Now Playing!
Cow Pie Bingo
by Larissa FastHorse
Winner, USA Pen Literary Award in Drama for previous AlterTheater commission, Landless
In this new comedy about the county fair circuit, four humans struggle with their moral compasses when faced with the possibilities of love and capitalism in the age of the Internet. Meanwhile, a cow is just trying to poop in peace.
A new AlterLab play
"Larissa FastHorse’s “Cow Pie Bingo,” about awkward 4-H Club members in South Dakota, is so sweet and light as to have a cow as a character, played by Gwen Loeb." --San Francisco Chronicle
" “Cow Pie Bingo” is a charming comedy that really drives home the deep connection people feel with their animals."--Marin Independent Journal
"Playwright plays loving tribute to rural American" --Marin Independent Journal
"AlterTheater opens window on resistance" --San Francisco Chronicle
Playing in San Francisco, in partnership with A.C.T.'s ArtShare
Jan 11th-20th
A.C.T. Costume Shop Theater
1117 Market Street.
San Francisco, CA
And in San Rafael Jan 26-Feb 18
1344 Fourth Street (between C & D Streets)
San Rafael, CA
PHOTOTS BY DavidAllenStudio.com
Cast & Crew
Larissa FastHorse
Laarissa FastHorse (Sicangu Lakota) is an award winning playwright, director and choreographer. Larissa's produced plays include What Would Crazy Horse Do? (KCRep, Relative Theatrics), Urban Rez (Cornerstone Theater Company, ASU Gammage, NEFA National tour 2019-20), Landless and Cow Pie Bingo (AlterTheater), Average Family (Children’s Theater Company of Minneapolis), Teaching Disco Squaredancing to Our Elders: a Class Presentation (Native Voices at the Autry), Vanishing Point (Eagle Project) and Cherokee Family Reunion (Mountainside Theater). Her new comedy, The Thanksgiving Play, will be produced at Artists Rep and Cap Stage next season. Larissa directed the critically acclaimed play, Our Voices Will Be Heard (Perseverance Theater Company) and is developing several new projects to direct with an emphasis on cross cultural community engaged work between Indigenous nations.
Larissa won the PEN USA Literary Award for Drama, NEA Distinguished New Play Grant, Joe Dowling Annamaghkerrig Fellowship, AATE Distinguished Play Award, Inge Residency, Sundance/Ford Foundation Fellowship, Aurand Harris Fellowship, the UCLA Native American Woman of the Year and numerous Ford, Mellon and NEA Grants. She is a proud officer of the Board of Directors for TCG and represented by Jonathan Mills, Paradigm NY www.hoganhorsestudio.com <http://www.hoganhorsestudio.com> www.indigenousdirection.com <http://www.indigenousdirection.com>
Jeanette Harrison
has produced nearly 20 world premiere and First Look productions with AlterTheater. She is the architect of AlterTheater's AlterLab playwright residency program; the inaugural AlterLab production was the world premiere of Ann Brebner's THE DEAD GIRL in 2013. She co-directed with Ann Brebner the world premiere of LANDLESS by Larissa FastHorse (2016 USA PEN Literary Award in Drama), and is honored to be back in the room with Larissa and the spirit of Ann. Other recent directing credits include the multi-Theatre Bay Area Award-winner THE AMEN CORNER by James Baldwin, and A Midsummer Night's Dream, with the University of Southern California's BFA juniors. Her next directing project is a collaboration with Lorraine Hansberry Theater on AlterLab play Br'er Peach by Andrew Saito. She's worked with many Bay Area theater companies, including Berkeley Rep, the Magic, Cutting Ball, Theatre Rhino, Aurora Theatre, Golden Thread, SF Shakes, Women's Will.
Gwen Loeb
is delighted to be making her AlterTheater debut. Gwen’s recent productions include: Can You Hear Me Baby with Prospect Theatre Company in New York; Strange Ladies with Central Works; The Nurse in Romeo and Juliet with San Francisco Shakespeare Festival; Mrs. Bennett in Pride & Prejudice at Livermore Shakespeare Festival; Pauline in A Bright New Boise, and Babette in The Arsonists at Aurora Theatre Company; Gertrude Stein in the one-woman show There There with First Person Singular; Scripts readings of Mabel Cantwell in The Best Man, and Mrs. Bacon & the Nurse in East of Eden at American Conservatory Theatre; and Flo in the movie The Boat Builder with Christopher Lloyd.
Cathleen Riddley
is proud to be an actor with Alter Theater, as well as its Associate Artistic Director. She was seen here most recently as Azucar in Bondage by Star Finch, and is happy to be reprising that role very soon. Here at Alter she also made her debut as Music Director for The Amen Corner for which she won a TBA award, as well as one for her portrayal of Sister Margaret in the same show. Cathleen is also proud of her award winning performance in Shotgun Players' brownsville song: b side for tray, and happy to have performed in two shows in Shotgun's rep season in 2016, one of which was Hamlet, where each actor's role was chosen from Yorick's skull each night 5 minutes before the show began! Cathleen has performed lead and supporting roles in many Bay Area theaters, including SF Playhouse, Marin Theatre Company, TheatreWorks, Berkeley Playhouse, ACT, African-American Shakespeare Company, Magic Theatre, and Z Below. Cathleen is a proud member of Actors’ Equity Association and Theatre Bay Area, and is a PlayGround company member. She is an alumna of The Juilliard School Drama Division, a certified ASL Interpreter and has an MA from the University of Pennsylvania. A current project close to her heart is working with incarcerated men in San Quentin in their violence prevention program called No More Tears/Healing Circle.
Nick Moore
Nick Moore is excited to be working with Alter Theater for the first time on this amazing new play. Nick's recent productions include: The Normal Heart at Theatre Rhinoceros, The Rainmaker at Sonoma Arts Live, The Miser at Curtain Theatre, Everything That's Beautiful at New Conservatory Theater Center, Peter and the Starcatcher at Marin Onstage, and Othello and Twelfth Night at Marin Shakespeare Company. Nick Moore also manages social media for various theater companies in the Bay Area!
Luisa Frasconi
is happy to be making her AlterTheater debut. Most recently she appeared in Three Musketeers at Marin Shakespeare Company where she has also played Desdemona in Othello, Juliet in Romeo & Juliet, Phebe in As You Like It, Diana in All's Well That Ends Well, and Helena in A Midsummer Night's Dream. Other recent Bay Area credits include Mechanics of Love at Crowded Fire Theatre and Detroit at Aurora Theatre Company. She has also worked at Impact Theatre, Shotgun Players, Cal Shakes and Livermore Shakespeare Festival. She won a BATCC Award for her performance as Phebe in As You Like It at Impact Theatre and was the recipient of a TITAN award grant through Theatre Bay Area. She trained at Shakespeare and Company in Lenox, MA. Mama of two little cows.
Renee Rogoff
Renee is an alumna of The Lee Strasberg Studio, Stella Adler, and American Academy of the Dramatic Arts. She is currently pursuing a degree in Photography at Academy of Art University. Her appearances include Josie in Eugene O'Neil's A Moon for the Misbegotten, Sarah in Time Stands Still, and has performed with Upright Citizens Brigade in NYC. She can be seen in Roustabout Theater Company’s production of Six Degrees of Separation as Ouisa this June at the Luther Burbank Center for the Performing Arts. She’s thrilled to be working with this amazing cast and thanks her family for their love and support.
Frank Cardinale
is excited to be working on his third full production with AlterTheater after Landless and Bondage. For the past 7 years he has worked a variety of productions throughout Marin and San Francisco, from tiny 45 seat houses to the 4000 seat Cushing Theater with the Mountain Play, and everything in between. From big Broadway style musicals, to intimate new works he is always happiest when in a dark theater with a headset on.
Natalie Barshow
is excited to be collaborating with an amazing group of artists and to make her AlterTheater debut. Recent costume designs include The Jungle Book (Marin Theatre Company), On The Verge (Dragon Productions), On Clover Road (SF Playhouse), The Tempest (Silicon Valley Shakespeare), Dead Man Walking (San Jose State University), Fuddy Meers (SPOTLITE Stage Co.), and several short films. Her assistant designer credits include Much Ado About Nothing (Cal Shakes), Anne Boleyn (Marin Theatre Company), and The Tempest (Cal Shakes). Natalie is currently the Wardrobe Coordinator for ODC/Dance. She is a graduate from San Jose State University, holds her B.A. in Theatre Arts, and is currently a freelance costume designer, assistant, and wardrobe person for theatre and film around the Bay Area. More information available at nbarshow.wix.com/nataliebarshow
Margaret Belton
was born in Indiana into a large artistic family (imagine the von Trapps meet Monty Python in a hysterical mash-up). Margaret received her BFA from Indiana University. She spearheaded many artistic endeavors including various group exhibitions, mural commissions and the founding of Women Exposed, a feminist arts collective which is still thriving today. After graduating, she moved to the Left Coast and began teaching art for adults with developmental disabilities at The Cedars Of Marin Victory Center. While initially inspired primarily by visual art, she realized she needed to let her inner bohemian out of the performance closet. She then formed The Patsychords a Patsy Cline tribute band which led her to play Patsy in the play ‘Always… Patsy Cline’. She is currently singing and acting on screens and stages and working in home staging and design.
Jen Brault
is a native of Rochester, NY and graduated with a BFA degree with a concentration in Sculpture and Painting from Xavier University in New Orleans and St. Michael's College in Vermont. Her career as a visual artist spans over 2 decades and she's explored multiple disciplines as an accomplished painter, illustrator and designer. Her work has exhibited in several group and solo shows in NY and CA, along with commissioned works throughout the country. Professionally, she beautifies residences as both the co-owner of the Oakland based Design Co REALM Art and Design, and sole proprietor of the SF based Painting and Color Consulting Co, Jennifer Brault Painting. She is excited and honored to be included in this wonderful project with AlterTheater.
Gerry Grosz
Gerry Grosz
is known on the Bay Area jazz scene as a spirited performer on both piano and vibraphone. A passionate, stylistically diverse composer and songwriter, he was awarded "Song of the Year" by the West Coast Songwriters in 2004. Grosz's credits include original songs for a stage production of "The Phantom Tollbooth", music for the documentary "PDA (Public Displays of Affection)", and he cowrote the song "Bathtub Gin", the title track on the current cd by Roberta Donnay & The Prohibition Mob Band. Grosz is a local piano teacher and dance accompanist by day, and is happy to be working with AlterTheater again, after his work as Composer / Sound Designer on "The Amen Corner" in 2015.
is known on the Bay Area jazz scene as a spirited performer on both piano and vibraphone. A passionate, stylistically diverse composer and songwriter, he was awarded "Song of the Year" by the West Coast Songwriters in 2004. Grosz's credits include original songs for a stage production of "The Phantom Tollbooth", music for the documentary "PDA (Public Displays of Affection)", and he cowrote the song "Bathtub Gin", the title track on the current cd by Roberta Donnay & The Prohibition Mob Band. Grosz is a local piano teacher and dance accompanist by day, and is happy to be working with AlterTheater again, after his work as Composer / Sound Designer on "The Amen Corner" in 2015.
previously dramaturged Alter Theater’s world premiere of Fellowship by Ignacio Zulueta. Freelance dramaturgy credits include foolsFURY, Denver Center, Oregon Shakespeare Festival, Berkeley Rep, San Diego Rep, and the Old Globe, where he dramaturged for Arthur Miller on his penultimate play Resurrection Blues. Scott was formerly Manager of Play Development for Cornerstone Theater Company and Literary Director for the Black Dahlia Theater in Los Angeles. He has dramaturged productions for leading playwrights, including Sheila Callaghan, Sarah Ruhl, Octavio Solis, David Edgar, Austin Pendleton, and James Still, and for leading directors, including Bill Rauch, Mark Lamos, and Kyle Donnelly. Directing credits include Native Voices, East West Players, and the West Coast Ensemble. He is based in Larkspur and currently serves as Associate Professor of Contemporary Theatre and Dramaturgy at Sonoma State University, where he teaches dramaturgy, playwriting, theater history, and dramatic literature, and also runs the campus Arts Integration program as SSU Arts Dramaturg. Scott is a proud and active member of Literary Managers and Dramaturgs of the Americas (LMDA). He holds an MFA in Dramaturgy from UCSD.
Scott Horstein
Robin DeLuca
joins AlterTheater for the first time, creating lighting for Cow Pie Bingo and Bondage in rep at A.C.T. Costume Shop Theater, and for Cow Pie Bingo at 1344 Fourth Street, San Rafael.