Aaron Posner has crafted his latest re-imagined Chekhov to radically intersect with its Russian progenitor. While Three Sisters plays out in one theatre, half the cast is also performing upstairs in another: Same building, different theatre... No Sisters! While Olga, Masha, and Irina yearn for Moscow, the rest of the household and its hangers-on grapple with their own heartache and longing, bit players in a world whose focus is elsewhere. No Sisters explores the screwed up, endlessly fascinating psyches of Chekhov’s lovelorn, world-weary misfits and broken dreamers in a wildly funny play about wildly unhappy people. Commissioned as a part of Studio R&D, Studio Theatre’s new works initiative.
Runtime: This production will run approximately 3 hours with one 15 minute intermission.
Environmental Warnings: This production will contain gunfire.
Aaron Posner is a playwright, director, and teacher. He returns to Studio for No Sisters after previously directing Lungs. Mr. Posner has written two other Chekhov reinventions, Stupid Fucking Bird and Life Sucks. Other plays include District Merchants, My Name Is Asher Lev, The Chosen, Who Am I This Time? & Other Conundrum, Sometimes a Great Notion, Cyrano and many more. He has directed at major regional theaters from coast to coast and won numerous awards as both director and playwright. Mr. Posner is currently an artistic associate at the Folger Theatre. He lives in this area with his wife, actress Erin Weaver, and his amazing daughter, Maisie.
(As of March 2017)
New Neighborhood is a theater/TV/music company whose sincerity and authenticity are so combustible they cannot be housed under one roof for too long without doing severe structural damage. With new work, bruised work, all-singing, all-dancing, foul-mouthed musical work, New Neighborhood finds a show, produces the sh*t outta it, and disappears into a cloud of train smoke. Recent projects include the world premiere of Suzanne Heathcote’s I Saw My Neighbor on the Train and I Didn’t Even Smile (co-produced with Berkshire Theatre Group), the west coast and New York premieres of Rolin Jones’s These Paper Bullets! (produced in association with Geffen Playhouse and Atlantic Theater Company), Season One of Fox Television’s “The Exorcist” (produced in association with Morgan Creek Productions and 20th Century Fox Television), and the debut album of Honus Honus, Use Your Delusion.
(As of February 2017)
Ryan Rilette makes his Studio debut in Three Sisters / No Sisters. He has acted and directed at theaters throughout the country, and has been featured in a handful of television shows and films. Mr. Rilette has been the Artistic Director of Round House Theater since 2012, and was previously the Producing Director of Marin Theatre Company in the Bay Area, Producing Artistic Director of Southern Rep in New Orleans, Founding Artistic Director of Rude Mechanicals in New York, President of the National New Play Network, and a professor at Loyola University New Orleans and Tulane University.
(As of March 2017)
Kimberly Gilbert returns to Studio in Three Sisters / No Sisters after last appearing in Jumpers for Goalposts. Most recent credits include Charm at Mosaic Theatre and Angels In America, Parts 1 and 2, a co-production of Round House and Olney Theatres. A DC artist since the year 2000, she has been gratefully playing on the stages of The Kennedy Center, Ford’s Theatre, Folger Theatre, Forum Theatre, Theater J, Source Theatre, Round House Theatre, and most frequently Woolly Mammoth Theatre Company and Taffety Punk Theatre Company, where she is a company member. Ms. Gilbert received a Helen Hayes Award in 2015 for her portrayal of the ill-fated queen in Woolly Mammoth’s production of Marie Antoinette. She holds her MFA with the inaugural class of Shakespeare Theatre Company’s Academy For Classical Acting.
(As of March 2017)
Todd Scofield makes his Studio debut in Three Sisters / No Sisters. Over the past 14 years in DC, Mr. Scofield has appeared in numerous shows at Shakespeare Theatre Company, Folger Theatre, and Round House Theatre, as well as productions at Theater J, Ford’s Theatre, Adventure Theatre, Imagination Stage, and Olney Theatre. Regional credits include productions at Everyman Theatre in Baltimore, Arden Theatre, PlayMakers Theatre, Charlotte Repertory Theatre, and four seasons at North Carolina Shakespeare Festival. Television credits include a recurring role in seasons 3 and 5 of The Wire.
(As of March 2017)
Ro Boddie returns to Studio Theatre for the fourth time, where he previously appeared in Dirt, Three Sisters, and No Sisters. Off-Broadway credits include Socrates at The Public Theater, Appomattox at 59E59 Theaters, and the upcoming production of A Play is a Poem at Atlantic Theater Company. Select regional credits include A Play is a Poem at the Mark Taper Forum, Blueprints to Freedom at La Jolla Playhouse, Skeleton Crew at The Old Globe, The Mountaintop at Cleveland Playhouse, Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom at Baltimore Center Stage, The Whipping Man at Milwaukee Repertory Theatre. Television credits include The Good Wife, Elementary, Person of Interest, and Unforgettable. Ro is an alumnus of University of the North Carolina School of the Arts.
(As of November 2019)
Biko Eisen-Martin makes his Studio debut in Three Sisters / No Sisters. Credits include Lift at Crossroads and Off-Broadway at the 59E59 Theatres; Fences at Pioneer Theatre Company; All The Way at Cleveland Playhouse; Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead at Folger Theatre; Stick Fly and Under The Skin at Arden Theatre Company; The Ashes Under Gait City at Contemporary American Theatre Festival; The Whipping Man at Syracuse Stage, Actors Theatre of Louisville, and Gulfshore Playhouse; Topdog/ Underdog at Marin Theatre Company; and Brother Size, Love’s Labours Lost, and Three Sisters at Chautauqua Theatre Company. Other credits include performances at Denver Center Theatre Company, Colorado Shakespeare Festival, TheatreWorks, Berkeley Repertory Theatre, Philadelphia Theatre Company, People's Light, and Campo Santo. Mr. Eisen-Martin holds an MFA from the National Theatre Conservatory and a BA and MAT from Brown University.
(As of March 2017)
William Vaughan makes his Studio debut in Three Sisters / No Sisters. He has performed at regional theatres along the East Coast including A Tale Told by an Idiot produced by Psittacus Productions through Lincoln Center Education; District Merchants, Julius Caesar, Twelfth Night, and Romeo and Juliet (u/s) at Folger Theatre; Miss Bennet and Ironbound at Round House Theatre; The Flick and Tender Napalm (u/s) at Signature Theatre; Abominable at The Hub Theatre; Romeo and Juliet and The Winter’s Tale at We Happy Few; The Lost Colony at Waterside Theatre; and The Three Musketeers at Theatre Carolina. His film credits include Dreadful Sorry and Colonizing the New World.
(As of March 2017)
Nancy Robinette has been affiliated with Studio since the late 1970s, first as a student and then performing in The Woolgatherer, Camino Real, Tribes, The Beauty Queen of Leenane, The Play About the Baby, Three Sisters (1995-96), Ivanov, The Seagull, Afterplay, Frozen, Souvenir, Slavs!, The New Electric Ballroom, and Laughing Wild. Her recent work at Studio includes Three Sisters (2016-17) and The Hard Problem. Ms. Robinette most recently performed on Broadway in The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time. She has also performed on most of the DC stages, and at the McCarter Theatre, Paper Mill Playhouse, Williamstown Theatre Festival, Roundabout Theatre, New York Theatre Workshop, The Globe Theatre, as well as in Key West and the former Yugoslavia. Film and television credits include Louie, Serial Mom, Soldier Jack, and the upcoming Three Christs. Ms. Robinette is a Woolly Mammoth Theatre Alumna and an Associated Artist with Shakespeare Theatre Company.
(As of March 2017)
Daven Ralston makes her Studio debut. Select regional credits include As You Like It at Folger Theatre; The Magi at Hub Theatre; A Bid to Save the World at Rorschach Theatre; Wild Sky at Solas Nua (company member); A Midsummer Night’s Dream, Friendship Betrayed, and The Madwoman of Chaillot at WSC Avant Bard; and Space Bop and Snow Day at Arts on the Horizon. Independent film credits include Macbeth Unhinged (EIFF, NYCIFF Selection) and Kara (DCIFF/Best of DC Award).
(As of March 2017)
Daniel Conway has designed more than two dozen plays for Studio Theatre including Three Sisters and No Sisters, The Aliens, and his Helen Hayes Award-winning design for Hand to God. His recent work on Macbeth for Chicago Shakespeare Theater and The Scottsboro Boys for Signature Theatre was featured in the 2019 Prague Quadrennial of World Stage Design and Performance Art. He is currently designing Singin’ in the Rain for Olney Theatre Center. Other regional credits include work for Arena Stage, Signature Theatre, Ford’s Theatre, Woolly Mammoth, Cincinnati Playhouse in the Park, The Cleveland Play House, Shakespeare Theatre Company, South Coast Rep, Milwaukee Rep, A.R.T., The Kennedy Center, and Boston Lyric Opera. Daniel is the designer for the performance artists/magicians Penn and Teller. Awards include 14 Helen Hayes nominations and four awards for Outstanding Set Design, nominations for the Los Angeles and Boston Critics Awards, and The Anderson-Hopkins Award for Sustained Contributions to Theatre in Washington DC.
(As of August 2019)
Jesse Belsky previously designed P.Y.G. or The Mis-Edumacation of Dorian Belle, The Remains, The Effect, Three Sisters, No Sisters, and Animal at Studio Theatre. Regional credits include The Magic Play at Portland Center Stage, Syracuse Stage, and Actors Theatre of Louisville; Lydia and Rough Crossing at Yale Repertory Theatre; and The Year of Magical Thinking at PlayMakers Repertory Company. DC designs include Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf? at Ford’s Theatre; J.Q.A. and The Year of Magical Thinking at Arena Stage; Oslo, Handbagged and Book of Will at Round House Theatre; The Mystery of Love & Sex at Signature Theatre; Henry IV P1, Winter’s Tale, Sense & Sensibility, and A Midsummer Night’s Dream at Folger Theatre; Labour of Love, The Invisible Hand and The Magic Play at Olney Theatre Center. Jesse holds a BA from Duke University and an MFA from the Yale School of Drama, and he has taught lighting design at Connecticut College and UNC Greensboro.
(As of December 2019)
Jessica Ford makes her Studio debut with Three Sisters / No Sisters. Other DC projects include The Gaming Table and Orestes: A Tragic Romp at Folger Theatre, and The Fantasticks at Arena Stage. Ms. Ford has designed for numerous New York City and regional theatres and companies across the United States, including The Rattlestick Theatre Company, The Debate Society, The Long Wharf Theatre, Syracuse Stage and Baltimore CenterStage, to name a few. She received LA and CT Critics Circle awards and a Drama Desk nomination for These Paper Bullets! at Geffen Playhouse, Yale Repertory Theatre, and Atlantic Theatre Company. She holds an MFA from Yale School of Drama.
(As of March 2017)
Christopher Baine returns to Studio for Three Sisters / No Sisters after designing Cloud 9 and Water by the Spoonful. He recently composed the music for When She Had Wings (Helen Hayes Award) and The BFG with Imagination Stage (Helen Hayes Award nomination). Some recent designs include The Critic & The Real Inspector Hound and Heir Apparent with Shakespeare Theater Company and Guthrie Theater, Colossal with Olney Theatre Center (Helen Hayes Award), Wonderful World of Dissocia at Theatre Alliance (Helen Hayes Award), Fetch Clay, Make Man at Marin Theater Company, Detroit at Woolly Mammoth Theatre Company, and Romeo and Juliet (Helen Hayes Award nomination) and Taming of the Shrew (Helen Hayes Award nomination) at the Folger Theatre. He also designed The Elaborate Entrance of Chad Deity (Helen Hayes Award nomination), Gruesome Playground Injuries and A Bright New Boise (Helen Hayes Award) with Woolly Mammoth Theater Company, and Gift of Nothing and Jason Invisible at The Kennedy Center Theatre For Young Audiences. Other regional credits include Everyman Theatre, Forum Theatre, dog & pony dc, Adventure Theatre MTC, Children’s Theater Charlotte, Synetic Theater, and Theater Alliance. He has been a guest artist with The University of Maryland, Catholic University, UMBC and American University. Mr. Baine has been the Resident Sound Designer for Imagination Stage since 2009, and was a Kenan Fellow at the Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts in 2012.
(As of March 2017)
James Barry makes his Studio debut in Three Sisters / No Sisters as well as his debut as a theatrical composer. As a performer, Mr. Barry has played Carl Perkins in the first national tour and in several regional productions of Million Dollar Quartet. A New Neighborhood company member, Mr. Barry originated the role of Pedro in These Paper Bullets which ran at Yale Repertory Theatre, The Geffen Playhouse, and Atlantic Theater Company. He was in the original cast of Bloody Bloody Andrew Jackson at The Public Theater and on Broadway. His album of original rock music, “Embrace Yourself Tonight”, is available on iTunes, Spotify, and on pink vinyl LP through Etsy.
(As of March 2017)
Adrien-Alice Hansel is the Literary Director at Studio, where she has dramaturged the world premieres of Queen of Basel, The Remains, No Sisters, I Wanna Fucking Tear You Apart, Animal, Laugh, Red Speedo, Dirt, Lungs, and The History of Kisses as well as productions of Cry It Out,Translations, Curve of Departure, The Effect, Wig Out!, Straight White Men, Cloud 9, Hedda Gabler, Constellations, Jumpers for Goalposts, Bad Jews (twice), The Apple Family Plays, Invisible Man, Sucker Punch, The Golden Dragon, and The New Electric Ballroom, among others. Prior to joining Studio, she spent eight seasons at the Actors Theatre of Louisville, where she headed the literary department and coordinated project scouting, selection, and development for the Humana Festival of New American Plays. She also served as production dramaturg on roughly 50 new, contemporary, and classic plays there, including premieres by Naomi Wallace, Gina Gionfriddo, Kirk Lynn and Rude Mechs, Rinne Groff, The Civilians, Anne Bogart and SITI Company, Jordan Harrison, and John Belluso. She is the co-editor of eight anthologies of plays from Actors Theatre and editor of eight editions of plays through Studio. Adrien-Alice holds an MFA from the Yale School of Drama.
(As of April 2019)
Becky Reed has previously stage managed No Sisters and The Effect at Studio Theatre. Other DC-area credits include The Cerulean Time Capsule and Elephant and Piggie’s We Are In A Play! (National Tour) with the Kennedy Center Theater for Young Audiences; Macbeth and King John with Folger Theater; Marjorie Prime and I And You at Olney Theatre Center; Ain’t Misbehavin’ at Signature Theatre, Happy Hour with Spooky Action Theater and machina eX; and Copenhagen, Everything Is Illuminated, and Becoming Dr. Ruth at Theater J. Becky has worked as an assistant stage manager at many DC-area theaters, including Opera Lafayette, Olney Theatre Center, Rep Stage, Signature Theater, Theater J, and Woolly Mammoth Theatre Company. Becky has a BFA in Theater Production and Management from Auburn University.
(As of March 2019)
