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Monday, December 4th at 7PM

The Repeating Arms of Sarah Winchester

by Scott Winfield Sublett

Tuesday, December 5, at 7PM

Gunpowder Joe

By Anthony Clarvoe

Hammer Theatre Center

101 Paseo De San Antonio, San Jose, CA 95113

FREE Admission | Reservation Required

San Jose Stage in collaboration with SJSU Dept of Film & Theatre

San Jose Stage Company has partnered with San Jose State University’s Department of Film & Theatre to combine educational instruction with professional execution. The first presentations of this program will be a staged reading of the new plays at the Hammer Theatre Center, melding SJSU student actors with working professionals.  Admission is FREE but tickets are required, reserve yours below.

San Jose Stage is thrilled to extend their mission of developing new works by partnering with SJSU on this exciting collaboration.  “We’re considering a number of world premiere plays for upcoming seasons, and a staged reading helps us see if what works on the page also works on the stage,” said Cathleen King, Executive Director of The San Jose Stage Company.

Cast includes:  

WILL SPRINGHORN, JR. *
HALSEY VARADY *
MARTIN ROJAS DIETRICH *
KATHRYN SMITH-MCGLYNN *
JOSHUA MARX *

*members Actors Equity Association

The Repeating Arms of Sarah Winchester

Written by Scott Winfield Sublett, professor in the SJSU Dept of Film and Theatre, The Repeating Arms of Sarah Winchester explores Sarah Winchester’s exposure to the new and progressive religion of Spiritualism while she is still a young widow residing in New Haven, Connecticut. “This is not the fictional, kooky Sarah of the tourist attraction house,” says Sublett “At this point in her life, Mrs. Winchester is a rational, well-read, progressive suffragette, searching, like many Americans were in the late 1800s, for a new religion to replace the harsh Calvinism of her youth.”

Gunpowder Joe

December 5th @ 7PM FREE Admission (reservation required)

Hounded out of his native England, Joseph Priestley hoped to secure a sanctuary along the banks of the Susquehanna. Would this refugee find America, that great experiment, to be the true democracy he had championed from across the sea? Would he finally be free to pursue his religion, his science, and his political beliefs in this new “land of liberty?”

Controversy continued to swirl around him.  Revolutionary comrades turned into bitter political opponents when it came time to actually govern the country they founded. The immigrant Priestley was drawn into the vortex of America’s first major crisis. “Freedom of Speech” had yet to be tested, and Priestley’s admirers John Adams and Thomas Jefferson were engaged in a deeply polarized debate over the fate of our fledgling nation.

December 5th @ 7PM  FREE Admission (reservation required)