YOGA WITH JILLIAN Limbers Up For The Edinburgh Fringe

Guaranteed to get the blood pumping and open your Chakras so you're ready for a day on the Fringe, Yoga with Jillian, a brand-new screwball comedy by Lia Romeo opens at the Pleasance on 2 August and promises to give your chuckle muscles a good workout.

From the team behind Trump Lear which enjoyed two years of Fringe sold-out success, and hit New York and Chicago seasons, Yoga With Jillian comes to Edinburgh direct from an off-Broadway season to explore whether Gwyneth Paltrow, green juice, and guru culture aren't perhaps something that could save us all!

But as we all know, the past few years have been tough. As Jillian tries to teach again in our changed world, the shiny, happy yoga teacher attempts to keep the class, and herself, from completely imploding. 

No previous yoga experience necessary.  Watch from your chair or on a mat. It doesn't matter if you don't know your downward dog from your sun salutation, or your asana from your elbow; after an hour with Jillian's capable hands, you'll be walking tall. So, join Jillian on her yoga mat for show that expands the mind, stretches the hamstrings, and rids you of those nasty toxins leftover from a night in the Pleasance bar.

Playwright Lia Romeo is a playwriting fellow at Juilliard. Her plays have been developed at theatres including the O'Neill, La Jolla Playhouse and the Lark, and have been produced off-Broadway at 59E59 and ART/NY as well as regionally at venues such as Dorset Theatre Festival, Laguna Playhouse, Unicorn Theatre and New Jersey Repertory Theatre amongst others. Four of her plays have been recognized by the Kilroys List. Her plays are published by TRW, Broadway Licensing, and Broadway Play Publishing. She is the associate artistic director with Project Y Theatre Company and the co-founder of the Parent-Caregiver Playwrights Group. She teaches playwriting at Primary Stages/ESPA and in the M.A. program in creative writing at Fairleigh Dickinson University.

 

Director Andrew W. Smith is also the Co-Founding Artistic Director of award-winning Project Y Theatre Company. Selected regional acting work includes Pittsburgh Public Theatre, Pittsburgh City Theatre, Quantum Theatre, Actor's Theatre of Louisville, Seattle Repertory Theatre, Arena Stage, Woolly Mammoth Theatre Company, Roundhouse Theatre, Potomac Theatre Project, Ars Nova, Studio Theatre, and Olney Center for the Arts.  Film work includes Lucid, Shooting Script, Death of a Nation, and Under-Ground.  Andrew's television work includes American Rust, GONE, and Law and Order: Criminal Intent. Andrew is currently an Associate Professor of Acting at the Carnegie Mellon School of Drama.  www.smithandrewwilliam.com.

 

Michole Biancosino (JILLIAN) co-created the Fringe hit, Trump Lear with actor/comedian David Carl. The show had a year-long run in New York before sold out performances at The Pleasance, two Edinburgh Fringe seasons in a row.  Another co-creation, Celebrity One-Man Hamlet, enjoyed two hit Fringe runs – in New York at The Cow, and then in Edinburgh at Underbelly – before touring the US including a run at Chicago Shakespeare Theatre.  Her productions have won multiple New York Innovative Theatre Awards, a United Solo Award, and Best Of and Critics' Pick from The New York Times and TimeOutNY.  Recently, her production of Planet of the Grapes featuring Peter Michael Marino won the Edinburgh Fringe Infallible Award.  She produces Project Y's Women in Theatre Festival, a NYC festival that produces, commissions, and develops the work of women writers and lead artists. The festival, now in its 8th year, showcases the work of between 50-80 artists each season. For her work with Women in Theatre Festival, Michole was featured by Amy Poehler's Smart Girls. She is a recipient of the Sir John Gielgud Award from the Society of Stage Directors and Choreographers. She is an associate professor of theatre at Middlebury College, a member of the League of Professional Theatre Women, and when she's not spending the summer in Edinburgh she runs Tiny Barn theatre, a streaming theatre created during COVID, out of her backyard.

 

2 & 3 August - tickets £7.00

4-8, 11-13, 18-20, 25-27 August - tickets £12.50 (concessions £11.50)

9-10, 14-15, 17, 21-24, 28 August - tickets £12.00 (concessions £11.00
Two-for-one tickets on 7 & 8 August

All performances begin at 12.00.  Running time is 1 hour.

 

Richard Jordan Productions is an Olivier, TONY, and EMMY Award-winning production company based in London under the artistic leadership of British producer Richard Jordan. Founded in 1998, his company has produced over 260 productions in the UK as well as 28 other countries, including 98 world premières and 91 European, Australian or US premières producing and collaborating with many of the world's leading theatres. In the US, Richard is also International Producing Partner at Chicago Shakespeare Theater – one of the largest not-for-profit producing theatres in North America; in the UK, Richard is Patron of the Brighton Fringe. He has enjoyed a twenty-four year association with both the Edinburgh Fringe and Pleasance with whom he has presented and co-produced many productions including: Miriam Margolyes' Dickens' Women; Jesus, Jane, Mother and Me; My Name is Gideon; Krapp 39; The Art of Falling Apart; Itsoseng; Victor Spinetti's A Very Private Diary (Revisited); Hirsch; Alphonse; Kafka and Son; The Q Brothers Othello the Remix; xxO; God's Official; Bitch Boxer; Ali J; The Adventure; Lash!; Die Roten Punkte: Robot/Lion Tour; Trump Lear; Heroin(e) for Breakfast and Happy Hour. Described by The Stage newspaper as “one of the UK's most prolific theatre producers”, Richard, along with his company, have been at the forefront of developing and/or commissioning works often with a strong social and political agenda. A new writing and musical theatre specialist, past productions have won over 60 major awards including: the TONY Award for Best Play (and 11 other TONY nominations); Olivier; EMMY; 17 Scotsman Fringe Firsts; DORA; Amnesty International Freedom of Expression Award; Spirit of the Fringe; two Herald Angel; 10 Total Theatre; Adelaide Fringe Award; US Black Alliance; Obie; the Infallible Award for Creative Innovation in Digital Theatre; and the John Gassner Award for Best New American Play. In 1998 Richard was the first recipient of the Society of London Theatre/ TIF New Producers Bursary Award, and in 2013 he became the first British producer to have won every notable Broadway and Off-Broadway Best Play award. Richard and Project Y Theatre regularly produce together; their previous productions of Trump Lear, Gary Busey's One Man Hamlet and The Planet of the Grapes have enjoyed hit seasons in Edinburgh, Brighton, New York, Chicago, and on tour across North America.

 

Founded in 1999, Project Y has been called the “smartest of the city's theatre troupes,” by N.P.R. The company has had an unwavering presence in the New York indie theatre community and has been nominated for nine Innovative Theater Awards. Project Y has been the recipient of grants from NYSCA, ART/NY, The Nancy Quinn Fund, The Dramatists Guild, NYC Department of Cultural Affairs and the humanitarian Puffin Foundation. They have produced work which includes Planet of the Grapes Live! (Infallible Award Winner, Ed Fringe), Trump Lear, Gary Busey's One-Man Hamlet, David and Katie Get Re-Married, Connected, and Fubar, at venues including 59E59,  A.R.T./New York, HERE, Theatre Row, and Edinburgh Fringe. They have produced and/or developed work by playwrights including Megan Monaghan Rivas, Lia Romeo, Karl Gadjusek, Charles Mee, Lee Blessing, Sean Christopher Lewis, Antu Yacob, Johnna Adams, Tori Keenan-Zelt, Amina Henry, Em Lewis, Nikkole Salter, France-Luce Benson, Judy Tate, Bleu Beckford-Burrell and Erin Mallon. For more check out: www.projectytheatre.org

 

Since 1985, the Pleasance Theatre Trust has become one of the most famous festival organisations in the world. With 23 venues at the heart of the Edinburgh Festival Fringe and a year-round operation in Islington, London, with theatre, rehearsal and development spaces, the Pleasance has created a platform where the most established artists stand shoulder to shoulder with the rising stars of the future.