Watch the trailer for Mortar Theatre’s world premiere of Under America
Photo lapse courtesy of Ryan Flynn from Cabrini-Green.com a world premiere by Jacob Juntunen opens Friday, September 3rd.“[Jacob Juntunen] is bringing a striking new voice to theatre in Chicago. I got a chance to chat with him after the show, and he is direct, political only in the sense of history, and does not wish to bring confrontation, but release from our American landscape, our nightmares, our misery. This is solemn theatre; not for those who wish to leave the venue singing a song. This is theatre for those who want to leave the theatre changed and moved,” from Chicago Theatre Blog, June 12, 2010.
“Source Festival: Group B” from D.C. Theatre Scene June 17, 2010
(review of “Saddam’s Lions,” a 10-minute play, performed as part of the Source Theatre Festival in Washington, D.C.)
A World Premiere Work
by Jacob Juntunen
directed by Rachel Edwards Harvith
Produced by Mortar Theatre
The Athenaeum Theatre
September 3rd to 26th, 2010
Her job threatened, a reporter from Chicago’s Gold Coast must write a series on public housing, gentrification, and the prison industry. But when she moves into the infamous Cabrini Green projects, she tries to help with the legal problems of a young man willing to get out by any means necessary. In the end, they both find themselves lost in the tunnels that seem to connect everything Under America.
Jacob is the co-founder and Managing Director of Mortar Theatre.
Mortar Theatre will produce Jacob’s latest play, Under America in September 2010. Set just prior to the demolition of the Cabrini Green housing project, it began with a scholarship from Lee Blessing, was selected by the Driehaus Foundation for the Sundance Chicago Roundtable, and helped Jacob win a Tennessee Williams Scholarship to attend the Sewannee Writers’ Conference. Read more!
His first play produced by Edward Albee, Jacob has enjoyed productions nationally. Having received Lee Blessing and Tennessee Williams Scholarships, Jacob was a finalist for the Christopher Brian Wolk Award. His first feature screenplay was a finalist for admission into the 2010 Sundance Screenwriters Lab. High school dropout turned doctoral recipient, Jacob has earned degrees from Clackamas Community (AA) and Reed Colleges (BA) and Northwestern University (PhD). It is from this unique vantage he writes. Currently, he is a Senior Network Playwright at Chicago Dramatists, co-founder and Managing Director of Mortar Theatre, and faculty at UIC and the School of the Art Institute.
