The Hunger Cycle Plays
“Darkness got a way a makin it feel like time ain’t movin.”
Time moves differently in Skid Row, Los Angeles, where artists rub shoulders with lawyers, pastors, social workers and b-ball players. From the benches of San Julian Park to the walls of an intimate apartment and a raucous karaoke hall, Love On San Pedro, Cornerstone’s fourth play in The Hunger Cycle, weaves an unlikely love story. Shunned by her community, Marjorie’s weariness drags time to a near standstill. But when she’s wooed by a man whose hope and hoop-shots know no bounds, her world speeds up fast. Meet Skid Row’s intricate and vibrant community, a mere one square mile of downtown streets where the moon shines brightest in the darkest corners.
This project is commissioned and developed in partnership with Full Stage USA at New Dramatists, a program made possible by the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation.
“You want to hear some of the freshest, funniest dialogue in town? Head over to Cornerstone’s world premiere of Love on San Pedro.”
– Stage & Cinema
“Love On San Pedro is a sobering examination of an-often overlooked part of Los Angeles, and a reminder that love defies even the darkest of circumstance.”
– Neon Tommy
“James McManus, the writer, has given us a marvelous play that touch on emotions deep inside us where we felt our deepest pain of our own lives, when we thought things were hopeless and had given up. But, in the telling of this story (which includes the collaborations of skid row occupants), he provides us with a ray of hope that things are going to get better providing one has to will not to give up.”
– Joe Straw #9
James McManus
Playwright
James McManus (Playwright) is the author of six plays: Love on San Pedro, Dorothy 6, Bulldog Whiskey, Underground, Cherry Smoke and Blood Potato. His plays have been developed and performed at Labyrinth Theater Company, Apothecary Theatre Company, The Clockwork Theatre, Glass Umbrella Creative (Sydney), Revolt Theatre (Melbourne), Gurnet Theatre Project, The Kennedy Center, The BE Company, Pittsburgh Playwrights Theatre Company, The Edinburgh Festival Fringe, Barebones Productions, Irish Repertory Theatre, Son of Semele, The Side Project Theatre Company, The Lark Play Development Center, The Inkwell, Diverse City Theater Company, and the August Wilson Center for African American Culture. James was the recipient of the 2006 Princess Grace Award in Playwriting for Cherry Smoke, which is published by Samuel French. He received an MFA in Dramatic Writing from Carnegie Mellon University and is a resident playwright at New Dramatists.
Shishir Kurup
Director
Over the past few years Shishir directed Michael Garces' first play for Cornerstone, Los Illegals, wrote and directed On Caring for the Beast, was the lyricist for Cornerstone's Making Paradise: The West Hollywood Musical and in Spring '11 directed Lynn Manning's The Unrequited in the community of Watts. He will be writing the Hunger of Addiction play which goes up in '14. Shishir has acted in numerous Cornerstone shows, currently in Lisa Loomer's "Cafe Vida and has written over a 150 songs for various Cornerstone productions. The songs he wrote for the Medea portion of MedeaMacbethCinderella (MMC), a production originally created as a collaboration between Cornerstone Theater and The Actor's Gang in 1998, will be part of the 2012 Oregon Shakespeare Festival's season running from late April to late November 2012. He is also a solo performer and a founding faculty member of the new Applied Theatre Arts MA program in the School of Theatre at USC. Shishir’s play Merchant on Venice premiered in Chicago and appears in the anthology Beyond Bollywood and Broadway. He recieved the TIME (Time for Inspiration, Motivation and Exploration) Grant from the Audrey Skirball Foundation for his body of work. He's a Princess Grace Fellow, TCG/Alan Schneider directing finalist, two-time Herb Alpert nominee and MAP grantee. His feature film Sharif Don’t Like It (writer/director) is about the loss of Habeas Corpus and most recently the short documentary Amu's Kitchen about his mother which was created for Cornerstone's "Creative Seeds," both of which will soon be seen on Vimeo. Shishir's TV and film credits include: Bones, Lost, Sleeper Cell, Alias, Monk, Surface, Heroes, various pilots and most recently the Disney Channel movie musical, Lemonade Mouth. His most profound, instructive and daily inspiration, however, is his daughter Tala Claye Ananya Perl Kurup.
Click here to hear exclusive Love on San Pedro Podcasts on Skid Row Internet Radio! Our community partners for Love on San Pedro include:
- Downtown Women’s Center
- Lamp Community
- Los Angeles Community Action Network
- Los Angeles Mission
- Operation Face-Lift/Skid Row
- Skid Row Housing Trust
