Nueva York — Historias de inmigrantes representadas por los mismos protagonistas se verán reflejadas en el estreno mundial de la obra dramática “Las escenas de la cruz”, el 17 de julio en el teatro Dorothy Strelsin de la ciudad de Nueva York.

Escrita por el afroamericano Daniel Carlton, la pieza se basa en los duros e inesperados desafíos que enfrentan los inexpertos jóvenes inmigrantes. Se relatan ocho historias verídicas del “cruce” de individuos de varios países a los Estados Unidos, mediante escenas propias de técnicas teatrales tradicionales como el “brechtian agitprop”, la farsa francesa y el realismo americano.

El evento forma parte de la 10ma edición del Midtown International Theatre Festival (MITF) que se llevará a cabo a partir del 13 de julio en la Gran Manzana.

El concepto fue creado por iDoTheater como parte de los proyectos de la organización benéfica neoyorquina iPOWER.

Carlton escribió las escenas inspirado en las sesiones improvisadas con los miembros del iDoTheater y entregó la pieza a consideración del MITF.

“Esta es una obra original donde participan jóvenes de 10 países, quienes han aprendido no sólo el idioma inglés sino a valorarse como personas”, señaló Carlton a EL DIARIO/LA PRENSA.

El elenco incluye a Navit Bautista, Faushell Brito, Xiaodeng Chen, José Degante, Jessenia Hernández, Carlos Jiménez, Emanuel Jiménez, Maxy Jiménez, Joanna Rodríguez, Joel Rodríguez, José Rodríguez y Cecilio Ximeyo.

“Las escenas de la cruz” estará en cartelera desde el 17 de julio al primero de agosto del 2009 en el teatro Dorothy Strelsin, ubicado en el complejo Abingdon Theatre Complex, 312 Oeste de la Calle 36 de Manhattan. Boletos: $18. Para más detalles puede llamar al 1 (866) 811-4111 o www.midtownfestival.org.

julio.paredes@eldiariony.com

NEW DRAMA “THE SCENES OF THE CROSS”/“LAS ESCENAS DE LA CRUZ”
MAKES WORLD PREMIERE ON JULY 17 WITH IMMIGRANT STORIES
PERFORMED BY THOSE WHO LIVED THEM

SIX BILINGUAL PERFORMANCES FROM JULY 17–AUGUST 1
AS PART OF 2009 MIDTOWN INTERNATIONAL THEATER FESTIVAL
Press/VIP Night on Tuesday, July 21 at 5:30pm

New York, NY (June 29, 2009)—Rooted in true stories and oral histories, LAS ESCENAS DE LA CRUZ/SCENES FROM THE CROSS, is a new play about the poignant and unexpected struggles of recent immigrant youth, performed by the very people who lived them. On Friday, July 17, LAS ESCENAS will make its already sold-out World Premiere as part of the 10th Annual Midtown International Theatre Festival. Presented by Carlton Industries and iDoTheater, an iPOWER project, LAS ESCENAS tours to Mexico later this year in partnership with the not-forprofit Ipsoculta.

Through eight vignettes, actual “scenes from the cross” from Mexico to the U.S. are told in through theatrical traditions including Brechtian agitprop, French farce and American realism. The drama captures the struggles of recent immigrant youth, with stories conceived, created and performed by those very people. The collective concept was generated by members of iDoTheater, a project within the larger NYC non-profit iPOWER. Director and playwright Daniel Carlton scripted the scenes out of their improvisational sessions and submitted the piece for MITF consideration.

“I was extremely impressed with Daniel’s drive, ambition and excitement regarding his theatre company’s dedication to helping immigrant youth,” says Susan Rankus, artistic director of international plays for MITF. “I was also impressed with his team—a large group of driven and committed individuals all inspired by the cause.”

The ensemble cast includes Navit Bautista, Faushell Brito, Xiaodeng Chen, Jose Degante, Jessenia Hernandez, Carlos Jimenez, Emanuel Jimenez, Maxy Jimenez, Joanna Rodriguez, Joel Rodriguez, Jose Rodriguez and Cecilio Ximeyo.

Playwright/Director Daniel Carlton has worked as an actor and teaching artist in more than 35 states across the U.S. As an actor, he spent eight years in New York, regional and touring theater. He is a recipient of a S.A.R.T.A. (Sacramento Area Regional Theater Award) for Best Actor in a Play (“The Laramie Project” at the Harbor Theater, CA), a Leonardo Da Vinci Award for Best Actor in a Musical (“Cowboys!” at Wings Theater, NYC) and an O.O.B.R. Award (Off Off Broadway Review) for Outstanding Achievement. Favorite roles include Lysander in “A Midsummer Nightʼs Dream” (Marin Shakespeare, CA) and Don Pedro in “Much Ado About Nothing” (American Shakespeare Center, VA). As a teaching artist, Carlton has facilitated the creation of original works by young people in public schools throughout New York.

LAS ESCENAS DE LA CRUZ runs from July 17–August 1, 2009 at The Dorothy Strelsin Theatre, located in the Abingdon Theatre Complex, 312 W. 36th St (between 8th and 9th Avenues), 1st Floor, New York, NY, 10019. Tickets are $18 ($15 for students and seniors) and available by calling 866-811-4111 or www.midtownfestival.org. Performances take place on July 17 at 7:30 p.m. (SOLD OUT), Saturday, July 18 at 3:00 p.m.; Sunday, July 19 at 4:00 p.m.; Press & VIP Night on Tuesday, July 21 at 6:30 p.m.; Thursday, July 25 at 1:00 p.m. and Wednesday, August 1 at 7:00 p.m. Run time is 60 minutes with no intermission.

About Carlton Industries:
Carlton Industries is an arts organization that is focused on community empowerment. Founded by award-winning performer and educator Daniel Carlton, Carlton Industries creates programs that foster language as a means of understanding and expression in its mission to illuminate crucial, hidden realities that act as barriers to global progress.

About iPOWER:
iPOWER, Immigrant People Organizing and Working for Empowerment and Rights, is a community organization based in New York City. Their mission is to inspire youth activism, providing empowering learning opportunities and leadership development that responds to the needs of immigrant youth and build on existing strengths and knowledge, to achieve a vision of society that values freedom, equality and compassion above all and for all. iDoTheater is one of iPOWERʼs many program offerings. More at http://www.ipoweryouth.org/.

About the Midtown International Theatre Festival:
Now in its 10th year, the Midtown International Theatre Festival (MITF) celebrates the diversity of theatre in New York City and abroad. The festival represents a fantastic, often paradoxical, adventurous, and intriguing cross-section of the theatre community. The MITF proudly hosts production companies from across the country and around the globe, uniting talent in one of the biggest theatre capitals in the world. The 2009 festival runs from July 13 through August 3. More at http://www.midtownfestival.org/

LAS ESCENAS DE LA CRUZ
INFO AT-A-GLANCE

Performances Dates:
• Tuesday, July 17 at 7:30 p.m. OPENING NIGHT
• Saturday, July 18 at 3:00 p.m.
• Sunday, July 19 at 4:00 p.m.
• Tuesday, July 21 at 6:30 p.m. PRESS NIGHT
• Thursday, July 25 at 1:00 p.m.
• Wednesday, August 1 at 7:00 p.m.

Run time:
60 minutes, no intermission

Venue:
Abingdon Theatre Complex
Dorothy Strelsin Theatre
312 W. 36th St, 1st Floor
New York, NY 10018

Tickets:
$18, $15 for students and seniors
866-811-4111
www.midtownfestival.org

Director/Playwright:
Daniel Carlton

Cast members:
Navit Bautista, Faushell Brito, Xiaodeng Chen, Jose Degante, Jessenia Hernandez, Carlos Jimenez, Emanuel Jimenez, Maxy Jimenez, Joanna Rodriguez, Joel Rodriguez, Jose Rodriguez, Cecilio Ximeyo

Media Contact:
Kerri Allen, kerri@allenpr.com, 718-501-1567

iPOWER! is a highly effective program models for promoting the academic and career achievement of ESOL students. The program enables students to develop academic, leadership and job readiness skills while learning English as an additional language. The organization of the iPOWER! program is tailored to meet the linguistic, academic, and effective needs of our youth; provides ESOL students with the necessary instruction to allow them to progress to success through a rate commensurate with their fellow students and native-speaking-peers and mentors; and make the best of the environment and community resources.

The iPOWER! mission is to inspire youth activism, providing empowering learning opportunities and leadership development that responds to the needs of immigrant youth and build on existing strengths and knowledge, to achieve a vision of society that values freedom, equality and compassion above all and for all.

Current iPOWER! projects include:

• iBook
• iCare aims to raise the awareness of the health of your youth. Members are actively involved in exploring holistic health options and practices and running workshops influence other youth. The process will also explore the health care systems for recent immigrant youth.
• iChat (leaders: Xiao Deng, Yi Mei) mission is sharing foreign language and culture with each other, and improving English conversation skill. Members through our lessons will build up their foreign language skills. We also improve our English skill and present our culture when we become foreign language tutors.
• iCook (leader: A Hao) explores restaurant worker’s rights through culinary arts. The project aims to produce a youth friendly  cookbook witth culturallly infused food recipes and rent immigrant youth’s stories that will be told through the making of the wood recorded as documentary series. The stories will be liked with worker’s rights and its implication in each scenario.
• iDance
• iDoCraft (leader:  Anita) mission is to encourage them to learn various techniques to make products creatively using materials we have or what we can get. Moreover, one of our team’s goals is to turn reusable objects or something that we can find into beautiful crafs to add a little “green” to our Earth.
• iDoMusic (leader: Mr. Ma) aims to provide young adults with an inspiring atomsphere to learn more about many types of musical instruments with different backgrounds and how to use them. Interestingly, there are even many hand-made and creative instruments that are both durable and fun to work with.
• iDoTheater
• iFashion
• iLearn aimst to develop special programming for basic education. A project of iLearn is the Spanish Literacy classes for Spanish speaking members that are English learners and have low literacy in their native language. Another project of iLearn is the GED self-study program. iLearn develops self-study and online bilingual GED materials and provide flexible schedule to accommodate you under trafficking and situation.
• iReach (leader: Christina) mission is to build knowledge to education, enhance serve to design and engage trust to energy.
  
• iRead (leader: Emmanuel) provides baasic Spanish literature class in supporting struggling readers and early dropouts from schools. Classes are designed for recent Spanish speaking immigrants.
• iMakeOver
• iSave
• iStrive (leader: Jing Yu) is a project that aims to let students know how to get into college by providiing information about Financial Aid and all the steps they have to follow. Explores and support college admissions to recent immigrant youth and college bound members.
• iTech
• iTour (leader: Wei Jie) was created from the need of new ESL students who expressed their confusion and general nervousness during the beginning stages of coming the U.S.  We will support these new students and help them understand the resources availed to them in their first language. Also iTour has expanded its actual tours into various immigran.t communities; the purpose of these tours is to indoctrinate iPower! youth the immigrant history and culture in New York City.
• iWish composes financial literacy curriculum through individual lesson planning. The members are involved in managing iPOWER! account, apply grants for  iPOWER! and facilitating grant application for other projects.
• iWork (Leader: Jose) is worker’s rights project that aims to educate the community about rights at the workplace such as minimum wages, overtime pay, worker’s compensation etc. Participants of the project work with a mentor from ROC NY (Restaurant Opportunities Center) receiving training and guidance from both them and the Legal Services Center to  conduct training and advocacy for their peers about worker’s rights.

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