Eisenhower: This Piece of Ground

JOHN RUBINSTEIN (Dwight D. Eisenhower) created the title role in the Broadway musical Pippin, directed by Bob Fosse, and won the Tony and Drama Desk Awards for his performance in Children of a Lesser God. Other Broadway appearances include Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, Ragtime, Hurlyburly, M. Butterfly, The Caine Mutiny Court-Martial (Drama Desk nomination), Love Letters, Fools, Getting Away with Murder, and the Diane Paulus Pippin revival. Off-Broadway, he appeared in Rosencrantz & Guildenstern are Dead, Morning’s at Seven, and won the Lucille Lortel Award as Best Actor for Elmer Rice's Counsellor-at-Law; for his work in Eisenhower: This Piece of Ground, he was nominated for the Outer Critics' Circle and the Off-Broadway Alliance award for Best Solo Performance. He originated the leading roles in A. R. Gurney’s Love Letters and in Kander, Ebb, and McNally’s Kiss of the Spider Woman, and he played the Wizard in Wicked in Los Angeles for 18 months. Films include "Michael," “Killing Castro,” “Being the Ricardos,” “Hello I Must Be Going,” “21 Grams,” “Red Dragon,”“The Boys from Brazil,” “Someone to Watch Over Me,” “Daniel,” "Zachariah," “The Car,” and “Getting Straight.” On television, he starred in two series, “Family” (Emmy nomination) and “Crazy Like a Fox,” and in over 300 episodes and miniseries. He is a director, a composer of film and television music (“Jeremiah Johnson,” “The Candidate,”“Family,” “China Beach”), a university professor (NYU, UCLA, USC), and has recorded over 170 audiobooks, most numerously Jonathan Kellerman’s Alex Delaware novels. He is married to Bonnie Burgess, and their son Max is the youngest of his five children, joining Jessica, Michael, Peter, and Jacob.

Richard Hellesen is the author of numerous plays for adults and young audiences.  His most recent work, Eisenhower: This Piece of Ground, premiered off-Broadway at Theatre at St. Clement's in 2023.  As an Associate Artist at Ford's Theatre in Washington, his work includes the full-length Necessary Sacrifices, the one-acts One Destiny and The Road from Appomattox, and the 2015 adaptation of Frank Wildhorn's musical The Civil War, titled Freedom's Song.  With composer David De Berry he wrote the book for a widely-produced adaptation of Dickens' A Christmas Carol, most recently seen at the Denver Center Theatre and Syracuse Stage.  Other plays include Kingdom (Denver Center; Stavis Playwriting Award, National Theatre Conference, and finalist for the PEN USA-West Literary Awards); Once In Arden (South Coast Repertory; Julie Harris Award, Beverly Hills Theatre Guild); Moonshadow (Dennis McIntyre Award, Philadelphia Festival Theatre for New Plays); and an adaptation of Frank Norris’ The Octopus (semi-finalist, O’Neill National Playwrights Conference).  His two dozen short plays include five finalists for the National Award for Short Playwriting, all produced at City Theatre in Miami (among others).  His one-act Dos Corazones received a Los Angeles Ovation Award writing nomination, and appears in an edition of “Best Ten-Minute Plays” by Smith & Kraus.  Mr. Hellesen’s plays for young audiences include a version of The Twelve Dancing Princesses (published by Samuel French), and adaptations of The Emperor’s New Clothes and Esther Forbes’ novel Johnny Tremain (both premiered at B Street Theatre, Sacramento).  With Grammy-winning composer Michael Silversher he has written a musical adaptation of Kenneth Grahame’s The Wind in the Willows (commissioned and produced by South Coast Repertory), as well as eleven Educational Touring musicals for SCR, three of which--Face 2 Face, My Mom’s Dad, and Birds of A Feather--were subsequently produced at the Sundance Children’s Theatre in Utah.  Along with composer/lyricist Joy Sikorski, their adaptation of Lois Lowry’s young adult novel Gathering Blue was a finalist at the National Music Theatre Conference, and premiered at the Gretna Theatre, Pennsylvania, in 2017.  A member of the Dramatists Guild, Mr. Hellesen has twice been playwright-in-residence at the William Inge Center for the Arts in Independence, Kansas, and assists with One-on One Dramaturgy for the Playwrights Center in Minneapolis.  He has also worked in the literary departments of Berkeley Repertory Theatre, South Coast Repertory, and B Street Theatre in Sacramento, where he makes his home.

Peter Ellenstein is Producing Artistic Director of the New Los Angeles Repertory Company. He is a multi-award-winning director, producer, new play midwife, and educator, whose work has been seen all over the country. For thirteen years, Peter was Artistic Director of the William Inge Center for the Arts in Kansas where he created many innovative playwright development programs such as the William Inge Home Playwright Residencies, partnerships with leading national arts organizations (Martha Graham Company, Cornerstone Theater) and rural arts and education partnerships.. He served seven years as Producing Director of the original Los Angeles Repertory Company, for whom he directed the LA Premiere of Assassins, Odets’  Rocket to the Moon, and many other acclaimed productions. Peter served as Interim Artistic Director of both the Gretna Theatre in Pennsylvania, and the Jerry Herman Ring Theatre at the University of Miami in Florida. Peter has been a consultant, board member, panelist and site visitor for many institutions including the National Endowment for the Arts, California Arts Council, Association for Theatre in Higher Education (ATHE) and KCACTF. Peter directed a nationally prominent streaming version of Richard Hellesen’s Necessary Sacrifices. He has a decades long artistic relationship with Richard Hellesen and has directed the premieres of many of Richard Hellesen’s plays.  Peter comes from a theatre family, his father was noted actor/director Robert Ellenstein and his brother David is longtime Artistic Director of North Coast Rep and current interim Artistic Director of Laguna Playhouse.  Peter lives in Los Angeles with his three dogs: Sabine, Helena and Mr. Jiggs.

MICHAEL DEEGAN (Scenic Designer/Associate Lighting Designer) has designed scenery, lighting, and projections since 1970. His focus has been on opera, starting in Boston working with Esquire Jauchem. He was recruited by the Metropolitan Opera in 1977 and moved to New York City where he married and started collaborating with costume and set designer Sarah G. Conly. Notable Off-Broadway productions are Flight, Dante’s Inferno and Angel of the Amazon. They designed A Streetcar Named Desire for Andre Previn in Pittsburgh. The New York Times picked their production of Pique Dame as a top ten of the year. International design credits include Philip Glass’ La Belle la Bete and Dracula. Michael and Sarah have designed scenery, lighting and costumes for opera productions in Iceland, Italy, Japan and China. Michael won an Emmy for “Bernstein at Seventy.” On Broadway, he designed the lighting for The Circle and Shadowlands.

For the past forty years, Esquire Jauchem has had an extremely varied career in the performing arts.  He was the founder of the Boston Repertory Theater, Associate Director (with Sarah Caldwell) of the Opera Company of Boston, and co-founder of Broadway’s Jauchem & Meeh Special effects company.  He has worked as a Producer, Writer, Director, and Designer (lighting, sets, and costumes) in a variety of performance arts and produced over 1,000 episodes of network and cable television.  His film, “Bondage,” based on a play by David Henry Hwang, can currently be seen on Amazon Prime.

Joe Huppert is working with New LA Repertory Company for the first time. Previous designs include: This Wonderful Life at North Coast Rep, American Blues and other venues ; The Dybbuk and The Oldest Boy (Craig Noel Award) for San Diego Repertory Theater, Lizard Boy for Diversionary Theater,Glengarry Glen Ross for La Jolla Playhouse.  Sound designs includeBlueprints to Freedom,Peter and the Starcatchers (La Jolla Playhouse),The Fantasticks andStop Kiss for Pasadena Playhouse,Scott Joplin's Rag, Extraordinary Chambers (Craig Noel Nomination (Mo'Olelo); Wisdom From Everything (Local Theater Company),Urinetown,Over the  Tavern,KingO’ The Moon (Mercury Theater)

Sarah G. Conley is in the process of winding down a 50-year career as a designer of costumes and (with partner Michael Deegan) scenery for opera, television, and stage. Working primarily in opera, she has created productions for companies all over the United States and the world including in China, Japan, Korea, Italy, and Iceland as well as in the middle of the Pacific Ocean on a Theatre at Sea cruise from Sydney to Hong Kong. She is happy to suspend her retirement plans to consult on This Piece of Ground.