Touring artists

THE RED GUITAR, 2018 & 2016

written and performed by John Sheldon in collaboration with director S.Stoodley.

Serious Play’s original production, THE RED GUITAR toured to Edinburgh Fringe Festival in 2016 & returned by invitation in 2018. Performances ran for a month and received an excellent 4-star review from the Guardian, to accompany the 5-star review from the Herald in 2016.

Guitarist John Sheldon uses a unique blend of storytelling & layered electric guitar licks, to send the audience zipping through the folds of time, from James Taylor to Jimi Hendrix, emerging into an original transformative melody which developed into his acclaimed song, The Grand Parade.

JOHN SHELDON musician, songwriter, composer, guitarist extraordinaire. John’s performing credits include lead guitarist for Van Morrison at 17yrs., songwriter for James Taylor, and work with his own bands. John has written hundreds of songs & instrumentals & released 15 CDs of his own music. A Phi Kappa Lambda graduate of New England Conservatory of Music. John’s theatre credits include composing music for Serious Play’s Milosevic at the Hague, (which toured to the JoakimInterfest, Serbia) & for Meta Pina Project, & Blind Dreamers (which toured in 2013 to Mt Holyoke College & the Irondale Theater Center, Brooklyn). He has performed and played in productions of Ambush on T Street, What She Knows, and Skyscraper. John worked with Serious Play’s Sheryl Stoodley to shape his original monologues- Journey to the Center of the Earth and The Red Guitar- into solo theatre with music. Serious Play presented The Red Guitar at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival 2016 with a sold-out run and received a five-star review from the Herald/Scotland. The Red Guitar directed by Sheryl Stoodley, returned to the Edinburgh Fringe in 2018, with another successful run.

THE RED GUITAR - In the company of a candy apple red Fender, John Sheldon takes us on a trip, moving through the rise of guitar music in the nuclear age, from folk through rock, to a vision of the future in which the past is vibrantly alive. Just when you think you are seeing a deconstruction of popular music, you sense something else taking place, an awakening of senses, a reclaiming of sounds you thought were consigned to history. John, a master guitarist, who unknowingly drew praise from Jimi Hendrix, whom Ed Ward of National Public Radio called, one of the great guitarists of our time, uses a unique blend of storytelling, improvised sounds, and wicked layered guitar licks, to send us zipping through the folds of space and time, emerging into the light of the personal creation of a simple, transformative melody. John's belief in the power of sound pervades his whole performance- the conviction that music is not just entertainment, but a soul-saving enterprise, worthy of the lifelong commitment he has made to it. His technical skill never overwhelms the story- the poignant, the humorous, the moments of illumination. The performance sets a course to the center of who we truly are: vibration.

DO IT NOW: MANUAL OVERRIDE, 2018

This new original production was presented by Serious Play at the Edinburgh Fringe 2018 / TheSpace@Niddry- off the Royal Mile, with artists: Paul Richmond, John Sheldon & Tony Vacca

Spoken-word, electric guitar & percussion music, incorporating contemporary commentary addressing issues of systemic racism & intolerance in the USA. Received a wonderful 4-star review from the Herald/Scotland.

DO IT NOW: MANUAL OVERRIDE - All systems in the USA. seem corrupt or broken, heading for a crash, “manual override” needed! We must take back the controls, in order for future generations to exist. Do It Now, a fusion of spoken word & improvisational music. Created by John Sheldon on his red Stratocaster, Tony Vacca on all things percussion, & Paul Richmond with his droll yet beguiling spoken-word delivery. Richmond takes on anything from: the mundane envy of a neighbor’s dog, to nuclear power posturing, to systemic racism- turning them into poetic flashes of text that erupt from a hotbed of music. An often non-verbal connection on stage amongst performers- an intuitive understanding made manifest- is as much a part of the improvisational texture of this show as Richmond’s interwoven words, with moments of personal insight by Sheldon and Vacca. 

 MILOSEVIC AT THE HAGUE 2010

New original production presented at JoakimInterfest, Kragujevac, Serbia – directed by Sheryl Stoodley & Milan Dragicevich, written by University of Massachusetts Professor, Milan Dragicevich.

With actor Kermit Dunkelberg in the lead role & original music by John Sheldon, performed by the Serious Play Milosevic Ensemble

Received an International Theatre Award for Innovation, also written up in American Theatre Magazine 

MILOSEVIC AT THE HAGUE - Interweaving live new music and soundscapes, bold text, stylized ensemble movement, acapella Balkan harmonies, Milosevic at the Hague traces the shock waves from the Balkans-echoing through the United States- produced by Serbia’s Slobodan Milosevic’s rise to power. This production explores the charismatic personalities that attached themselves to his fate. 

What government holds the power? Who holds the justice? These questions figure prominently in Milošević at the Hague, which charts the unlikely rise of Slobodan Milošević, through his manipulative appeals to Serbian mythology and nationalistic fervor, as well as the 78-day NATO bombing of Serbia, to the War Crimes Tribunal at The Hague, and the disintegration of a country. 

The play raises important questions about complicity and retribution: for Serbs, for Americans, for people of any country. This new play pits Milošević and his wife, Mira Marković, against Chief Prosecutor of the United Nations War Crimes Tribunal for Yugoslavia, Carla del Ponte, and her legal team. The devil is given his due, and as in real life, Milošević makes an impassioned argument in his own defense by turning the spotlight on civilian deaths caused by the NATO campaign. But he is undone by the moral contradictions of his posturing, and by the moral courage of a young Serbian woman. As a counterpoint to the power plays of: Milošević, NATO Joint Air Force Commander General Michael C. Short, and Carla del Ponte, the audience follows the transformation of a young Serbian peasant woman, Jelena, into a warrior for peace. Her moral growth is in response to the loss of her idealistic brother, Jovan, an aspiring photojournalist killed in the NATO strike against the Belgrade Television and Media Center. Senior Serbian television staff was warned of the attacks. Why, Jelena confronts Milošević, were sixteen young journalists left behind? Did he need martyrs for Serbia? Jelena, in turn, interrogates Carla del Ponte by asking, Why has the Chief Prosecutor not also indicted NATO for its war crimes against civilians? (As alluded to in the play, Carla del Ponte considered bringing charges, but lacked the political backing to do so). The fictional Jelena symbolizes the spirit of peaceful resistance embodied in the quiet heroism of ordinary citizens who continually perform small acts of resistance, calling out political corruption.

COASTLINE by Alice Tuan, 2005 adapted & directed by Sheryl Stoodley

Premiered locally then toured to the Edinburgh Fringe Festival, Scotland where it was performed for one month by the ensemble.

COASTLINE simulates the rhythms of our computer culture placing them in a live physical stage space with actors, dialogue, movement and music. The audience are the users and determine the order of the scenes by choosing letters and creating their own order from the title, C-O-A-S-T-L-I-N-E. Thus, each audience determines the scene order that will be played for that performance. The main event of the play follows two young-adult rap-artists, Char and Blur, as they travel from east to west across America, and witness the slow merging of the two coasts as the USA has imploded on its own hubris. It is a search by these two young adults for the essential reasons for living now, in a time as they see it, dominated by governmental arrogance, corporate lying, media stereotyping, military aggression, and personal pettiness. It is a quest for answers communicated in urban rap music rhythms from the rap styles of East Coast New York to West Coast Los Angeles. It is a raw and radical road trip for the soul. Char and Blur are going to test their world and all the media-manufactured characters in it to find out what bits and pieces of firm ground remain, where being human is welcomed and where machine manners and mass-manufactured attitudes are checked at the door. It is about being totally honest with ourselves and the people we are closest to, about what is really important in our lives. 

MARAT SADE: WHAT’S LEFT IS NOT RIGHT, 2002

adapted by Sheryl Stoodley & Jonathan Croy from the 1963 play by Peter Weiss directed by Sheryl Stoodley.

Opened locally then toured to the Rosemary Branch Theatre in London, following a New York City Premiere. New music by Liz Swados arranged by Mitch Chakour / Dave DelloRusso. Performed by Serious Play Alumni Ensemble.

MARAT SADE: WHAT’S LEFT IS NOT RIGHT - This new adaptation uses ensemble movement, song, new music by NYC composer Elizabeth Swados and dance combined with a swirl of chaos, to comment on the madness and desperation of the French Revolution-the violence of humanity reflected so often in today’s news. Inside the metal fencing of this modern-day clinic, in the hands of patients turned actors, rages a philosophical debate about revolution & social change. Is violence always necessary for social change? Or is it the tool of choice? Jean-Paul Marat with his inflammatory writing believes violence is necessary. All his written work incites action that kills innocent and guilty alike. But a new revolution is rising to destroy him. Where does this violence end? And is it within human nature to ever end it? asks the Marquis De Sade, the director and sometimes voyeur of the clinic performance. We want a revolution now! echoes across the stage, but we are reminded of the power of the word to incite mob violence, and after all, Marat is an asylum inmate.

HAMLET: ASALTO a la INOCENCIA, 2000

adapted from the Shakespeare by Jonathan Croy directed by Sheryl Stoodley with new dialogue for Hamlet & Gertrude by playwright Migdalia Cruz.

Toured to the Fifth International Women In Theater Conference Athens, Greece.

HAMLET: ASALTO a la INOCENCIA - Shakepeare’s Hamlet consumed with self -doubt and suffering, swings between indecision and resolve to revenge the death of his father. Hamlet fiercely rebukes his mother for remarrying, and stabs to death the father of the girl he cares about, Ophelia, who then goes mad and takes her own life; all the while consoled by his noble friend Horatio. Serious Play’s Hamlet, reconstructed with new text by Migdalia Cruz, for actors Arnaldo Rivera and Candy Santiago, as Hamlet and Gertrude, helped envision the characters from a Puerto-Rican point of view in a white dominated world.