American Buffalo

November 02–December 11

American Buffalo
By David Mamet
Directed by Liesl Tommy

In a cluttered pawn shop, an unlikely trio plot to steal a rare coin. But times are hard, tensions mount, and the need to get ahead turns ruthless. A modern masterpiece, showcasing Mamet’s legendary knack for plot twists and his mastery of the profane poetry of capitalism.

Digital Dramaturgy

Cast

William Hill*
Don

Rusty Ross*
Bob

Jordan Lage*
Teach

Baltimore Center Stage: American Buffalo. Broadway—Steppenwolf Theatre Co.: One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest. New York—Synchronicity Space: On the Open Road; Home: One Neck; Circle Rep: The Man with the Flower in His Mouth; South Street: Real Family; Westbeth: Lobby; Ensemble Studio Theatre: two seasons Hell’s Kitchen Sink. National Tour—The Graduate. Regional—George Street: The Seafarer; River Arts Rep: Velvet Elvis; Long Wharf: Departed; Players Columbus: Wait Until Dark; Whole Theatre: Angel Street. Film/TV— Boardwalk Empire, Mildred Pierce, The Company Men, Gran Torino (dir. Clint Eastwood), Cadillac Records, The Key to Reserva (dir. Martin Scorsese), A Dog Year, Anything Else, School of Rock, How to Lose a Guy in 10 Days, People I Know, Small Time Crooks, Analyze This, Earthly Possessions, Isn’t She Great, The Siege, Devil’s Advocate, Striptease, The Associate, The Juror, Life Happens, Rescuing Desire, Wolf, The Good Wife, Bored to Death, Fringe, The Return of Jezebel James, Damages, Rescue Me, Kidnapped, Trial by Jury, Queens Supreme, Law & Order: SVU, Ed, Law & Order: CI, Big Apple, Third Watch, Spin City, Now and Again, Mary & Rhoda, Becker, Trinity, Cosby, Players, Law & Order, New York News, The Sunshine Boys, Ghostwriter, New York Undercover, All My Children.

Baltimore Center Stage: American Buffalo. Broadway— Hilton Theatre/St. James Theatre: Original cast of Dr. Seuss’ How the Grinch Stole Christmas!. Other New York—BAM: Robert Wilson’s Alice; N. Richard Nash’s The Loss of D-Natural (premiere). National Tour— Lincoln Center: South Pacific (dir. Bartlett Sher). Regional—Pioneer Theatre: A Midsummer Night’s Dream; Old Globe Theatre: Dr. Seuss’ How the Grinch Stole Christmas! (dir. Jack O’Brien, premiere); New Jersey Rep: Sick (premiere); Penguin Rep: Greetings!, Our Lady of South Division Street (now Miracle on South Division Street, dir. Joe Brancato, premiere); Depot Theatre: The Cripple of Inishmaan (dir. John Christopher Jones), How to Succeed…, Proposals; Totem Pole Playhouse: Crimes of the Heart, Adventures of Huckleberry Finn; Weston Playhouse: Six Degrees of Separation. Film/TV—Law & Order. Education— Northwestern.

Baltimore Center Stage: American Buffalo. Broadway—Race, Speed-the-Plow, Inherit the Wind (TONY nom. Best Revival), Glengarry Glen Ross (TONY Best Revival; Drama Desk Award), The Best Man (TONY nom. Best Revival), The Old Neighborhood, Our Town (TONY Best Revival), A Few Good Men (nat’l tour). Off Broadway—Keep Your Pantheon, Almost an Evening, Mojo, The Night Heron, The Water Engine, Edmond, The Lights, Distant Fires (AUDelco Award nomination), Blithe Spirit, The Woods, The Blue Hour, The Hothouse, Boys’ Life, Three Sisters (Mamet translation), Mamet’s HOME and In a Linguistics Class. Regional— Philadelphia Theatre Company: Race, Love! Valor! Compassion! (Barrymore Award); Huntington: Rabbit Hole; McCarter: Glengarry Glen Ross; American Rep: Absolution. Film/TV— You Don’t Know Jack, Salt, Body of Lies, World Trade Center, Michael Clayton, The Pink Panther, The Believer, Homicide, The Spanish Prisoner, Things Change, The Big C, Damages, Blue Bloods, Hack, Ugly Betty, Rescue Me, all Law & Orders, Oz, All My Children, As the World Turns. Founding member, Atlantic Theater Co. (NYC).

Creative Team

Liesl Tommy
Director

Neil Patel
Scenic Designer

Kathleen Geldard
Costume Designer

Lap Chi Chu
Lighting Designer

Broken Chord
Sound Designer

Kellie Mecleary
Production Dramaturg

J. Allen Suddeth
Fight Choreographer

Janet Foster
Casting Director

Captain Kate Murphy*
Stage Manager

Raine Bode*
Assistant Stage Manager

Laura Smith*
Assistant Stage Manager

Baltimore Center Stage: American Buffalo. Off Broadway— The Public Theater: The Good Negro; New Georges: Angela’s Mixtape; The Play Company: Romania KISS Me; Women’s Project: A Stone’s Throw. International— Sundance East Africa, Manda Island, Kenya: He is Here He Says I Say, Book of Life; DanskDansk Theatre, Denmark: The White Man—A Complex Declaration of Love; Canadian Stage, Luminato Festival, Toronto: Peggy Picket Sees the Face of God. Regional—Oregon Shakespeare Festival: Ruined; La Jolla Playhouse: Ruined; Berkeley Rep: Ruined; Yale Rep: The Piano Lesson, Eclipsed; Huntington Theatre Company: Ruined; Woolly Mammoth Theatre Company: Eclipsed; Dallas Theater Center: The Good Negro; CATF: A History of Light, Yankee Tavern, Stick Fly; Synchronicity Performance Group. Awards— NEA/TCG Directors Grant, New York Theatre Workshop Casting/Directing Fellowship, and numerous awards for directing, production, acting, and design. Other professional— Taught master classes in acting, directing, and new play development internationally; guest directed at Juilliard, Trinity Rep/Brown University’s MFA Directing Program, The Strasberg Institute, NYU’s Tisch School of the Arts. She is a native of Cape Town, South Africa.

Baltimore Center Stage: Marley, dance of the holy ghosts, Animal Crackers, Mud Blue Sky, The Mountaintop, The Whipping Man, American Buffalo, Working it Out, Joe Turner’s Come and Gone, Once on This Island, Elmina’s Kitchen, Ain’t Misbehavin’, The Hostage, As You Like It, many others. Broadway—Soul Doctor; Oleanna; Wonderland; [title of show]; Ring of Fire; ’night, Mother; Sideman (also West End & Kennedy Center). Off Broadway—Civilians: Pretty Filthy, This Beautiful City; Signature Theatre: stop.reset, My Children! My Africa!; Second Stage: Water by the Spoonful, By the way, Meet Vera Stark, Gruesome Playground Injuries, Peter & Jerry, Living Out; Roundabout: McReele, Hurrah at Last; Vineyard: Now.Here.This., The Long Christmas Ride Home; MTC: The Lion, Between Us, Glimmer Glimmer and Shine; MCC: The Mercy Seat; NYTW: The Beard of Avon, Lydie Breeze, Resident Alien, A Question of Mercy, Bob, Quills, Slavs!; Playwrights Horizons: Mr. Burns a Post Electric Play, Stage Kiss, Lobster Alice, On the Mountain; Public/NYSF: Father Comes Home From the Wars (Parts 1, 2 & 3), Dirty Tricks, Othello. Film/TV—Some Velvet Morning, Loitering With Intent, Dil Dhadakne Do, In Treatment (HBO), Billy and Billie (DirecTV). Awards—Obie Award (2), Helen Hayes Award, Eddy Award, Hewes nom (5), Drama Desk nom (3).

Baltimore Center Stage: American Buffalo. Regional—Cincinnati Playhouse: Shakespeare in Love, Little Shop of Horrors, Mad River Rising; Actors Theatre of Louisville: Peter and the Starcatcher, Humana Festivals 2015, 2016, 2017; Shakespeare Theatre Company: Macbeth; Arena Stage: The Year of Magical Thinking; Portland Center Stage: Little Shop of Horrors; Huntington Theatre Company, Signature Theatre, Woolly Mammoth, Florida Studio Theatre, La Jolla Playhouse, Berkeley Repertory Theatre, Arena Stage, Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts, Studio Theatre, Round House Theatre, Imagination Stage, Flashpoint Theatre Company, Folger Theatre, Martha’s Vineyard Playhouse, Studio Arena Theater, Children’s Theatre of Charlotte, Liz Lerman Dance Exchange. Awards—2012 Bay Area Critics Circle nom for Ruined at Berkeley Rep; 2012 IRNE Award nom for Ruined at Huntington Theatre; 2009 Helen Hayes nom for The Neverending Story at Imagination Stage. Professional—Artistic Associate at Signature Theatre.

Baltimore Center Stage: Pride and Prejudice, American Buffalo. New York—Atlantic Theater: The Jammer, The Lying Lesson; The Incubator Arts Project: OZET; Labyrinth Theater: The Insurgents; Manhattan Theatre Club: Spirit Control, When We Were Young and Unafraid; Primary Stages: A Lifetime Burning, Harrison TX, Informed Consent; The Public Theater: The Good Negro; Rattlestick: Stay, Massacre; Second Stage Theatre: The Other Thing; Signature Theatre: The Dance and the Railroad, Appropriate; Women’s Project: Lascivious Something, Row After Row. Regional—Actors Theatre of Louisville: The Adventures of Tom Sawyer; Berkeley Rep: Party People; Dallas Theater Center: The Tempest, King Lear, The Odd Couple; Hartford Stage: Whipping Man, Snow Falling on Cedars; Huntington Theatre: Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom, A Raisin in the Sun; La Jolla Playhouse: Ruined; Oregon Shakespeare Festival: Ruined, Party People; People’s Light: End Days; Shakespeare Theatre Company: Romeo and Juliet; Trinity Rep: Steel Magnolias, The Glass Menagerie; Yale Rep: Eclipsed, These Paper Bullets!. brokenchordcollective.com.

Baltimore Center Stage: An Enemy of the People, Mud Blue Sky. Kellie holds a Master’s Degree in Performance Studies from New York University and a BA in English and Theater from Goucher College. Other Center Stage credits include Production Dramaturg for Mud Blue Sky, An Enemy of the People, A Skull in Connemara, American Buffalo, and co-producer of the Pub Lab Series. Other Baltimore credits: BROS: Murdercastle; Single Carrot Theatre: Drunk Enough to Say I Love You?, Milk Milk Lemonade. Previously New York based, she has worked as a dramaturg, director, critic, producer, administrator, and stage manager with various organizations including Brave New World Repertory Company, Pipeline Theater Company, WOW Café Theater, Manhattan Theater Source, and Vital Theater. Her writing has been published through Cerise Press and OffOffOnline.com.

Baltimore Center Stage: American Buffalo, The Whipping Man, The Homecoming, The Wiz; Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom, Cyrano, The Importance of Being Earnest, ’Tis Pity She’s a Whore; Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf?; Matchmaker; Rosencrantz & Guildenstern are Dead; Joe Turner’s Come & Gone; Hearts; Arsenic & Old Lace; Ah, Wilderness!; Death and the Maiden; The Three Sisters; King Lear; over 60 others. Broadway— Gem of the Ocean; Saturday Night Fever; Jekyll & Hyde; Angels in America; Loot; Saint Joan; A Small Family Business; Hide and Seek. Off Broadway— MTC; The Public; Playwrights Horizons; INTAR; Women’s Project; NYTW; TFANA; Big Apple Circus. Regional—Arena Stage; Shakespeare Theatre (DC); Denver Center; Hartford Stage; Goodman; ATL; Seattle Rep; many others. TV— over 750 episodes. Author— Fight Directing for the Theater. Professional— one of 15 Fight Masters recognized by The Society of American Fight Directors.

Baltimore Center Stage: The Rivals, American Buffalo, Crime & Punishment; Snow Falling on Cedars; The Homecoming, The Wiz, Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom, The Importance of Being Earnest; ’Tis Pity She’s a Whore; Fabulation or, The Re-education of Undine; Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf?; The Matchmaker; A Little Night Music; Hearts; Arsenic & Old Lace; Trouble in Mind; The Boys from Syracuse; Death and the Maiden. Broadway—The Light in the Piazza (Artios nom.); Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom; Lennon; Taking Sides (co-). Off Broadway—Westside Theater: DUST. Endpapers; True Love; The Dying Gaul; The Maiden’s Prayer; Dream True; Trojan Women; A Love Story; Playwrights Horizons: Floyd Collins, The Monogamist, A Cheever Evening, Later Life. Regional—Kennedy Center: Golden Child; Westport Country Playhouse; Intiman; Dallas Theater Center; Berkeley Rep; Pittsburgh Public; Yale Rep; Prince Music; Goodman; Steppenwolf; A.R.T.; Cal Shakes. Film/TV—The Deal; Advice from a Caterpillar; Cosby; Tracey Ullman Takes on New York. BBC World Services radio dramas “The Day That Lehman Died” (Peabody Award) and “Severed Threads.”

Baltimore Center Stage: One Night in Miami…, Next to Normal, Animal Crackers, Mud Blue Sky, The Mountaintop, …Edgar Allan Poe, A Skull in Connemara, American Buffalo, Crime & Punishment, Let There Be Love, The Santaland Diaries, The Importance of Being Earnest, Things of Dry Hours, Trouble in Mind, Three Sisters, Radio Golf, The Murder of Isaac, Once on This Island, King Lear. Regional—Trinity Rep: Boeing-Boeing; Actors Theatre of Louisville: All Hail Hurricane Gordo*, The Clean House, Moot the Messenger*, Dracula, The Ruby Sunrise*, Tall Grass Gothic*, The Drawer Boy, Amadeus, As You Like It (*premieres at the Humana Festival of New American Plays); Contemporary American Theater Festival: The Overwhelming, Pig Farm; Totem Pole Playhouse: Over 75 productions through 13 summer stock seasons. Film/TV—Route 30, Route 30 Too!, The Father and the Bear, Next Food Network Star. Professional—Director of Stage Management at Virginia Tech University. Proud Actors Equity and ASCAP Member. For Whitney – with love and gratitude.

Baltimore Center Stage: Detroit ’67, As You Like It; 4000 Miles; After the Revolution; It’s a Wonderful Life: A Live Radio Play; Amadeus; Wild with Happy; Twelfth Night; Stones in His Pockets; dance of the holy ghosts; Clybourne Park; Beneatha’s Place; The Mountaintop; Bus Stop; An Enemy of the People; The Whipping Man; Gleam; The Rivals; Snow Falling on Cedars; Cyrano; Working it Out; Fabulation or, The Re-Education of Undine; Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf?; Joe Turner’s Come and Gone. Regional—Shakespeare Theater Company: Salome; Contemporary American Theater Festival: World Builders; Everyman: Pygmalion, Shipwrecked, The Exonerated, Rabbit Hole, Doubt, Gem of the Ocean, And a Nightingale Sang, The School for Scandal, A Number, Someone Who’ll Watch Over Me, Yellowman; Woolly Mammoth: Gruesome Playground Injuries, House of Gold, The Unmentionables, Vigils, After Ashley; Folger: Measure for Measure, Olney Theatre: Stuff Happens; Theater Alliance: Headsman’s Holiday, Pangea.

*Member of Actors’ Equity Association

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Creative Team

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