Displaying items by tag: Eleanor Burgess

Fleetwood -Jourdain Theatre, an award-winning theatre company that has been thrilling audiences with over four decades of unique, inspirational, and invigorating Black American and African Diaspora-centered storytelling, has announced the cast and production team for the final production of its 2026 season. THE NICETIES, a two-character play by Eleanor Burgess, follows a 20-year-old Black college student in a meeting with her white professor to discuss the student's term paper about slavery's effect on the American Revolution. The paper's thesis is that the revolution would not have succeeded without the contributions of black slaves. The professor disagrees, and what begins as a polite clash in perspectives explodes into an urgent debate about race, history, and power. 

Fleetwood-Jourdain Producing Artistic Director Tim Rhoze, who will direct the play and design the set, announced his cast today. Appearing as the student, Zoe, will be Georgerinna Farley, whose stage and television credits include IN THE CONTINUUM for Pegasus Theatre and SEND HELP for AMC Networks.  Janine, the professor, will be played by Jesi Mullins, who is currently appearing in ADVANCE MAN for Strawdog Theatre Company, and has extensive television credits that include CHICAGO MED. THE NICETIES will be performed at the Fleetwood-Jourdain Theatre in the Noyes Cultural Arts Center, 927 Noyes Street in Evanston, from October 31 through November 15. 

The world premiere of THE NICETIES, directed by Chicago's Kimberly Senior, was co-produced during the 2018-2019 season by the Huntington Theatre Company in Boston, Massachusetts; Manhattan Theatre Club in New York, New York; and McCarter Theatre Center in Princeton, New Jersey. THE NEW YORK TIMES said it was "a bristling, provocative debate play about race and privilege in the United States, and it begs to be argued with." DC THEATER ARTS called it "a brilliant and important play." 
 
The production team for FJT'S THE NICETIES, in addition to Rhoze as Director and Set Designer, includes Brenden Marble (Lighting Designer), Rick Sims (Sound Designer), Kate Parker-Burrows (Costume Designer), Shane Rogers (Technical Director), Phil Timberlake (Vocal Coach), Bria Walker-Rhoze (Artistic Associate, Dramaturg), Tara Malpass (Stage Manager), and Joe Ciresi (Assistant Stage Manager).
 
Tickets to THE NICETIES are $33.00, Seniors $22.00, Students $10.00  at the box office on the day of performance with ID. Tickets are on sale at www.fjtheatre.com.
 
LISTING INFORMATION
 
THE NICETIES
by Eleanor Burgess 
Directed by Tim Rhoze
October 31 – November 15, 2026
Saturdays at 7 pm, Sundays at 3 pm
Fleetwood-Jourdain Theatre in the Noyes Cultural Arts Center
927 Noyes St., Evanston
Tickets $33.00, Students $10.00. On sale at www.fjtheatre.com
Phone 847-866-5914
 
Zoe, a Black student at a liberal arts college, is called into her white professor's office to discuss her paper about slavery's effect on the American Revolution. What begins as a polite clash in perspectives explodes into an urgent debate about race, history, and power.
 
BIOS

Eleanor Burgess (playwright). In addition to THE NICETIES, Eleanor Burgess' plays include WIFE OF A SALESMAN, START DOWN, CHILL, SPARKS FLY UPWARD, and GALILEE, 34.  Her work has been produced at theaters across the United States, including Manhattan Theatre Club, South Coast Rep, Geffen Playhouse, McCarter Theatre Center, Huntington Theatre Company, Writers Theatre, Milwaukee Rep, Merrimack Repertory Theatre, Geva Theatre Center, InterAct Theatre, Portland Stage, the Alliance Theatre and the Contemporary American Theatre Festival, as well as the Finborough Theatre in London. She has also written for film and television, including work on PERRY MASON for HBO, WE CRASHED for Apple TV+, INTERVIEW WITH THE VAMPIRE for AMC, and screenplays for Bad Robot, Amblin, and Anonymous Content. Originally from Massachusetts, she studied history at Yale College and Dramatic Writing at NYU/Tisch.
  
Tim Rhoze (Director, Artistic Director) Tim Rhoze has been the Producing Artistic Director of Fleetwood-Jourdain Theatre since 2010. His directing credits include: IN THE CONTINUUM, GEE'S BEND, THE BALDWIN | GIOVANNI EXPERIENCE, PASS OVER, HONEYPOT: BLACK WOMEN WHO LOVE WOMEN, UNTIL THE FLOOD, FOR COLORED GIRLS WHO HAVE CONSIDERED SUICIDE/ WHEN THE RAINBOW IS ENUF, 1619: THE JOURNEY OF A PEOPLE, THIS BITTER EARTH, , THE LIGHT, AMERICAN SON, HOME, TWILIGHT: LOS ANGELES 1992, THE MEETING, FIRES IN THE MIRROR, BLACK BALLERINA (co-writer),  NUTCRACKER(ISH), CROWNS, HAVING OUR SAY, FROM THE MISSISSIPPI DELTA, WOZA ALBERT!, GOING TO ST. IVES, SINGLE BLACK FEMALE, A SONG FOR CORETTA, YELLOWMAN, SWEET, LADY DAY AT EMERSON BAR & GRILL, BEAR COUNTRY, NOBODY, FENCES, PIANO LESSON, AIN'T MISBEHAVIN, K2, THE GLASS MENAGERIE, and others. Tim is also the writer/director of WHY NOT ME? A SAMMY DAVIS JR. STORY, and MAYA'S LAST POEM, both produced at FJT; and BLACK BALLERINA, produced at FJT and Pittsburgh Public Theatre. He was also co-writer and director of THE BALDWIN | GIOVANNI EXPERIENCE and A HOME ON THE LAKE. His performances in August Wilson's PIANO LESSON (1997) and JOE TURNER'S COME AND GONE (2024) at the Goodman Theatre were nominated for Jeff Awards.
 
Georgerinna Farley (Zoe) is an actor in the Chicago area who is passionate about real, raw, and authentic stories. She holds an MFA in Acting from The Theatre School at DePaul University, as well as a BA in Theatre Performance from Rhode Island College, where she became a part of the Lin-Manuel Miranda Family Fellowship. Her work spans across stage and screen, including SEND HELP (AMC Networks), IN THE CONTINUUM (Abigail) at Pegasus Theatre, JULIUS CAESAR (Mark Antony), and RENT (Mimi Marquez). 
 
Jesi Mullins (Janine) is delighted to make her Fleetwood-Jourdain debut! Theatre: ADVANCE MAN (Strawdog Theatre), RACECAR RACECAR RACECAR (Bramble Theatre Company), A CHRISTMAS CAROL (Metropolis), FAIRVIEW (Definition Theatre), MARYS SEACOLE (Griffin Theatre), THE SECRETARIES (First Floor Theater), BACHELOR - THE UNAUTHORIZED PARODY MUSICAL, LOVE ACTUALLY? THE UNAUTHORIZED MUSICAL PARODY (Apollo Theater), MACBETH (Spectrum Shakespeare), EXIT THE KING, NEIGHBORHOOD 3: REQUISITION OF DOOM (The Theatre School at DePaul). TV: CHICAGO MED (NBC). Film: NOTHING'S GOING ON WITH ME AND SANDRA (Big C Creative), RETURN TO START (908 Media). Co-host of FYI: The Murphy Brown Podcast (featured on CNN's TV ON THE EDGE). MFA, The Theatre School at DePaul University. Jesi is a certified actor combatant and dialect coach.
 
ABOUT FLEETWOOD-JOURDAIN THEATRE 

Founded in 1979, Fleetwood-Jourdain Theatre is a professional, award-winning theatre company that has been thrilling audiences with over four decades of unique, inspirational, and invigorating Black American and African Diaspora-centered storytelling. The company has been honored by the Black Theatre Alliance/Ira Aldridge Awards and is frequently listed as a top-rated Chicago theatre company. From original plays to the best of Broadway, Fleetwood-Jourdain Theatre has remained committed to supplying the very best in theatre. "Umoja!! ....Working Together in Unity" is the foundation from which FJT began and continues to thrive!
 
It is our mission to present powerful, thought-provoking, Theater Arts programming with a commitment to diversity and creative excellence. We are dedicated to providing a nurturing and creative environment for directors, playwrights, actors, set, light, and costume designers. In this positive environment, they can further develop their creative skills and share their artistic expressions. The Fleetwood-Jourdain Theatre is funded by the City of Evanston and in part by the Illinois Arts Council, A State Agency.

Playwright Eleanor Burgess has delivered one of the best scripts I've read or seen, in ‘Wife of a Salesman.’ While it may be viewed somewhat as a “prequel” to Arthur Miller’s 1949 classic ‘Death of a Salesman,’ it never directly references that play, and is an intriguing and challenging work of art that is an instant classic. Its world premier, running through April 3 at Writers Theatre in Glencoe, IL, is a theatrical event of the first order.

Produced in partnership with the Milwaukee Rep, 'Wife of a Salesman' is set in the 1950s (television is just arriving), the play opens in the apartment of The Mistress (Amanda Drinkall), a young blonde awakening to her day perhaps still basking in the glow of an amorous adventure the night before. When a knock somes to her door, she opens it, giving us a glimpse of a matronly woman with a briefcase, then slams it shut immediately, scurrying to straighten up the room, and pull herself together. A minute later she opens the door to this visitor, The Wife (Kate Fry) of the title.

From that opening moment The Mistress conveys through a gasp that she recognizes this unbidden visitor. Then the door reopens and The Wife enters, posing as a fabric saleswoman.Moments of increasing intensity follow, The Wife unable to open her sample case, and The Mistress deftly managing it for her. The Wife comments on a figurine of the Madonna, noting awkwardly that The Mistress must be Catholic. “My neighbors are Catholic,” she notes, and adds that they are nice people. She begins her halting sales pitch on the various samples. And soon The Mistress takes her to task for her poor salesmanship, offering with ratcheting intensity examples of how a sales presentation should be made. And the frey begins.

The Wife, we learn, has driven from New York to Boston, to confront her husband’s mistress, grist for any soap opera, a story from time immemorial. But Burgess unfolds this telling with precision strikes, and Kate Fry and Amanda Drinkall do not miss a beat in the imaginative script under the tight direction of Jo Bonney.

Burgess, whose plays include ‘The Niceties,’ plays out this examination of women’s roles in the 1950s with master craftsmanship. Every beat of the performances draw us into the story, the conflict, and to contrast contemporary views of women’s status in society with expectations from an earlier era.

Then, with a magical stroke (no spoiler), Burgess allows us to meet the actresses playing the roles, and see ways their personal lives parallel those of the 1950s characters. We listen to a generational divergence, Millennial vs. Genx types, in how to chart careers.

But the playwright goes further: the actresses ask the director Jim (Rom Barkhorder) to restore two powerful monologues that he has cut, and to let them speak to the playwright directly. In this meta transformation, Burgess is naming several of the fraught dynamics of theater: the tendency of at least some directors to view actors as”necessary evils” in staging plays, like herding cats. Jim also has an indifferent patriarchal power, and he fends off with familiar tropes of male disregard the multiple entreaties by the actresses to be given their due.

The creative team has given the show a set that is a delight to behold. Tickets to this outstanding production of 'Wife of a Salesman' are available at Writers Theatre.