Building Houses On The Moon

PREMIERED 2001

This Award-winning touring production is described by InsideOut as an “Extraordinary theater piece that evokes both the isolation and the  courage of GLBT youth in their struggle for identity and inclusion.”

The play is a tapestry of powerful, poignant, and sometimes hilarious vignettes inspired by the internet posts of gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender youth from around the world and deals with gender and sexual orientation identity issues, the role of straight allies, homophobia, family and peer relationships, and inclusion and safety at school. Student groups and educators have embraced BUILDING HOUSES as a powerful tool for education and support.

Contact us to bring Building Houses on The Moon to your community.

Artistic Team

DAVID CARSON

DIRECTOR

Jeffrey Solomon

Playwright

Jeff wrote and directed two of the Houses touring plays, BUILDING HOUSES ON THE MOON (Lucille Lortel, City Theatre, Pittsburgh, Winner: Best Play for an Ensemble, Columbus National Gay and Lesbian Theatre Festival) and DE NOVO. (59E59 St. Theaters, Americas Off Broadway Festival, Tour of El Salvador) He is also the author of TARA’S CROSSING, which appeared at the Queens Theatre’s Immigrant Voice’s Project and its world premiere run at the Tenement Theatre in New York. DE NOVO and TARA’S CROSSING are presented widely in Law Schools as a training tool on asylum and refugee issues. As a solo performer and playwright Mr. Solomon’s MOTHER/SON premiered at HERE Art Center in New York and he received a Joseph Jefferson Nomination for Best Actor for the same performance in Chicago at the Bailiwick Rep. The play has toured the U.S., U.K. India, Sri Lanka, the Philippines, and Australia and is used widely as a diversity training tool at colleges, universities, houses of worship and corporations. MOTHER/SON won the Audience Favorite, Best Playwriting and Best Male Solo Performer at the National Gay and Lesbian Theatre Festival and Mr. Solomon won Best Male Performance at the Absolut Gay Theatre Festival in Dublin, Ireland. His other solo play SANTA CLAUS IS COMING OUT premiered at the Bailiwick in Chicago, ran Off Broadway the Kirk Playhouse and has toured nationally including the Diversionary Theatre in San Diego where it won a StageSceneLA’s Best Of 2010-2011 Award for Best Solo Performance. The play also received the Best of the National Gay and Lesbian Theatre Festival. As head-writer for the CityKids Foundation in New York his theatrical works for young audiences appeared on Broadway at the St. James Theater, Carnegie Hall, the United Nations, community settings nationally and on the Oprah, Donahue and Arsenio shows. Jeffrey Solomon created an issue-based Saturday morning television program on A.B.C. called “CityKids” for Jim Henson Productions, and was also a staff writer for the same series. His pilot episode was nominated for an Emmy Award as Best Children’s Special as well as winning an Ollie Award for excellence in Children’s Programming and a Golden Rose Award for Human Values.

Andrew Ingkavet

Music

Many moons ago, Andrew Ingkavet helped found this company and continues to contribute music (and designed the logo!) With over 30 years experience as educator, designer, composer & entrepreneur, he was a VJ for MTV-Asia, an award-winning composer for theater & film and is currently CEO/Founder of the Musicolor Method® (https://themusicolormethod.com) a unique approach to music education, now taught throughout the world. Andrew holds a BA Music from NYU with post-grad studies at Mannes College of Music, ASCAP/NYU Film Scoring Workshop, SVA and The Juilliard School. Let’s continue to shoot for the moon with theater that awakens…


Cast

Carlo D’Amore

Cast

Carlo is an award-winning actor, a playwright, a Drama Desk Nominated director, a producer, as well as an experience designer and the creative director and founder of Live in Theater Productions (LIT LLC). The work of LIT has been experienced by hundreds of thousands in between New York City, Madrid, Spain, and Austin Texas.

BROADWAY ACTING CREDITS: “Summer and Smoke” The Roundabout Theater Company, directed by David Warren “Latinologues” Helen Hayes Theater directed by Cheech Marin.

OFF-BROADWAY ACTING CREDITS: The Lark, Urban Stages, Repertorio Espanol, Ensemble Studio Theater, Manhattan Playhouse, Lucille Lortel Theater, Rattlestick Theater, Intar, Puerto Rican Traveling Theater, The Theater at Riverside Church, 59E59, The TBG theater, The NY-Historical Society, Houses On The Moon Theater Company, & Live in Theater.

REGIONAL ACTING CREDITS: San Francisco Shakespeare Festival, Magic Theater, The Sacramento Theater Company, San Jose Repertory Theater, San Diego Repertory Theatre, The San Francisco Playhouse, Theater Rhino. Penguin Rep, Passages Theater Company.

FILM AND TELEVISION: When In Rome” by Touchstone Pictures, “I the Sinner” (Yo Pecador) in Bogotá, Colombia. “Fly Trap” & “The Tool” by Miles Kahn. “State Property 2” by Lionsgate Films. “Strapped” & “Beautiful Something” By Altar Boy Productions HBO’s “OZ”, “Pan Am” by ABC. “Kurt” by Polish cinematographer Łukasz Swaryczewski. DIRECTING CREDITS: “Voices From Guantanamo” for Actors and Poets Group. “De Novo” for Houses on The Moon, Central America tour. The interactive site-specific hits “The Ryan Case 1873”, “Lombardi Case 1975’, “The Murder of Venus Xtravaganza 1988”, “Fierce & Deadly 1988”, “The Pinkertonian Mystery”, “The Trial of Typhoid Mary 1915”, “J&K 1965 – An immersive love story” “Spirit of the Torch”, “Open Mind – A Simulife” for Meow Wolf, for SXSW Festival 2018.

Emily Joy Weiner

Cast

Emily Joy Weiner is the Co-Founder and Artistic Director of Houses on the Moon Theater Company, a NYC based 501c3 not for profit. Since the company’s inception in 2001 she has been creating, developing, performing, producing and directing new works that address the complex and sensitive issues of our time. Emily has been a facilitator of creative theater making workshops throughout the NYC public school system for the past 25 years, specializing in programs with teenagers and young adults going through the criminal justice system.  In most recent years Emily directed the Off-Broadway production of THE SANTA CLOSET at Teatro Circulo, guided the company through its production of DE NOVO at Next Door at NYTW, directed the world premiere of THE ASSIGNMENT at the ART/New York Theatres and continues to guide the touring, live storytelling production of gUN COUNTRY. She has performed all over NYC and beyond with some highlights including OTHELLO at the West End Theater, COMING THROUGH at the American Place Theatre, FINDING THE WORDS at the Lucille Lortel, AN EPIDOG with Mabou Mines and FEFU AND HER FRIENDS at Williamstown Theatre Festival. She co-developed and toured a one-woman adaptation of Faulkner’s AS I LAY DYING with the late Wynn Handman of The American Place Theatre whom she studied with for many years. The League of Professional Theatre Women recently honored Emily with the Josephine Abady award for her work with Houses in the creation of multicultural works. Her play, SHARED SENTENCES, had its Off Broadway world premiere in Fall 2022.