FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
April 24, 2013
Contact: Lori Raffel, Marketing and Media Relations Director
Phone: 317-435-0293 (cell) or 317-635-2381 (office)
Email: lraffel@phoenixtheatre.org
Web: www.phoenixtheatre.org
PHOENIX THEATRE ANNOUNCES
4000 Miles
May 9 – June 9, 2013
Indianapolis – The Phoenix Theatre of Indianapolis proudly announces the Indiana Premiere of the newest
play by Amy Herzog, 4000 Miles in the Frank and Katrina Basile Theatre. Opening Thursday, May 9, and
running through Sunday, June 9, 2013, the play is a skillful joining of loose ends. The dangling threads in this
case are Leo, a scruffy cyclist trying to find his bearings after a cross-country road trip, and Vera, a crotchety
lefty teetering on the brink of infirmity in a rent-controlled apartment in Greenwich Village. In the end, Leo
and Vera endear themselves to the audience in much the same way that they grow on each other.
“About a year ago, Martha Jacobs brought this play to my attention. She had seen – and was moved by - 4000
Miles on Broadway and thought it would be a good fit for the Phoenix,” stated Phoenix Theatre Producing
Director Bryan Fonseca. “In the end, this play is about how we all struggle to find our place in the world. Leo
and Vera help each other find where they belong.”
About 4000 Miles
The play takes its name from the bike trip Leo has been on with his ill-fated friend, Micah, from St. Paul to
New York City, where his outdoorsy girlfriend, the touchingly mournful Bec is studying. Clueless Leo turns up
at Vera’s threshold before dawn and soon enough, the easily irritated Vera is washing out his underwear and
lending him money for trips to the climbing-wall gym.
The sharing of close quarters brings out the best in Leo and Vera, without thoroughly erasing what renders
them imperfect and what would make either of them tough to live with. The sweet speech Leo practices for
Vera at the end of the play reveals that he may be ready to abandon the cocoon in which he’s traveled all
those miles, just as Vera experiences a meaningful cracking of her own shell.
The Cast
Phoenix Theatre Producing Director Bryan Fonseca and 4000 Miles Director Bill Simmons has brought
together a wonderful cast, including Martha Jacobs as Vera. Jacobs was most recently seen on the Phoenix
stage as the family matriarch in August: Osage County, but who has acted in and directed over 20 shows in the
Phoenix history. Purdue Junior Andrew Martin is making his Phoenix debut as Leo. Arianne Villareal,
previously seen in this season’s Bloody Bloody Andrew Jackson, is Amanda, and recent DePauw graduate
Jacqueline Keyes is Bec.
The Playwright
Amy Herzog’s plays - in addition to 4000 Miles - include After the Revolution (Williamstown, Playwrights
Horizons; John Gassner Award Nomination), The Wendy Play (ACT, San Francisco), Hungry (Ensemble Studio
Theater) and Belleville (upcoming, Yale Repertory Theater). She has had readings/workshops at Steppenwolf,
Manhattan Theater Club, New York Stage and Film, Arena Stage in Washington, D.C., and Soho Rep, among
others. She holds commissions from the Yale Rep, Steppenwolf, Ars Nova, and Playwrights Horizons and is an
alumna of Youngblood, Play Group, and the SoHo Rep Writer/Director Lab, a Helen Merrill Award recipient, a
former Playwrights’ Realm Fellow, and the 2010 Playwright in Residence at Ars Nova. She teaches Playwriting
at Bryn Mawr. MFA: Yale School of Drama.
The Reviews
“(4000 Miles is) a funny, moving, altogether wonderful drama. Plays as truthful and touching and fine as
4000 Miles come along once or maybe twice a season.” – The New York Times
“(4000 Miles) helps to cement Ms. Herzog’s reputation as a young writer of stature, one who draws on her
family’s history — and her own — to create forceful, literate, compassionate drama.” — The New York Times
ABOUT THE PHOENIX THEATRE
"The Phoenix Theatre has cornered the market on hip new works." — Chris Jones, Chicago Tribune
The Phoenix Theatre is Indiana's only professional contemporary theatre, and has presented productions to
challenge and entertain the Indianapolis community for 30 years. An Equity house, the Theatre presents the
Midwest and Indiana premieres of many popular Broadway and Off-Broadway plays, and has presented more
than 85 world premieres in its quarter century. The Phoenix operates the 130-seat proscenium Livia and Steve
Russell Theatre as well as the 65-seat cabaret-style black box Frank & Katrina Basile Stage. The Phoenix Pub,
located in the Basile Stage, serves beer, wine, coffee, soft drinks, water, and treats, and patrons may take all
refreshments into either theatre. Both venues are housed along with administrative offices in a renovated
1907 church in downtown Indianapolis' historic Chatham Arch neighborhood, part of the Mass Ave Arts &
Theatre District. The Phoenix Theatre is a member of the National New Play Network and the League of
Indianapolis Theatres, and is supported by the Indiana Arts Commission, the Arts Council of Indianapolis, and
the National Endowment for the Arts, as well as local corporate and foundation funders and more than 400
individual donors.