Bike America is a wildly theatrical picaresque journey that crams the entire continent onto one stage. The play takes the audience on a cross-country bike trip from Boston to California, with stops in big cities and small towns along the way. Our feckless heroine Penny is looking to bring more meaning into her life, to find a lifestyle that suits her and a town that feels like a home…
The play peddles the audience along a cross-country bike trip from Boston to California, with stops in big cities and small towns along the way. Our feckless heroine Penny is looking to bring more meaning into her life, to find a lifestyle that suits her and a town that feels like a home… so she drops her clingy boyfriend in Beantown and takes off for Santa Barbara! Along the way she befriends a colorful crew of bikers: Ryan, the health nut biking instructor; Tim Billy, the innocent wanderer; Annabel and Rorie, the badass activists seeking to get gay-married in every state they hit on the trip; and the mysterious Man with the Van who carries their stuff. Featuring a flexible and diverse cast, Bike America is a multi-state, multi-generational odyssey to discover our obsession with happiness.
Directions
About the Playwright
Mike Lew is co-director of Ma-Yi Writers’ Lab and is currently on a 3-year fellowship at Ma-Yi through the Mellon Foundation (which he shares with his wife Rehana Lew Mirza, whom he met in the Lab). His plays include Teenage Dick (Woolly Mammoth, Donmar Warehouse, Ma-Yi at the Public, Artists Rep, and Perseverance productions; Public Studio, O’Neill, OSF workshops), Tiger Style! (Olney, Huntington, La Jolla Playhouse, and Alliance productions; O’Neill and CTG workshops), Bike America (Ma-Yi and Alliance productions), microcrisis (Ma-Yi, InterAct, and Next Act productions), Moustache Guys, and the book to the musical Bhangin’ It. He is a Tony voter and Dramatists Guild Council member. Honors include La Jolla Playhouse Artist-in-Residence (with Rehana Lew Mirza); Lark Venturous and NYFA fellowships; and the PEN Emerging Playwright, Lanford Wilson, Helen Merrill, Heideman, and Kendeda awards. Education: Juilliard, Yale. Website: mikelew.com
About the Director
Moritz von Stuelpnagel is a freelance director based in New York City. His production of Hand to God on Broadway received five Tony Award nominations including Best Play and Best Director. Other recent productions include Important Hats of the Twentieth Century by Nick Jones (Manhattan Theatre Club), Teenage Dick by Mike Lew (Public Theater), Verité by Nick Jones (Lincoln Center/LCT3), Bike America by Mike Lew (Ma-Yi), Love Song of the Albanian Sous Chef by Robert Askins (Ensemble Studio Theater), Trevor by Nick Jones (Lesser America), Mel & El: Show & Tell (Ars Nova), The Roosevelt Cousins Thoroughly Sauced by Mike Lew (EST), Spacebar by Michael Mitnick (Studio 42), and My Base and Scurvy Heart by Adam Szymkowicz (Studio 42). Around the US, his work has been seen at the Alliance Theatre, Williamstown Theatre Festival, the Huntington Theatre, and others. Moritz is the former Artistic Director of Studio 42, New York City’s producer of “unproducible” plays. www.moritzvs.com
Design Team
- Andrew Boyce | Scenic Design
- Melissa Schlachtmeyer & Amy Pedigo-Otto | Costume Design
- Matthew Richards | Lighting Design
- Jill BC Du Boff | Sound Design