World Premiere of "The Ruby Sunrise"
May 14th -- June 20th at Trinity Rep

Trinity Rep will present the world premiere of "The Ruby Sunrise," hailed as a highlight of the recent Humana Festival of New Plays.

Written by Rinne Groff and directed by Artistic Director Oskar Eustis, this "intelligent romantic comedy"  tells the story of two young women, in two different decades, and their love affair with television.

A runaway teenage girl named Ruby arrives at her aunt's Midwestern farm in 1927 and sets to work dismantling and reassembling every electronic device she can find. In the barn one night, she constructs a crude television set and is convinced that her invention will change the way people look at the world.

Twenty-five years later, in a television studio in Manhattan, a live television adaptation of her story is about to be made. As the actors prepare for the live broadcast performance, writer's block, commercial compromises and the anti-communist blacklist threaten Ruby's story.

The idea for "The Ruby Sunrise" reportedly came to Groff after her mentor, Martin Epstein, mentioned a NOVA special on the story of Philo T. Farnsworth, the inventor of the all-electrical television system.  Groff explains "I thought it was odd that most people didn't know who the inventor was or the circumstances of the invention of television -- especially given that TV is so much a part of our modern life."

Playwright Rinne Groff received the Graduate Award in Playwriting from the Dramatic Writing M.F.A. Program at New York University's Tisch School of the Arts, where she is now a member of the faculty. Her work has been seen at the Humana Festival, The Kitchen, HERE theater, the Provincetown Playhouse and Soho Rep.

Oskar Eustis  is artistic director at Trinity Rep, where he has directed seventeen plays, most recently last season's "The Long Christmas Ride Home" (both in Providence and  at Long Wharf Theatre in Connecticut) and "Copenhagen."
 
For more information, visit the box office at 201 Washington Street in Providence, call 401-351-4242 or log on to www.trinityrep.com.

-- OnStage Boston

5/1/04