LOVE INTEREST

written by Lee Melillo
developed with & directed by Alexandra Haddad
produced by Personal Pizza Party & Alexandra Haddad

JUNE 27@ 7:00PM
JULY 30 @ 9:30PM
JULY 1 @ 3:00PM

THE TANK
312 W 36 ST, NEW YORK, NY

Featuring: Alex Ramirez Cannon (James Sloan), Benjamin Izaak (Tim Fairly), James Carlos Lacey (Val Jones), Eric May Liu (Kit Bordeaux), Emma Noelani (Nadia Velez), Celeste Samson (Beck Fears), Linnea Scott (Annie Goose), Emily Sullivan (Lydia Fay), Steven Weatherbee (Zack Brothers). With Anna Mayo (Swing), Ethan Peña Mock (Stage Directions/Swing), Francesca Pinilla (Swing).

Love Interest runs approximately 120 minutes.

CAST

  • Alex Ramirez Cannon (he/him) is thrilled to be a part of this great Love Interest team! He is a recent graduate of the BFA program at CAP21 Conservatory and a proud Houston native. Favorite credits include Max in Cabaret and the Suitor in the NYC premiere of Patronage at the Astoria Performing Arts Center. He wants to give special shoutouts to his parents and to Callie the cat. Instagram: @alex.ramirez.cannon

  • Eric May Liu, an actor, singer, multi-instrumentalist, and college dropout, based in New York City, is excited to be part of this production of Love Interest. Raised in Grand Rapids, Michigan with a love for performing, Eric is proud to be working through New York’s illustrious theatre scene and hopes to become a mainstay for a long time to come.

  • Benjamin Izaak is a graduate of PACE University (BFA in Acting). Theatrical credits include Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead (PACE), The Laramie Project (PACE), Blue Ridge (PACE), Until Death (Berkshire Theatre Festival; Dir. Larry Moss), Love’s Labor’s Lost (Nevada Conservatory Theatre) and The Music Man (BTF). TV/Film: Hondo (Amazon Prime; Dir. Wayne Yip), Rose Tint (South Tide Productions). Thank you, Baka, for your eternal love and support! For more, please visit: benjaminizaak.com.

  • Emma Noelani is thrilled to be a part of this production! She just graduated from the Manhattan School of Music and is excited to be hitting the industry. Recent and favorite roles include Mercutio in Romeo and Juliet, #14 in The Wolves, and Meg in Missed: Connections. She would like to thank her family and best friends for their constant support - it means the world! Besos xx

  • James Carlos Lacey is a Paraguayan actor who grew up in Great Britain. He is also a playwright, director and singer-songwriter. Originally, a History Major from the University of East Anglia, England, he has performed globally and received his Master’s at the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art, London, where he co-founded The Undertow Theatre Company. He has just completed his MFA at the Academy for Classical Acting with the Shakespeare Theatre Company in D.C.

  • Celeste Samson (they/them) is an interdisciplinary theatre artist from Queens. Recent roles/undergraduate work include: Antigone (Ismene), Mr. Burns: A Post Apocalyptic Play (Scratchy), The Bacchae (Bacchae Chorus), and Call Me By Any Other Name… Just As Sweet (Romeo) at Muhlenberg College, Ramaavan (Surpanakha) at the American Theatre of Actors, “Girl Scouts Play” (Girl Scout #2) and Revenge of Eve (Lillith) at Letter of Marque Theatre Company. @celsolstice on instagram

  • Linnea Scott (she/they) is a multidisciplinary theatre artist who was born and raised in Denver, CO. New York: Variations on a Blueprint (Lincoln Center: Education), mother / land (Theater Row), The Program (Falconworks Theater). Regional: The 39 Steps (Southern Colorado Repertory Theatre). Film: The Raging Heart of Maggie Acker (555 Films), The Lower Depths (Yellow Pad Pictures), Drainpipe (Nightwire Films). Training: University of North Carolina School of the Arts. linneascott.com

  • Emily is a proud Indiana University alum and Wells Scholar. She especially loves classical and new works. Favorite credits: Two Tickets to Mars (film, Austin Film Festival 2021), Medea (Medea), Romeo and Juliet (Juliet), Henry V (Henry V), and Crumble: Lay Me Down, Justin Timberlake (Mother). She is managed by EKG Talent Group and has two beloved cats. www.emilysullivanactor.com

  • Steve Weatherbee is making his debut at The Tank with Love Interest. An MFA graduate from Texas Tech, Steve is an actor and educator who daily relishes the chance to learn from others -- artistic craft, philosophy, and pedagogical approach all especially. Born and raised in California, he is thankful to his supportive and ever-inspiring friends and family. Steve acknowledges and is honored to work alongside these dedicated and thoughtful artists.

  • Ethan Peña Mock is a Tejano actor and director from Houston and Fordham Theatre alumnus, currently based in New York City. He is interested in work that uplifts the voices of the multicultural working class and is critical of the systems that surround our lives. He is deeply committed to collaboration and making great art accessible to all. He is so excited to continue developing Love Interest with such a fantastic team of collaborators!

  • Francesca Pinilla is grateful to be a part of her first staged reading! Credits include: My Fair Lady (Eliza Doolittle), Footloose (Ariel Moore), The Great Gatsby (Myrtle Wilson). Graduate of the New York Conservatory for Dramatic Arts. She’d like to thank the creatives of the show for the opportunity to support this production.

CREATIVE

  • Lee Melillo is an NYC-based, New Haven-raised writer, director, and producer who will not shut up about living in Sunnyside, Queens. Writing includes The Broken Brain Breakup Game at the Chain Theatre, produced by Breaking & Entering Theatre Co and Mommy at the Chain Theatre Festival. Directing includes Night and Daedalus and next to normal at Fordham University. Producing includes anything with Personal Pizza Party’s name on it. Her work explores the identities and idiosyncrasies which inform how we interact with the world at large. Lee’s projects often explore themes of mental illness and neurodiversity; gender and sexuality; and financial and educational privilege. Lee is a co-founder of Personal Pizza Party, an NYC-based production company. leemelillo.com | IG: @leemelillo

  • Alexandra (she/her) is a director and artist of new work, comedy, & postcolonial interpretation of classics centering those who are not wholly represented, including women, the queer community, & people of the Global Majority.

    Select directing: A GENTLEMAN’S GUIDE TO LOVE AND MURDER with Penn Singers Light Opera, THE BROKEN BRAIN BREAKUP GAME with Breaking & Entering Theatre Co., BARD OVERBOARD at the SoHo Playhouse, THE PENELOPIAD at Barnard, ALMOST, MAINE at Columbia, BEACH WEEK at Round House Theatre (Teen Performance Company Sarah Play).

    She is an intimacy and fight choreographer affiliated with Theatrical Intimacy Education. She was McCarter Theatre Centre’s Artistic Assistant/BOLD Fellow from 2021-2023 and was also the first intimacy professional to choreograph on McCarter’s stages. She is a member of the 2021 cohort with Directors Lab North, and a member of the Consortium of Asian American Theaters & Artists. With her mixed cultural heritage, Alex identifies as a “Third Culture Kid.” She graduated from Barnard with a major in theatre, concentrating in directing, and a minor in English, focusing on classics. alexandradarcyhaddad.com

  • Anna Mayo

  • Emily LaRosa recently received her BFA in Technical Theatre from Brooklyn College and is thrilled to be working with 3P! Select Stage Management credits include “...Weasel Festival” (The Public Theatre), ”In The Next Room”, “Gloria” (Brooklyn College), “As You Like It” (Theatre 315), “Little Women”, “Macbeth” (The Gallery Players), and “The Wizard of Oz” (Narrows Community Theatre). She sends love to her friends and family and thanks them for their endless support. emilylarosatheatre.wixsite.com/home

  • From being an Editor at NBC segmenting TV shows/films, a Media Producer for Youtube creators and podcasters, to being a Visual Journalist capturing special moments in the Theatre Industry. Rissa is a New York based creative for stage and screen. You can always find her immersed in her work with a next goal being a Theatre Producer and Casting Director. Find her at www.rissavisuals.com and on social media @rissavisuals

  • Personal Pizza Party (3P) is an NYC-based production company founded in 2023 by Christian Caro, Lee Melillo, and Ethan Peña Mock, with the goal of providing whatever ingredients their artists need to cook up the projects they're hungry for, and to cultivate collaborative, community-based spaces for these projects to thrive. Led by their core tenants of honesty, irreverence, and fun, 3P aims to develop platforms to showcase work that tells a diverse array of untold stories by young artists throughout the city.