"It's exciting and terrifying to have my own space," says playwright and director John Rosenberg as he shows me around the spacious first floor of the Papermill Theater, where his company, hellafresh theater, is in residence. "It used to be such theater dork talk, you know 'wouldn't it be awesome to have your own space.'" His collection of six short plays, Cheap Guy HOF, Class of 2010, will be the first performance to take place in the newly converted theater when it premieres at the 2010 Philly Fringe Festival.
The play, which coronates six cheap Americans into an imagined hall of fame, was largely inspired by a story that John read in the newspaper a few years ago about a judge masturbating in court under his robes. "I was like 'WTF?!' and that gave birth to the idea of chronicling cheap guys."
Cheap Guy HOF's debut will also be John's theater debut in Philly. He's a recent transplant from San Francisco, where he worked with a company called Sleepwalkers. He broke off with them to form hellafresh, a name he says "gives people an idea of what your shit is." Then his "lady friend" wanted to moved back to her native Philly.
"I said 'Hooray!'" and in January they relocated to Philly, where they now live in Center City. So far John's found the theater scene in the City of Brotherly Love to be thriving.
And he's working hard to expand where theater happens in the city. With the Papermill Theater, John says, "We are throwing our lives into this project up in Kensington." This past week, construction finished up, lights went in, and Cheap Guy HOF is ready to go.
"San Francisco has a huge music scene, but as big as music is there, theater is here," he says. "What blew my mind was all the bus stop posters for theater performances, because other cities don't have that."
Two months before the Fringe he was doing readings of Cheap Guy HOF on top of converting the space that was once a paper mill and then an illegal nightclub into a theater. "I really love workshopping a play until it goes on." He doesn't work "by the book," he says, because he doesn't like to talk that much. Plus as a playwright he says the actors continually surprise him.
"One of the plays I thought would be a dirty, nasty play," he says. "But when I read with an actor who a combo of like Jimmy Stewart and Jack Lemon, the play changed for me to be about this all-American, go-getter guy who just lost his shit." In this way, when John says "cheap guy," he's not necessarily referring to a man who won't foot the bill.
"It was a derisive term from when I was growing up in L.A. Me and my sister use to use it to describe like an old guy who kept gold buried in the background or someone who discharges firearms," he explains. "Like guys who are 'allergic to condoms.'"
Cheap Guy HOF, Class of 2010 opens on Saturday, September 4 and runs every Saturday and Sunday throughout the Philly Fringe. Papermill Community for the Arts, 2825 Ormes Street, Kensington. Times vary, $10. For details and tickets, click here
--Ellen Freeman
Photos courtesy of John Rosenberg.
Posted At : August 30, 2010 10:32 AM | Posted By : Live Arts Festival & Philly Fringe
Related Categories:
Cheap Guy HOF, Class of 2010,
Theater,
Titus Andronicus,
Philly Fringe,
Tiny Dynamite,
Acting Class (The Play),
Rosa de la Alhambra,
Statements After an Arrest Under the ImmoralityAct,
Emergence,
Casual World/Intimate Heart,
Music,
Dance,
Super Heroes Who Are Super,
Kid Out of Nowhere
The 2010 Philly Fringe previews are almost done, and the cavalcade that is the Fringe is about to begin. Tonight? The final Fringe showcase at Plays and Players. The lineup, please . . .
Act Normal Theatre: Kid Out of Nowhere
Kapow Productions: Tiny Dynamite
Hella Fresh Theater: Cheap Guy HOF, Class of 2010
Plays and Players: Titus Andronicus
Anj Granieri: Casual World/Intimate Heart
DysFUNctional Theater: Statements After an Arrest Under the Immorality Act
Duende Flamenco Fusion: Rosa de la Alhambra
MM2 Modern Dance Company: Emergence
Philadelphia Acting Studio: Acting Class (The Play)
Plays and Players presents Save The Day Productions: Super Heroes Who Are Super!
8:00 pm, Plays and Players, 1714 Delancey Place, Rittenhouse Square. $12.
--Nicholas Gilewicz
In this series, get to know your 2010 Philly Fringe artists. Today, meet cheap guy John Rosenberg.
Name: John Rosenberg
Age: 33
Where do you live now? Philadelphia
Where were you born? San Fernando Valley in L.A.
What's your show title? Cheap Guy Hall Of Fame, Class of 2010
What was the first thing you stole? 1984 Olympic pen set. Got busted by my mom. Had to apologize to store manager.
What's your favorite alcoholic beverage? White wine!
What was the last performance you saw? My family meeting my dad's bone marrow donor.
What's your favorite Philly intersection? Ormes and Cambria.
What's the worst thing you ever did for money? Told my mom my girlfriend killed herself so she would give me some cash.
Who's your favorite Phillies player? Dodger fan.
What's the most disgusting thing you've ever seen on SEPTA? I just moved here—I love SEPTA.
See, SEPTA? Many of us do love you! But all of us wish you sold tokens at every station. Cheap Guy Hall of Fame, Class of 2010 runs during all three weekends of Philly Fringe. The Papermill Community of the Arts, 2825 Ormes Street, Philadelphia. Various times, $10.
--Nicholas Gilewicz
Photo courtesy John Rosenberg.
Building a new arts space anywhere is a gamble, but building one on a residential elbow street in Kensington is, in the words of the new Papermill Community for the Arts' resident artist John Rosenberg, "sink or swim." For the 2010 Philly Fringe John is putting up Cheap Guy HOF, Class of 2010, a collection of six short plays about cheap guys at the Papermill Theater. The play will be both the native Californian's Philly debut and Papermill's inaugural theater performance.
The historic but newly re-imagined space was once a paper mill (hence the name) at 2825 Ormes Street, three blocks from the Somerset El stop. The gigantic brick façade rises from a block of classic dilapidated Philly row houses and sidewalks with large weeds growing out of the cracks.
"I want an energy here, a variety of mediums," say Karyn Vetter, one of the building's owners who works in real estate. Her and partner Yoel Wulfhart's plan for the building is to create a "Studioville" where all kinds of artists can have a space to work in for whatever they can afford. At this stage the top three floors of the five-story building, which in the interim between paper mill and arts space was used as a gigantic illegal nightclub, are mostly empty and the bottom floor is divided between gallery and theater space. 's Papier-mâché sculptures filled the gallery when we visited, and 's photography exhibition is next. Over the new wall that divides the bottom floor, John is working with contractors to build risers for the swanky dark wood and leather chairs left over from the building's nightclub days, install air conditioning, and light the space for his show.
"We could spend thousand of dollars on lighting, but we've decided to light it to celebrate the fact that it's a warehouse," he says. The high ceilings, exposed brick walls, and heavy sliding wooden doors are flexible enough to be made intimate with dividers for Cheap Guy HOF, or left open so that "if people want to put on a fucking opera, they can," says John. He's dipping into his retirement fund to help renovate the warehouse for his own work and for the future work of other writers and directors. "Space is a huge cost of putting up a work . . . it's exciting and terrifying to have my own space."
Click more to explore the Papermill Community for the Arts' other four floors.
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