Director’s Haven 7

Name: Director’s Haven 7
Start: 2024-03-25T19:00:00-05:00
End: 2024-03-25T21:00:00-05:00
Location: The Den Theatre

Featuring three emerging directors, this Director’s Haven 7 gives directors in the earliest stages of their professional careers a rare opportunity to take risks, hone their crafts and talents, and share their vision through a fully staged production of a short play.

The 2024 directors announced by Haven are: Leanna Oliveira, directing The Siren Song

of Stephen Jay Gould by Benjamin Bettenbender, Gaby Labotka, directing Skyflint, by Cassandra Rose, and Faith Hart, directing Krapp’s Last Tape by Samuel Beckett.

PRODUCTION DETAILS:

Title: Director’s Haven 7

Directed by Leanna Oliveira, Gaby Labotka, and Faith Hart

Location: The Den Theatre (Upstairs Mainstage), 1331 N. Milwaukee Ave., Chicago

Dates: Previews: Previews March 25 & 26 7:30 pm

Opening performance: Press Opening March 27 at 7pm

Regular run: Sunday March 31st – Sunday, April 10th, 2024

Curtain Times: Mondays, Tuesdays and Wednesdays at 7 pm; Sundays at 3 pm.

Tickets: Previews: pay-what-you-can. Regular: $15 Tickets are on sale now at havenchi.org.

About the Directors

Leanna Oliveira (Director, she/her) is a director and theatre educator originally from South Florida. She earned her Bachelor’s in Theatre from the University of Central Florida and her Master’s in Directing from the Chicago College of Performing Arts at Roosevelt University. Some of her favorite directing credits include: She Kills Monsters YA Edition, Antigone, Medea, Peter & the Starcatcher at Bak MSOA & Boynton High; A Christmas Story, Much Ado About Nothing at Lake Worth Playhouse; Not Unusual, Ellison Grants a Wish, Mycelium at PlayGround-Chicago.

Gaby Labotka (Director, she/they) is a multi-disciplinary artist who works as an actor, director, intimacy director, fight director, and choreographer across the country. She is a fierce advocate for respect, empathy, representation, inclusion, and safety in the theatre, and they are dedicated to making art that reflects those values. Recent Direction Credits: The Wonder (Eclectic Theatre Ensemble); Revenge Song and Peter and the Starcatcher (Oregon Shakespeare Festival, Asst. Director); Groups of Ten or More People (Littlebrain Theatre, Co-Director); In an Instant (Unheard of Company); [Trans]formation (The Living Canvas); and Tilikum (Sideshow, Assistant Director). www.gabylabotka.com @theatre_warrior

Faith Hart (Director, she/her) is a Chicago-based director and writer. Recent credits include assistant directing ‘ART’ at the Guthrie Theater (dir. Kimberly Senior) and The Band’s Visit at Writers Theatre (dir. Zi Alikhan). In 2023, she wrote and directed MAINTENANCE—a site-specific narrative experience centering sanitation workers—in collaboration with Pivot Arts. Other self-produced credits include Map of Virtue (Chi Yoga Shack) and Elektra, at solstice (Leone Beach). Faith is an alumnus of DePaul University and the Kennedy Center Directing Intensive. She is studying intimacy facilitation with the support of grants from Illinois Arts Council and Sarah Siddons Society.

About the Shows

The Siren Song of Stephen Jay Gould by Benjamin Bettenbender

Two strangers meet when one of them literally falls out of the sky in a failed attempt to end his own life. Debilitating heartbreak, overwhelming existentialism and the desire to leave it all behind connect these two strangers in an unexpected way.

Skyflint by Cassandra Rose

A woman with the innate ability to channel lightning escapes her restrictive life on the ground by hopping onto an airship and into the unexplored skies above. A rollicking Steampunk play jam-packed with sword fights, shanties, and squid.

Krapp’s Last Tape by Samuel Beckett

A dying writer revisits a tape he recorded at age 39 and finds a vast chasm between the man he is and the man he was. Beckett’s critically acclaimed Krapp’s Last Tape is a meditation on loneliness, failure, and the technology of memory.

About Haven:

MISSION

We embolden visionary artists to practice and hone their craft by providing an equitable haven of opportunity for the creation of innovative performance, theatre and media arts.

VALUES

Centering our artists, audiences and the work, Haven Chicago commits to the following values:

People First –We honor people for their stories, talents, contributions and spirit of collaboration by creating a safe and equitable working environment.

Inclusion – We aim to be accessible to all. As an anti-racist, multicultural institution, we value diversity, equity and inclusion.

Accountability – We cultivate trust and accountability to our community and mission through clear communication and intention.

Mentorship – We foster mentorship as a way of giving back to the community and carve pathways for the next generation of artists.