts as a caretaker for the memory of people who have died from AIDS. He does this by collecting the chairs they have used. Over the course of the play, the number of chairs on the stage inexorably increases.
For the production, InterAct actively sought and used actual chairs that had been used by Philadelphia area AIDS sufferers, or that were lent or donated in the memory of them.
Playing the role was an especially poignant one for the actor, who had lost his own brother, Jack, to AIDS the previous summer. "I feel a need to do this play," said Frank X, "As opposed to wanting to do it." The entire production was dedicated to the memory of Jack Holton.
Frank X would win the Barrymore Award for Best Actor for this performance.
Below - the marquee of the Adrienne Theatre (the former Wilma Theatre), where InterAct moved in January of 1997, together with the Venture Theatre. When Venture went defunct in 1999, InterAct would be the main tenant there until 2015. (PlayPenn a new developmental workshop started by the actor Paul Meshejian, would be in residence at the Adrienne during the summer months, and Seth Rozin would often act as their casting director.)
Above - the actor Harry Philobosian in Lebensraum, by Israel Horowitz (1999)
Although he has staged regular seasons of new plays for almost four decades Seth Rozin (left, in a photo from 2010) has worked with Thomas Gibbons (right), InterAct's playwright-in-residence, more than any other. Together they have staged Gibbons' works Pretending to America, 6221, Axis Sally, Black Russian, Bee-luther-hatchee, Permanent Collection, A House With No Walls, and Silverhill.
Below - Tim Moyer, Frank X in Thomas Gibbons' Permanent Collection (2003)
Above - Kristoffer Diaz' The Elaborate Entrance of Chad Deity (2009). Jeb Kreager, Donte Bonner, Juan Pacheco, Shalin Agarwal, and Nick Martorelli. In order to get enough space to stage the Philadelphia premiere of this play, InterAct used the space of Philadelphia Shakespeare Theatre on the next block of Sansom Street.
Above - Jihad Jones and the Kalashnikov Babes, by Yusef El-Guindi (2009). Leah Walton, Peter Schmitz, Laura Catlaw, Fajer Al-Kaisi, John Zak.
Above - When We Go Upon the Sea, by Lee Blessing, directed by Paul Meshejian: Conan McCarty as George W. Bush, Kim Carson as Anna-Lisa (2010)
Below - Two Jews Walk Into a War, a play by Seth Rozin (2011). John Pietrowski (left) and Tom Teti (right) as a pair of stubborn old men in Kabul. The idea for the play was inspired by a New York Times story about the "Last Two Jews In Afghanistan."
After two years of renovations, Seth Rozin and InterAct Theatre created two performance spaces out of the old ballroom at the Drake Hotel. Before the renovations, for many years, it had been used by student productions at the University of the Arts.
Now, almost every evening Philadelphia theatergoers can attend the Proscenium Theatre at the Drake, and the Louis Bluver Theatre (a 'black box' space). The entrances are on the narrow Hicks Street, between Spruce and Pine Streets. Together with the Azuka Theatre, Simpatico Theatre, Inis Nua Theatre, as well as PlayPenn and the Cannonball Festival, the venue is almost always busy with exciting new projects.
For a COMPLETE online gallery of images of the many decades of shows produced by the InterAct Theatre over the years, go the the company's own website, HERE.
Newspaper feature stories about "Philadelphia's Favorite Playwright" - Episode 111
