I believe we’re broken. Everybody is broken in some way. Everybody has a story to tell. There are cracks in us…Kintsugi is the Japanese art of repairing broken objects by highlighting their cracks with golden powder. . . the original object is even more beautiful than before it was broken…America is going to be even more beautiful; we’re looking at our brokenness. And I really believe with my heart and soul that we’re going to be even more beautiful after this. ~Joan Kane
GARY MORGENSTEIN’S
A BLACK AND WHITE COOKIE
IS A NEW OFF-BROADWAY COMEDY/DRAMA
ABOUT AN AFRICAN AMERICAN NEWSTAND OWNER ENCOURAGED TO FIGHT HIS EXORBITANT RENT INCREASE BY AN ECCENTRIC JEWISH RADICAL
DIRECTED BY JOAN KANE, THE PRODUCTION NOW PREMIERES
THURSDAY, JANUARY 21 AT 7:00PM/ET AS PART OF TFTNC’s ON THE AIR SERIES
& SUNDAY, JANUARY 24 AT 3PM/ET ON THE EGO ACTUS WEBSITE
Incorporating the pandemic experiences of the past eight months into their production that Covid-19 brought to a halt in March, the award-winning Ego Actus Theatre Company will still present Gary Morgenstein’s new drama A Black and White Cookie, but in an updated version that is set against the backdrop of New York City reopening, post-pandemic. The play’s schedule has been updated. The premiere will air as part of Theater for the New City’s virtual On The Air series. It is now slated for Thursday, January 21 at 7:00PM/ET, with an additional performance on Sunday, January 24 at 3PM/ET.
Directed by Joan Kane, A Black and White Cookie was originally scheduled to premiere at the Pulitzer Prize-winning Theater for the New City on March 26, 2020. There are plans to stage the show at TFTNC when in-person performances are again allowed in New York City.
The cast features Morry Schorr (Modern Family/ABC-TV), Roslyn Seale (The Color Purple/National Tour), Julie T. Pham (The OA/Netflix), Chris Collins-Pisano (Forbidden Broadway: The Next Generation/Off Broadway) and Mansoor Najee-ullah (Mulebone, G.R. Point, The Mighty Gents/Broadway).
Harold Wilson, a gruff, conservative African American senior, has finally reopened his East Village newsstand following the coronavirus lockdown. Then an exorbitant rent increase forces him to close after 30 years and reluctantly retire to Florida with his niece. Enter Albie Sands, an eccentric 1960s Jewish radical, who persuades Harold to fight the landlord. Overcoming their many differences, Harold and Albie form a powerful and unlikely friendship to confront corporate greed – and prejudice.
Said Gary Morgenstein: “For this new production, it was important to update A Black and White Cookie by layering in the terrifying burden of the pandemic to portray a city struggling to come into the light. While the play reflects hard truths about fear, disease and bigotry, it’s ultimately positive and uplifting. What the world needs now more than ever is love and understanding, and faith in ourselves, and each other. If these two stubborn old guys can come together, so can all of us. You just gotta believe.”
Gary Morgenstein’s (playwright) novels and plays have been featured in national media from the New York Times, Entertainment Weekly, Parade Magazine, the New York Post, Sports Illustrated to NPR. His sixth novel A Fastball for Freedom, the sequel to his critically-acclaimed dystopian baseball-science fiction A Mound Over Hell (“1984 Meets Shoeless Joe”), will be published by BHC Press on March 25, 2021. In addition to A Black and White Cookie, he is the author of the stage dramas Saving Stan and A Tomato Can’t Grow in the Bronx, and the off-Broadway sci-fi rock musical The Anthem. Morgenstein is developing the scripted television series Joyland, set during the tumultuous 1960s, with veteran network executive Russell Friedman and the award-winning Broadway performer and director DeMone Seraphin, who will direct the pilot episode on Zoom in early 2021.
Joan Kane (director) is the founding Artistic Director of Ego Actus and directed I Know What Boys Want at Theatre Row, Six Characters in Search of an Author in Oslo, Norway and Kafka’s Belinda in Prague. She also directed both Safe and what do you mean at 59e59 Theaters and in the Edinburgh Festival Fringe, getting four star reviews for each. Kane was awarded Best Director in the 2016 United Solo Festival was named to the Indie Theatre Hall of Fame by nytheatre.com. She has also directed plays and readings for the Lark, Ensemble Studio Theatre, the NY Fringe Festival, Theater for the New City, Urban Stages, Workshop Theater, Nylon Fusion, Abingdon Theatre, Oberon Theatre, the Samuel French Short Play Festival, the Midtown International Festival and The Actors Studio. Joan has an MFA in Directing from The New School, an MS in Museum Education from Bank Street College. She is a member of The New York Madness Company, the Dramatists Guild and the Society of Stage Directors & Choreographers. Kane recently directed two plays during the Ego Actus Survival is Insufficient 10-play reading series.
KINTSUGI is the Japanese art of repairing broken objects by highlighting their cracks with golden powder. Often undertaken as a form of art therapy to encourage resilience, the art of kintsugi follows a slow and painstaking process that requires patience and concentration. Day after day, week after week, step after step, the object is cleaned, gathered, cared for, mended and celebrated. The object becomes even more beautiful then it was before it was broken. Its about accepting and celebrating our brokenness.
First Online with Fran 
Karen Cecilia: Challenging the New Normal
Karen Cecilia She/Her/Hers (Playwright, Screenwriter, Director) Her work has been seen in NYC at 3LD, La Mama, HERE Arts Center, Dixon Place, Theater For The New City, Theatre Odyssey, Sarasota FL, The Coalescence Theatre, Illinois and The Firehouse Theatre, Richmond, VA and Jermyn Street Theater, London England.
As a writer, I feel it is a privilege to tell the stories of people’s lives and show their deepest struggles as well as their greatest triumphs. I strive to engage the audience with my writing, provoke thought about the world around us, and create a new narrative through characters with agency who do not fall into the standard conventions of the past. ~ Karen Cecilia
Perfectly Normal (previously named Mea Culpa) was chosen for the #Shepersisted festival in Bloomington, Illinois and received Semi-Finalist award from The Orlando Shakespeare Theater in 2019. Play Workshops: The Cry Havoc Theatre Company and IVP Productions. She was the winner of the Walter Prichard Eaton Prize for Playwriting Excellence from Hunter College in 2014. She was a co-screenwriter on Daughters of Solanas produced by The Women’s Weekend Film Challenge ‘19. Karen is a frequent guest on City World Radio speaking about theatre and playwriting.
In addition to her playwriting career, Karen founded a theatre company The Call Theatre in 2021 and also has been coordinating, producing and hosting local events that supports community and the arts. The Call Theatre’s mission is to inspire, educate, and truly represent the people of the community through story and community service.
The Call Theatre conceives that theatre can and should happen in any type of space and is in pursuit of claiming spaces in the community for the neighborhood to have access to theatre. *This is an independent theatre company and produces work in any city.
The Call Theatre respects its audiences, believing that public discourse is essential to a democratic society and that stories of underrepresented people are vital to our lives as individuals and as a collective.
The Call Theatre welcomes ALL to the theatre and supports community collaborations.
The Call Theatre conceives that theatre can and should happen in any type of space and is in pursuit of claiming spaces in the community for the neighborhood to have access to theatre. *This is an independent theatre company and produces work in any city.
The Call Theatre. Named to ask the audience, HOW WILL YOU ANSWER THE CALL?
Want to be involved?
email us at thecalltheatre@gmail.com
Instagram: thecalltheatre.brooklyn
Selected works: Ivy Walls-play finalist and produced at the Second Annual Theatre
Odyssey One Act Play Festival; Top Finalist Honors 2019 Ivoryton Women
Playwright’s Initiative. Perfectly Normal- Finalist #Shepersisted festival,
Bloomington, Illinois; Semi-Finalist The Orlando Shakespeare Theater, 2019,
Semi-Finalist The Athena Project, CO. Play workshops: The Cry Havoc Theatre
Company and IVP Productions. Winner: Walter Prichard Eaton Prize for
Playwriting Excellence Hunter College ’14. Co-screenwriter on Daughters of
Solanas produced by The Women’s Weekend Film Challenge ‘19. Writer/Director
(short) Vanish’d Sight. Video Director for the song Thinking About Leaving from
Kate Dulcich on her album Wrong Me.
Karen has an MFA in Playwriting from The Actors Studio Drama School, Member
of the the Playwright/Directors Workshop at The Actors Studio NYC, The
Dramatists Guild of America and on the Board of Directors for The League Of
Professional Theater Women. Publications: 100 MONOLOGUES FROM NEW
PLAYS 2020 — WOMEN Limelight Editions/The Applause Acting Series. “Zaza”
Monologue from STRIKE: All Women Stand United.
Instagram karen.cecilia6