The Tusk Hunters
WriTTEN by Dan Caffrey
directed by Dina Vovsi
Thursday June 12 at 3:00 pm
Open Jar Studios
1601 Broadway (entrance on 48th street between B'way and 8th Avenue)
Studio 11J
A Pay-What-You-Can ($5 minimum) Workshop Theater Lab Reading
Two men in the Alaskan tundra search for woolly mammoth tusks as an alternative to elephant ivory. But their most recent discovery causes their employer to pivot from the ivory trade to a more technologically innovative venture as a means of combating climate change. Inspired by the real-life founding of Colossal Biosciences, The Tusk Hunters explores the morality of de-extinction . . . .
Cast:
Peter Bradbury*
Peter McNally*
Erik Lochtefeld*
Stage Directions: Evan Moore-Coll
Stage Manager: Olivia Mancini
*Equity Member appearing with permission of Actors’ Equity Association without benefit of an Equity contract in this Off-Off Broadway production.
Erik Lochtefeld
Dina Vovsi (Director) is a New York-based director, theatermaker, and educator. Upcoming projects include Billy McEntee’s Amo’s Aunts Keep PopPop Alive (Justoffa Exit 155) and Liba Vaynberg’s The Matriarchs. Recent projects include The Blue Parts with co-creator Liba Vaynberg (2024-25 Next Stage Special Residency at The Drama League, Working Theater 5 Boroughs 1 City Commission, and 2023 NYSCA Support for Artists Grant) and River Watchers, a site-specific, journey-based play she conceived and directed on a 14-seat Langley canoe in Newtown Creek and co-created with Dan Caffrey and Jens Rasmussen (The Motor Company, 2023 Brooklyn Arts Council and Puffin Foundation Grants). Dina has directed and developed new work with WP Theater, The Civilians, New Georges, Working Theater, Cape Cod Theatre Project, The Orchard Project, New Dramatists, The Bushwick Starr, Fresh Ground Pepper, and more. She is a New Georges Affiliated Artist and current co-leader of the New Georges Jam, and an alum of the WP Directors’ Lab, the Roundabout Directors Group, the Mercury Store Directing Lab, the Robert Moss Directing Fellowship at Playwrights Horizons, The Civilians’ R&D Group, the Lincoln Center Directors’ Lab, and the SDC Foundation Observership. As an associate/assistant director, Dina has worked on Broadway, off-Broadway, and regionally with Roundabout, Playwrights Horizons, Spoleto Festival USA, Hudson Valley Shakespeare Festival, and more. A frequent guest director at universities, Dina also teaches directing at Playwrights Horizons Theater School at NYU’s Tisch School of the Arts and acting at Brooklyn College's MFA Acting Graduate Program. www.dinavovsi.com
Olivia Mancini (Stage Manager) is a New York City based Stage Manager. BFA from Purchase College. NYC Selected Credits: Cats: The Jellicle Ball (Production Assistant, PAC), This Land was Made (PA/SM Sub, Vineyard Theatre), The Wolves (Production Stage Manager, Atlantic Acting School), One Way (Production Stage Manager, Ades Performance Space) Don’t Stop Me (Production Stage Manager, Riverside Theatre), and We Are The Tigers (Script PA/Stagehand, Theatre 80).