Be Our Guest with Catherine Filloux, Jimmy Roberts and John Daggett (Welcome to the Big Dipper)

CATHERINE FILLOUX (BOOK) is an award-winning playwright who has been writing about human rights and social justice for twenty-five years.  Filloux is the librettist for three produced operas, NEW ARRIVALS (Houston Grand Opera, composer John Glover), WHERE ELEPHANTS WEEP (Chenla Theatre, Phnom Penh, Cambodia, composer Him Sophy) and THE FLOATING BOX (Asia Society, New York City, composer Jason Kao Hwang).  WHERE ELEPHANTS WEEP was also broadcast on national television in Cambodia, and THE FLOATING BOX was a Critic’s Choice in Opera News and is released by New World Records.  Catherine is the co-librettist with composer Olga Neuwirth for the opera ORLANDO, which premiered at Vienna State Opera. In development:  Thresh’s L’ORIENT (composer Kamala Sankaram, choreographer Preeti Vasudevan); MARY SHELLEY (composer Gerald Cohen, dramaturg Cori Ellison, Black Tea Music).  Her plays have been produced around the U.S. and internationally.  She has been honored with the 2019 Barry Lopez Visiting Writer in Ethics and Community Fellowship; the 2017 Otto René Castillo Award for Political Theatre; and the 2015 Planet Activist Award.  JIMMY ROBERTS  (MUSIC & LYRICS) composed the music for I LOVE YOU, YOU’RE PERFECT, NOW CHANGE, second longest running Off Broadway musical in New York theater history. Written with playwright Joe DiPietro, I LOVE YOU received both the Drama Desk and Outer Critics Circle nominations as Best Musical. It has since played in fifty states, twenty-five countries around the world, and is a major motion picture in Hong Kong. His second Off Broadway musical, THE THING ABOUT MEN, won the 2003 New York Outer Critics Circle award for Best Musical. Jimmy's songs were featured in two other Off Broadway shows: A…MY NAME IS STILL ALICE and PETS! His children's musical, THE VELVETEEN RABBIT, toured the United States for well over a decade. Jimmy is also a sought-after performer. In entertaining programs that combine classical and popular music, he has appeared at Merkin Concert Hall, the Time Warner Center, the 92nd Street Y, Steinway Hall, and the National Arts Club. A graduate of the Manhattan School of Music, where he studied with noted pianist, Constance Keene, Jimmy Roberts is also a poet, whose work has appeared often in the New York Times Metropolitan Diary, as well as TROLLEY, the journal of the NYS Writers Institute. JOHN DAGGETT (BOOK & ADD'L LYRICS) is a differently-abled actor who has starred Off-Broadway in the critically acclaimed plays LEMKIN’S HOUSE, TEAHOUSE OF THE AUGUST MOON, and LOVE LEMMINGS.  Other New York credits include: ROME, PORTRAIT OF A PRESIDENT, AN ARTIST’S LIFE, THE WITCHES TRIPTYCH, and his one-man show FLYING BY THE SEAT OF MY PANTS (Theatre Row).  Regional: Guthrie, Merrimack Rep, Jewish Repertory Theatre, Portland Stage, Roxy Theatre, Odyssey Theater, Kavinoky Theatre and H.T.Y.  Numerous roles for Pennsylvania Shakespeare, Orlando Shakespeare, Shakespeare in Delaware Park, Lake Tahoe Shakespeare and Sherwood Shakespeare.  John served as a member of the Government Relations Committee of the National Multiple Sclerosis Society. Welcome to the Big Dipper What defines home, family, and identity? Joan Wilkes confronts these questions when she must sell The Big Dipper Inn, near Niagara Falls in upstate New York, known for its music and African American heritage. She's all set to sign the contract when a blizzard lands a group of Amish folks and a busload of men in dresses on her doorstep. For three days and nights, they wait out the storm. Cultures clash, romance crackles, and Joan struggles for answers, as a houseful of strangers becomes an unexpected community.