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The Process Series: THE OTHER AMERICAN
February 20 @ 8:00 am - 5:00 pm
the process series
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE Press Contact: Joseph Megel | 919-843-5666 | uncprocessseries@gmail.com
THE OTHER AMERICAN
by D.W. Gregory
February 28 & March 1, 2025 @ 7:30 p.m.
Black Box Theatre at Swain Hall
The next offering from The Process Series, in partnership with StreetSigns Center for Literature and Performance, is a concert reading of D.W. Gregory’s haunting play The Other American.
Based on actual events, The Other American is the story of Stan Glickman, a promising American art student ensnared in one of the darkest chapters of the Cold War. One night in a Paris café, after a political debate with an American tourist, Stan spirals into a mysterious mental breakdown. His life is shattered; he never paints again. Twenty-five years later, he discovers why: The tourist was a CIA operative and the drink he bought Stan was laced with a mega-dose of LSD. When Stan realizes he has been made an unwitting subject in a secret CIA experiment in mind control, he is determined to track down the man who poisoned him and hold him accountable. But The Other American is about much more than one man’s quest for justice—it is also about the high human price we pay when we allow our government to reduce its citizens—or any individual—to some expendable “other.”
According to Artistic Director Joseph Megel, who worked with Gregory twenty-five years ago on the first production of her most produced play, Radium Girls, “D.W., always seems to interrogate the past in a way that makes us look anew at the present. Although this is a story of the Cold War, it feels deeply resonant today. And to share it with us, we have brought together a stellar cast led by Ron Menzel as Stan Glickman and including Jock Brocki, Cheryl Chamblee, Gabriel Graetz, and Kyma Lassiter.
Playwright D.W. Gregory adds, “The Other American was produced last fall at New Jersey Rep, which commissioned the play. It was very well received by audiences and the run sold out. But I still felt there was work to do on the play, and the Process Series presents a great opportunity to revisit it with a different cast and director. It’s really only through a series of presentations—productions or readings—that you learn how well a play holds up. In this case, I am looking at bringing more depth to one of the major characters and so it will be really helpful to hear these revisions and see if I achieve that end.”
Critical response to the 2024 New Jersey production was glowing.
“Stunning… powerful, enthralling drama.” Broadway World
“Like seeing an experimental film played out on stage or watching a dream unfold . . . an amazing experience.
Bold. New. Challenging. Fascinating. The play is likely unlike anything you’ve ever seen.” Gary Wien, NJ Stage”
About the Artist
D.W. Gregory is an award-winning writer whose plays frequently explore political issues through a personal lens and a comedic twist. The New York Times called her “a playwright with the talent to enlighten and provoke” for her most produced work, Radium Girls, about the famous case of industrial poisoning. Radium Girls has received over two thousand productions in the United Stages and abroad and is being adapted into a musical with composer Steven M. Alper and lyricist Sarah Knapp. Other plays include Memoirs of a Forgotten Man, a National New Play Network rolling world premiere; Molumby’s Million (Iron Age Theatre); A Thing of Beauty, winner of the Southeastern Theatre Conference’s 2023 Charles M. Getchell New Play Award; The Good Daughter (New Jersey Repertory Company); and a new musical comedy, The Yellow Stocking Play, also with Alper and Knapp. For five years in a row, Dramatics magazine named Radium Girls among the 10 Most-Produced Plays in American High-School Theatre.
Our Sponsors
Our 17th season is based in the Department of Communication, supported by StreetSigns Center for Literature and Performance, and is co-sponsored by The College of Arts and Sciences, Institute for the Arts and Humanities, Asian American Center, and these UNC Departments and Programs: American Studies, Art and Art History, Communication, Creative Writing, Dramatic Art, English and Comparative Literature, Music, and Philosophy.
About the Process Series
Dedicated to the development of new and significant works in the performing arts, The Process Series features professionally mounted, developmental presentations of new works in progress. The mission of the Series is to illuminate the ways in which artistic ideas take form, examine the creative process, and offer audiences the opportunity to follow artists and performers as they explore and discover. Immediately following each performance, we ask our audiences to join in the creative process, providing feedback critical to the development of the work as it moves forward. Most performances are free and open to the public.
For more information, contact Artistic Director Joseph Megel at megel@email.unc.edu, or visit the following links: Website: http://processseries.unc.edu Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/theprocessseries Donation link: https://give.unc.edu/donate?p=ascs&f=104345