The Human Ounce

THE HUMAN OUNCE: an audio play

an audio production of the last live theatrical performance!

Listen to the Audio Play

written by Nicole Parizeau
directed by Gary Graves
engineering, editing, and audio design by Gregory Scharpen

performed by Kimberly Ridgeway, Champagne Hughes and Don Wood
music by Zbigniew Preisner

A fine old painting on the gallery wall.

Pride of place in the museum. The painter? An old master in his own right…admired worldwide, historically important, and an inspiration to thousands.  And revealed as a monster. What now?

“This is how you raise awareness and shift the identity of an institution… To rectify centuries of imbalance, you have to do something radical”—Christopher Bedford, Curator, Baltimore Museum of Art

“Demonizing art is not a rational response to it. There is no way that you should punish the art for the crimes of the artist”—Jonathan Pugh, Oxford University

production sponsors: Patricia Milton and Linda Schieber

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Bios

Champagne Hughes (Jory) is a Bay Area Actor, DJ, Executive Director and Board Chair. Hughes is currently enrolled at California Institute of Integral Studies completing her M.A. in Psychology with an emphasis in Drama and Sex Therapy, MFT. Her mission is to provide compassionate assistance to couples/individuals experiencing sexual difficulties while using expressive arts modalities and integrate robust diversity initiatives in hopes of building a supportive working environment for all artists and art administrators of color within local theater communities. Previous onstage work includes The Rendering Cycle at SF Playhouse, Othello and Macbeth at African American Shakespeare Company, Clybourne Park at Altarena Theater, Romeo and Juliet at Ubuntu Theater. Champagne has also held management roles for The Flight Deck, American Conservatory Theater, Berkeley Repertory Theater and Beach Blanket Babylon. djchampagne.com

Kimberly Ridgeway (Biz) has been working professionally as an Actor, Director, Playwright and Producer in film and theater for over 20 years. Kimberly wrote, produced and directed the stage plays No More Secrets, Prospect Place, Heavy Burdens and The Gigolo Chronicles, and the short film The Confession. Kimberly has directed projects for Bay Area Drama Company, Dragon Productions Theatre Company, Contra Costa Civic Theatre, Altarena Playhouse, Ubuntu Theatre Project, Bay Area Performing Arts Collective, Playwrights Center of San Francisco and TheatreFirst. Some notable acting roles include Mrs. Muller, Doubt, Coretta Scott King/Fannie Lou Hamer, All the Way, Duchess, Wonderland (World Premiere), and Camae in Contra Costa Civic Theatre’s The Mountaintop for which she won the 2016 BroadwayWorld San Francisco Award for Best Leading Actress in a Play (Local).

Don Wood (Dodge), a Bay Area actor for 36 years, joins Central Works for the second time, the first being Chekhov’s Ward 6. He was also in this space performing in Sam Shepard’s Ages of the Moon for Anton’s Well.  Don is a Shotgun Players company member.

Nicole Parizeau (playwright) has been writing and editing in the Bay Area since arriving from Montreal 30 years ago. She is a long-time member of the Central Works Writers Workshop, and has been a finalist for the Sky Cooper New Play Prize, runner-up for San Francisco Playground and the Disquiet Literary Award, and winner of the Bill Holm Witness Prize. Nicole’s work is also published by Earth in Focus Editions, University of California, and a number of literary and science journals. The Human Ounce was her first fully produced play.

Gary Graves (director) has been a resident playwright and company co-director at Central Works since 1998. He has been a part of developing 67 world premiere productions with the company, many of which he has either written and/or directed. Some of the other productions he has directed for the company include The Lady Matador’s Hotel, Bamboozled, King of Cuba, Chekhov’s WARD 6, Into the Beautiful North and Machiavelli’s The Prince. He directed the company’s first collaboratively developed script, Roux, at the Berkeley City Club in 1997. He also leads the Central Works Writers Workshop, an ongoing development and commissioning program, and he teaches playwriting year-round at the Berkeley Rep School of Theater.

Gregory Scharpen (engineer/editor/audio designer) has designed for Central Works since the late 90s, and his work has appeared in productions by Shakespeare Santa Cruz, Shotgun Players, Theatre Rhino, TheatreFIRST, The Breadbox, and many others. He is also a documentary film editor (Have You Heard from Johannesburg; The Whistleblower of My Lai; and an upcoming feature about inventor/curmudgeon Don Buchla); and he helms numerous radio programs on KALX 90.7 fm. Under the moniker Thomas Carnacki, he concocts, records and performs unsettling music for the amusement of a limited fan base. He is the recipient of a SF Bay Area Theater Critics Circle Award (for Central Works’ Mesmeric Revelation), a Golden Eagle CINE Award (for Al Helm), and one of the very infrequently bestowed Jolly Trephination Awards for Total Textual Immersion.