...
Intiman Theatre and The Williams Project
presents
THE SIGN IN SIDNEY BRUSTEIN'S WINDOW
By Lorraine Hansberry
Directed by Ryan Guzzo Purcell
February 7 - 25, 2023
Erickson Theatre - 1524 Harvard Ave Seattle, WA 98122

You are invited to join Intiman Theatre and The Williams Project for their co-production of The Sign in Sidney Brustein’s Window by Lorraine Hansberry and directed by Ryan Guzzo Purcell this winter. Hansberry is best known for writing A Raisin in the Sun which was the first Broadway play to be written by a Black woman, and she was the youngest American playwright, the fifth woman, and the first Black American to win the New York Drama Critics Circle Award for Best Play of the Year. She was also nominated for a Tony Award for Best Play in 1960. The Sign in Sidney Brustein’s Window was her second play to open on Broadway, and this will mark the first time it has been professionally produced in Seattle. Learn more in this American Theatre Magazine feature story.

The two companies are working together again after Intiman presented The Williams Project’s Orpheus Descending in 2015 to rave reviews. 

"An extraordinary play, a drama so infused with emotional intelligence, linguistic treasures and the human conditions of dread and longing that it keeps you bolt-upright in your seat."
-The Chicago Tribune

Lorraine Hansberry. Photo by David Attie / Getty

ABOUT THE PLAY

It’s Greenwich Village in 1964, and Sidney Brustein’s living room is the place to be. The neighborhood bohemians gather here to drink, listen to records, and argue about politics, art, and sex. Soon, Sidney stumbles into owning a local newspaper and the arguments become more heated. With a marriage on the rocks, no money, and friends advocating for different causes, this aging idealist is forced to decide what he truly believes. Brimming with humor and pulling no punches, The Sign in Sidney Brustein’s Window asks us all: how much are you willing to sacrifice to live your ideals? 

FROM THE DIRECTOR

“This is a play about intersectionality and identity politics before either had a name. Lorraine Hansberry was a Black, queer, upper-middle class woman in an interracial marriage and she brings her full self to the play. She is grappling with queerness, her disillusionment with white liberals, and the battle between moderation and militancy. And she might have the best ear for dialogue of any playwright, ever.”
-Ryan Guzzo Purcell, Artistic Director of The Williams Project and the play’s director

GUARANTEE

Intiman Theatre guarantees your ticket purchase. We are implementing rigorous COVID-19 safety and testing protocols for our cast and crew, and in the event of a cancellation, we will reach out to offer you an exchange or refund (your choice!). We also gratefully accept tax-deductible donations of any unused tickets.

Seattle Public Library Reading List

Learn more about the play, Lorraine Hansberry, and the social causes the play explores in this curated list from Seattle Public Library!

MEET THE CAST

Max (he/him) is an actor, writer, director based in New York. He is a founding company member of The Williams Project, and has performed with them for the last nine years. He previously appeared at Intiman Theatre in Orpheus Descending with The Williams Project. Other regional credits include: Twelfth Night (Pittsburgh Public Theater), Swimmers (Marin Theatre Company), Bad Jews (Magic Theatre), The Rivals (Huntington Theatre Company), A Christmas Carol (American Conservatory Theater), The Miracle Worker (Olney Theatre Center). Film/TV: Free Spirit, La Mission (2009 Sundance Selection), Laurence, Seducing Charlie Barker, “Tosh.0”. Max has directed Shakespeare productions for NYU-Meisner and the Atlantic Acting School, and has held faculty positions at NYU, The American Academy of Dramatic Arts and the New York Conservatory for Dramatic Arts. He is currently on faculty at the Riverside Initiative for the Alexander Technique in NYC. BFA Theatre, Boston University. MFA Acting, The American Conservatory Theater. www.maxrosenak.com

Photo by Joe Gaffney

Chip (they/them) is a Core Company member at ACT Theatre, they are also known around town as Isis, in and out, of the Drag Duo LüChi, and as one of the founding parents of the kiki ballroom house, The Royal House of Noir. Beloved roles in Seattle include, Malcolm in Macbeth; Kenny Watson in The Watsons Go to Birmingham; 1963, Spirit 1 in A Christmas Carol, Corduroy in Corduroy, Dorian Gray in The Picture of Dorian Gray, and Alexander the Great in Alex and Aris. Thanks for supporting diverse theatre, the world needs it now more than ever!

Caitlin (she/her) is a Vermont raised, LA based actor and creator. Recent shows include world premieres of The Duration (Palm Beach Dramaworks), The Prince of Providence (Trinity Repertory Company) and The Surrogate (Centenary Stage Company) as well as productions of Intimate Apparel, Hamlet (Theater at Monmouth), On The Exhale, Caesar! (Brown/Trinity Rep), Pentecost and Arcadia (PTP/NYC). TV/Film: Good Trouble, 911: Lone Star, S.W.A.T., Bel-Air, The Tomorrow Job, First Contact. She received her BA from Middlebury College and her MFA from Brown/Trinity Rep. She is so grateful to The Williams Project team, her family and to YOU for being here.

Photo by Deb Lopez

Holiday (he/him) is a graduate of the Yale School of Drama/DGSD class of 2021-2022. There he has trained in Acting where he recently received his Master’s. Holiday has been seen in productions of; Manning by Benjamin Benne (Julio), Dutch King by Kristen Imani Spencer (Ismael) Ain’t No Dead Thing (Charles) by a.k. Payne, Mr. Burns by Anne Washburn (Homer, Marge), Measure for Measure (Claudio), Locust (Amos) by Chris Gabo, Lenny’s Fast Food Kids Gang (Walter) by Angie B. Jones under the conglomerate of his professors, cohort and school-mates. Holiday is also a recent graduate of the Atlantic “Full Time” Conservatory with a certificate in acting wherein he has been seen in the production The Last Days of Judas Iscariot (El Fayoumy) by Stephen Adly Guirgus. Upon graduation, he was a part of This Girl Laughs, This Girl Cries, This Girl Does Nothing by Finnegan Kruckmeyer. Holiday is from New Jersey and is also a graduate of Brookdale Community College where he received his Associates Degree in acting/humanities.

Alexandra (she/her) has appeared at Intiman Theatre as Ellie in Heartbreak House and Irina in The Three Sisters. Other productions include The Thin Place, Middletown, Rock ’n’ Roll and Christmas Carol. Elsewhere she has appeared in: The Winter’s Tale, The Odyssey, Constellations (nominated for Outstanding Actress), Three Tall Women and The Great Moment at Seattle Rep; Ironbound (nominated for Outstanding Actress) at Seattle Public Theatre; Frost/Nixon (nominated Outstanding Ensemble) at Strawberry Workshop Theatre; Elizabeth in Pride and Prejudice, The Clean House, Italian-American Reconciliation and Tom Jones at Actors Theatre of Louisville; Somebody/Nobody, Sherlock Holmes and The Suicide Club at Arizona Theatre Company; and Medea (nominated Outstanding Actress) in Medea at Seattle Shakespeare Company. She is a co-founding producing member of The Seagull Project and has performed with them as Nina in The Seagull, Masha (nominated Outstanding Actress) in The Three Sisters and Yelena in Uncle Vanya. She holds an M.F.A. in acting from University of Washington.

Lee (he/him/they/them) is a New York-based performer and theatre-maker returning to Intiman Theatre for the first time since 2015’s Orpheus Descending. In addition to his eight years with The Williams Project, he is a member of the New York Neo-Futurists and contributor to the Neos’ ongoing show, The Infinite Wrench. Lee has appeared as an actor with Trinity Rep and Arena Stage; voiced characters for Night Vale Presents, Dipsea, and 38 Studios; and collaborated with It Gets Better, Planned Parenthood, and the New York Public Library. As a writer, Lee has developed shows for Virgin Voyages, the New Ohio, and Future of Storytelling Festival. He is a former Kennedy Center LMDA Dramaturgy Fellow and script reader for Roundabout Theatre Company. Lee is a graduate of the University of Evansville and Brown/Trinity Rep’s MFA Acting program. He speaks on queerness, performance, and play at events and schools around the country.

Photo by Eileen Meny

Francesca is an actress and filmmaker who lives in New York City. She is excited to make her first appearance at Intiman Theater. TV: “Succession” (upcoming), “Alternatino” with Arturo Castro, “Gotham,” “FBI,” “Deception,” “The Blacklist,” “The Jim Gaffigan Show,” “Blue Bloods.” Film: A View of the World from Fifth Avenue (upcoming), The Drummer, The Undiscovered Country, Free Spirit, Private Life, Rebel in the Rye. Francesca graduated summa cum laude and Phi Beta Kappa from Columbia University with a degree in Creative Writing. In 2019, she wrote and directed her first feature film, Free Spirit.

Photo by Joe Gaffney

MEET THE CREATIVE TEAM

When Lorraine Hansberry’s (1930-1965) landmark play A Raisin in the Sun appeared on Broadway in 1959, the artist became, at twenty-nine, the first Black woman to be produced on Broadway and the youngest American playwright, the fifth woman, and the first Black American to win the New York Drama Critics Circle Award for Best Play of the Year. She was nominated for a Tony Award for Best Play in 1960, and in 1961, the film version won a special award at the Cannes Film Festival and was nominated for a Screen Writers Guild Award for Hansberry’s screenplay.

In 1965, Lorraine Hansberry died of cancer at age 34. In the six years she had between the triumph of her first play and her death, she was extraordinarily prolific. Her second play to be produced on Broadway, The Sign in Sidney Brustein’s Window, closed right before she passed away. To Be Young, Gifted, and Black, an autobiographical portrait in her own words adapted by her former husband and literary executor Robert Nemiroff, was posthumously produced in 1969 and toured across the country. In 1970, Les Blancs, her play about the inevitability of struggle between colonizers and the colonized in Africa, ran on Broadway to critical acclaim. 

During her career as a playwright, Hansberry wrote many articles and essays on literary criticism, racism, sexism, homophobia, world peace and other social and political issues. At her death, she left behind file cabinets holding her public and private correspondence, speeches and journals, and various manuscripts in several genres: plays for stage and screen, essays, poetry, and an almost complete novel. (Biography courtesy of and adapted from the Lorraine Hansberry Trust) 

Ryan Guzzo Purcell (he/him) is the artistic director of The Williams Project. Intiman credits include their co-production of Orpheus Descending. For The Williams Project: Marisol, Blood Wedding, A Bright Room Called Day, Blues For Mister Charlie. Other directing credits include Magic Theater, where he directed world premieres by Mfoniso Udofia and Christina Anderson, as well as Strawberry Theater Workshop, Washington Ensemble Theater, The Hangar Theatre, Olney Theatre Center and more. He has an MFA from Brown University, and a Fulbright Scholarship to develop theatrical practice based on Capoeira. He’s a born and raised Seattleite.

An-lin (she/her) is a set and costume designer based in Seattle. She is a company member of The Williams Project, where she previously designed Amen Corner; Marisol; Blood Wedding; The Bar Plays: Small Craft Warnings and The Time of Your Life; and A Bright Room Called Day. Seattle: Metamorphoses (Seattle Rep). Off-Broadway/New York: Paul Swan is Dead and Gone; What You Are Now (The Civilians), H*tler’s Tasters; Great Novel (New Light Theater), Salesman 之死; June is the First Fall (Yangtze Repertory Company), Bulrusher; Passage (Juilliard), Letters That You Will Not Get (American Opera Project). Regional: Huntington Theater Company, Hartford Stage Company, Alliance Theater, Yale Repertory Theater, Alabama Shakespeare Festival, Arkansas Repertory Theater, Virginia Stage Company, Magic Theater, Mixed Blood Theater, Park Square Theater, Serenbe Playhouse, Theater Alaska. Assistant Professor of Costume Design at the University of Washington. MFA Yale School of Drama. Proud member of USA 829. www.anlindauber.com.

Geoff (any/all) previously designed lighting for the 2019 Intiman production of David Greig’s The Events directed by Paul Budraitis and The Mystery of Irma Vep in 2005. Geoff has designed lighting for more than one hundred world premieres including August Wilson’s Two Trains Running and Sara Ruhl’s The Clean House at Yale Repertory Theatre. Most recently Geoff designed Michael John Garçes’ 36 Yeses for Cornerstone Theater. Geoff’s work has been seen on Broadway, at the Oregon Shakespeare Festival, Seattle Repertory, ACT, Seattle Children’s, Berkeley Rep, The Mark Taper Forum, South Coast Repertory, The Guthrie Theatre, the Goodman Theatre, and many other theatres across the USA. Geoff has been a member of the ensemble of Cornerstone Theater in Los Angeles since 1996. Geoff currently serves as the Executive Director of the School of Drama at UW, and is a graduate of California State University, Chico, and the Yale School of Drama.

Photo by Kyler Martin

M.L. Dogg (he/him) has designed for such companies as UW School of Drama, Alley Theatre, Primary Stages, Second Stage Theatre, Actors Theatre Of Louisville, Women’s Project, Signature Theatre, New York Stage And Film, Dorset Theatre Festival, Seattle Repertory Theatre, Huntington Theatre, American Repertory Theatre, Colt Coeur, Geffen Playhouse, Roundabout Theatre Company, Royal National Theatre, Debate Society, Ars Nova, Public Theatre, and Nicholas Ward Productions. Broadway: Here Lies Love (upcoming), Straight White Men; Oh, Hello On Broadway; The Pee-wee Herman Show. Drama Desk, IRNE, and IT nominee; Lortel award for Here Lies Love, fringeNYC award for Go-Go Kitty, GO!.

Broadway: Mrs. Doubtfire. Select regional: The Wiz, Mrs. Doubtfire, Austen’s Pride, West Side Story, Rock of Ages, Marie: Dancing Still, Annie (The 5th Avenue Theatre); Revenge Song (Oregon Shakespeare Festival); Songs For A New World, The Noteworthy Life of Howard Barnes, Newsies, Pump Boys and Dinettes, Billy Elliot (Village Theatre); King of the Yees, Until The Flood (ACT Theatre). Proud AEA member. Love to Mr. Nichols! @laurelleemarie

Nik (they/them) is a Seattle-based theatre artist, thrilled to be making their Intiman Theatre debut! Whether onstage, behind the scenes, or anywhere in between, Nik loves the chance to tell new stories and engage in creating theatre. Recent work includes The Wickhams: Christmas at Pemberley with Taproot Theatre and The Ruins of Memory with Tales of the Alchemysts Theatre.

MEET OUR PRODUCING PARTNER

Members of The Williams Project and Intiman Theatre. From L to R: Ellen Abram (Executive Director, The Williams Project), Kennedy Pridgen (Events Manager, Intiman Theatre), Jennifer Zeyl (Artistic Director, Intiman Theatre), Wesley Frugé (Managing Director, Intiman Theatre), and Ryan Guzzo Purcell (Artistic Director, The Williams Project). Not pictured: Dedra Woods (The Williams Project). Photo by Joe Moore.

The Williams Project is a national professional theatre ensemble, building ambitiously re-imagined productions of American plays. The company’s mission is to make theatrical excellence accessible to diverse and engaged audiences, while paying artists a living wage.

We create theatre that is:

  • Entertaining enough to make everyone feel welcome and part of a community;
  • Ambitious enough to risk humiliating failure;
  • Powerful enough to move people to love each other more, even in the face of the temporary nature of theatre and life.

We make theatre in a manner consistent with our belief that professional artists are vital to our culture and deserve to be compensated in a way that recognizes their value. Great theatre artists are working class heroes, who sacrifice greatly to make meaningful work. We strive to pay artists living wages in order to support that work.

The Williams Project was founded in 2014, when Artistic Director Ryan Guzzo Purcell brought together an ensemble of outstanding Equity actors to build a deconstructed, radically welcoming new staging of Tennessee Williams’ Orpheus Descending. Orpheus was remounted the following year within Intiman Theatre’s 2015 festival, receiving a warm public reception and critical praise. Since, The Williams Project has brought professional, accessible theatre to thousands of audience members in Washington. The company has created five seasons of festivals, developmental workshops, and full Seattle productions including José Rivera’s Marisol (Equinox Studios), Tennessee Williams’ Small Craft Warnings and William Saroyan’s The Time of Your Life presented in repertory as “The Bar Plays” (Washington Hall), James Baldwin’s Blues for Mister Charlie (Franklin High School/Emerald City Bible Fellowship), and Federico García Lorca Blood Wedding (Equinox Studios). The company’s work has been called “profoundly good theatre in the simplest of settings” in The Stranger and “transcendently gorgeous” in The Seattle Times. Since 2017, The Williams Project has offered Pay-What-You-Can ticketing at every performance.

VISIT THEIR WEBSITE HERE

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COVID SAFETY

Intiman Theatre does not require proof of vaccination or a negative COVID test to attend a performance. We strongly encourage all audience members to wear a mask over their nose and mouth at all times and ask that all audience members respect each other’s choices. Certain performances are mask-mandatory, and we require all audience members on these dates to wear a mask over their nose and mouth at all times.

Learn more about Intiman’s COVID Health & Safety guidelines HERE

ACCESSIBILITY

Intiman Theatre offers the following accessibility accommodations:

  • ADA accessible restroom facilities.
  • Reserved section for wheelchair seating and their guests.
  • Select performances will be ASL interpreted.
  • Please email us at boxoffice@intiman.org to arrange for advance accommodations, or if you have other needs we can assist with.
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