Free concessions provided courtesy of
Friends of the Studio City Library.

Follow Us:

Welcome

Hello, and welcome to The Gin Game by D. L. Coburn, the second presentation in Season Five of THE PRIZE WINNERS—Interact Theatre Company’s fully staged reading series, presented in partnership with the Los Angeles Public Library’s LA MADE cultural enrichment program, celebrating five extraordinary plays that have each received the Pulitzer Prize for Drama, the Tony Award® for Best Play, or both.

When I curate a season, I’m less interested in a single topic than in a shared human question. This year, that question is empathy—how it’s formed, how it fractures, and how incomplete it often is. Each of this season’s plays asks us to look again at people we think we understand and to recognize the limits of our assumptions.

In The Gin Game, a seemingly simple relationship unfolds into a poignant study of loneliness, pride, and human connection—shot through with wit, warmth, and unexpected humor. Its quiet revelations and emotional precision make it a natural fit for this season, inviting us to practice empathy by listening closely and resisting easy conclusions.

Taken together, these plays invite us to stay curious, to listen generously, and to lean into connection—even when it challenges us. Thank you for being here, for your openness, and for your enthusiasm for this work. Your presence makes this possible, and we’re grateful to share this afternoon with you.

Barry Heins
Artistic Director, Interact Theatre Company

Cast

Creative Team

Meet the Company

Steve Vinovich

Weller Martin

Steve Vinovich has been doing this acting thing for a while. He’s been truly blessed. He has actually made a living as an actor. Raised in Peoria, Illinois, attended the University of Illinois and UCLA before receiving a full scholarship to the Juilliard School, which brought him to NY. BROADWAY: Waitress, All the Way, Loose Ends, Lost in Yonkers, The Magic Show, The Robber Bridegroom, The Grand Tour, The Secret Rapture, Love Letters. OFF-BROADWAY: Old Jews Telling Jokes. NATIONAL TOUR: The Dinner Party. REGIONAL: Over 100 plays and musicals. Recently – the American Shakespeare Festival: A Funny Thing Happened Forum. Westport Playhouse: Diary of Anne Frank. Pittsburgh Public: Ben Franklin in 1776. Pasadena Playhouse: The Foreigner, The Little Foxes. Laguna Playhouse: Art, The Price. Reprise: Kiss Me Kate, Strike up the Band, Babes in Arms. Pacific Resident Theater: Awake and Sing, Golden Boy, All My Sons. Stratford: Twelfth Night with Lynn Redgrave. NY Public: A Midsummer Night's Dream. NCT: Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf, How I Learned to Drive, Inherit the Wind. FILM: Worth, The Intern, Shirley, The Santa Clause, Awakenings, Mannequin, Puffin in The Swan Princess. TV: about 120 guest spots and two series – recently Godfather of Harlem and such iconic shows as Three’s Company, LA Law, Hill Street Blues, Roseanne, Star Trek, ER, Everybody Loves Raymond, Law and Order, Matlock, Touched by an Angel, Malcolm in the Middle, and yes, even Hannah Montana. COMMERCIALS – over 200. TRAINING: Juilliard School under John Houseman, Strasberg Institute, Charles Nelson Reilly, Larry Moss. AWARDS: three LA DramaLogue Awards. www.stevevinovich.com

Carolyn Mignini

Fonsia Dorsey

Carolyn Mignini has spent her professional life as an actress and singer. Most recently: the 2025 premiere of The Reservoir at The Geffen Playhouse, Becoming Dr. Ruth at Cape May Stage, and the Broadway revival of The Rose Tattoo opposite Marisa Tomei. She spent three seasons on The Deuce for HBO, recurred on Showtime’s Escape at Dannemora, and was featured in Worth on Netflix, The Lincoln Lawyer, a stint as Barbara Walters in Clipped for FX, and Culprit, an indie thriller currently streaming on Amazon. She began in New York in musicals. Highlights include: a Drama Desk nomination for her role as “Anna Held” in Tintypes (which she performed on the TONY Awards® and CBS’s Kennedy Center Honors), Fiddler On The Roof, The Fantasticks, Christopher Durang’s A History of the American Film, and Sister Mary Ignatius Explains It All To You. A longtime member of Ensemble Studio Theatre, she loves participating in the development of new works. When she and Steve Vinovich moved to LA to raise their kids, she compiled a long list of TV credits: The Practice, Picket Fences, Mad About You, Chicago Hope, Murphy Brown, Touched By An Angel, The Wonder Years, Newhart, Family of Spies, and Days of Our Lives, to name a few. Carolyn has a voice studio where she teaches privately and conducts song performance workshops at Pacific Resident Theatre in LA. An Interact camp follower and fan for years, she is very happy to be part of this wonderful company. On we go!

Barry Heins

Producer/ ITC Artistic Director

Most recently, Heins produced and directed the critically acclaimed Los Angeles premiere of Aaron Posner's "Life Sucks" at the Broadwater Main Stage. The production earned a coveted spot on L.A. Times theater critic Charles McNulty’s Top 9 List of 2023 and received seven nominations from the L.A. Drama Critics Circle, including wins for Best Ensemble and Best Writing–Adaptation. A graduate of The Juilliard School and an alumnus of The Acting Company, Heins has performed on Broadway and Off-Broadway, at leading regional theaters across the U.S., and in both film and television. His notable Los Angeles stage credits include "Much Ado About Nothing" at the Ford Theatre (Drama-Logue Award for Outstanding Performance), ITC's celebrated production of "Counsellor-At-Law" with John Rubinstein (Ovation Award for Best Ensemble), the 2018 ITC revival of Jerry Sterner's "Other People's Money," and the West Coast premiere of Mark Rylance and Louis Jenkins' "Nice Fish." Heins is also an accomplished voice-over artist, lending his talents to everything from film trailers to political ads, and has served as a dialect consultant on Broadway productions and for PBS. He has taught at several professional actor training conservatories, including NYU Tisch School of the Arts/Playwrights Horizons Theater School and SUNY Purchase College. During the summers, Heins serves as executive producer of the company’s summer theater camp for underserved youth, INTERPLAY, which was integrated into the L.A. Department of Cultural Affairs’ five-week Summer Performing Arts Camp (SPAC) in 2023. Heins curates the ITC Play Lab for established local playwrights and has spearheaded four annual staged readings series in partnership with the Los Angeles Public Library’s LA Made cultural enrichment program, where he directed "You Can’t Take It With You," "The Great White Hope," and "Driving Miss Daisy," and performed in "Art." He also produced and directed two impactful short films written by Catherine Butterfield for ITC: "Faultless" and "Just Another Birthday in Bedlam." Both films garnered international recognition, winning multiple awards at prestigious film festivals, including a 2021 Bronze and 2022 Gold Telly Award. These films are available on ITC's official YouTube channel, @InteractTheatreCompanyLosAngeles.

Kristen Egermeier

Producer/ ITC Managing Director

Kristen is thrilled to continue her work with ITC as the new Managing Director. While she is a trained Actor first, Kristen has served as operational support for theatres across the county for the past 15 years. She has also produced, written, and managed multiple productions on stage and film. As a graduate of Cal State University, Northridge with a BA in Theatre Arts and a minor in Chemistry, her well-rounded education has combined her love of theatre with her organizational business skills. After working and studying with multiple theatre companies back east, she returned to Los Angeles to dive further into her roles as an actor and operational consultant, with an emphasis on nonprofit organizations. Kristen has aided in administratively supporting and developing multiple theatre and community programs. Her 20 years of experience in management and hands-on roles in accounting, data analytics, editorial writing, and operations management have created her specialty in working with small businesses and nonprofit organizations to develop business practices and streamline financials. A background in industries outside of the theatre world includes environmental research and services, federal and state government services, manufacturing, and GIS data services.

David Schaller

Stage Manager/ Assistant to the Director/ Dramaturg

DAVID SCHALLER Described by Disney management as “a creative powerhouse,” and “a Bellagio Fountain of creative ideas,” David’s work is distinguished by a unique mix of marketing and entertainment experience, and work that’s known for both its strategic insight and brilliant creative execution. David began his career as a theater director, working on Broadway for the multi-Tony Winning director Hal Prince, and in the UK for Academy Award winner David Puttnam. He then moved into marketing as a creative director at the great British design and marketing company Imagination, where he was a pioneer in the development of brand experience, and created events, exhibits and live shows for Ford, Lloyd’s of London, British Airways, and the British Government. Some of the spectacular and powerful projects he led included flying a geodesic dome into the air to reveal an exhibit for Ford, touring Sleeping Beauty’s Castle to the capital cities of Europe for Disney and staging a British Prime Minister’s live appearances in a landslide election win. He went on to establish Imagination’s New York office, winning a range of global clients, including Apple, Nike, Disney, Ford, Lincoln Mercury, and AT&T, for whom he created numerous shows and exhibits. David then joined Ammirati Puris Lintas, where he founded the first brand experience group at a global ad agency, doing brand strategy, retail design and major live events for Burger King, Four Seasons Hotels, Ameritech, Iridium, Wachovia Bank, Rover Cars, and MasterCard. He went on to start Brandnew, his own marketing consultancy, where he built a client list that included Disney, Ford, Apple, Cole Haan and match.com, offering a wide range of communications services from research and strategy to design development and implementation. Brandnew evolved into Garden Of Eden Entertainment, as many established entertainment companies were turning towards more highly interactive and immersive experiences. Since then, David has been the creative force behind an enormously adventurous range of immersive experiences. For Disney, he developed an array of innovative rides, parades, shows and attractions, including the original concepts for Star Wars: Gravity’s Edge, interactive entertainment for Avatar’s Pandora, and a full-length immersive and interactive version of Tim Burton’s Wonderland. David helped develop the master plan and the retail, restaurant and entertainment options for The Linq, the youth-oriented resort on the Las Vegas Strip, and designed proposals for the expansion of Elvis Presley’s Graceland. He created the hotel, retail, dining and entertainment offerings for a yet-to-be-realized Dubai theme park, based entirely on Arab legends, and has contributed concepts for various developments in Jeddah, and Makkah. His work has won numerous accolades. David’s script for Beyond All Boundaries, the central attraction at the National World War Two Museum, won multiple international awards. His work on Disney’s Gravity’s Edge won the Themed Entertainment Association’s Thea Award for Best Attraction. He wrote the opening ceremony for Diryah, the UNESCO World Heritage site in Saudi Arabia, which won the World’s Best Event Award at Cannes. He has also won major awards for graphic, exhibit, and trade show design, and was Artist-In-Residence at Walt Disney Imagineering. Recently, he contributed ideas for the launch of the Saudi Red Sea Project, and for the development of an immersive museum and light show at the Giza Pyramids in Egypt. He also oversaw the creation of Walmart’s exhibit at the Consumer Electronics Show, where Walmart bested major tech companies to win the Most Innovative Award. He is currently completing the prototype for a series of revolutionary learning apps that combine the qualities of an inspiring teacher with the excitement of a hugely involving video game. Whatever the media, David’s work displays tremendous insight into what audiences want and what brands need to do, and how to connect the two in a dramatic and satisfying way. Above all, he is a storyteller, who brings a sense of human connection, emotional impact and real meaning to every project he undertakes. He is typically involved throughout the development process from initial research to the creation of the final product. In addition to the skills he brings to any project, he can call on a world-class team across an exceptional range of disciplines from leisure and retail to digital design, and every aspect of the brand experience.

Anita Khanzadian

Director

Initiator and director of Interact Theatre Play Development Lab; Interact Theatre credits: Co-director, Counsellor-at-Law (L.A. Drama Critics Circle, Ovation, Drama-Logue Awards for direction); director, Marathons, The Root, (Drama-Logue Awards, direction); Death of a Salesman; State of the Union; All American Girl. Solo shows: Stephanie Satie’s Refugees, Coming to America, and Silent Witnesses; James Gleason’s Actor Under Fire. Guest Director: La Ronde and Painting Churches at Theatre 40. Acted in and directed Victoria Thompson’s Underground Woman. Appeared in Spy Ants production of E. M. Lewis’ Infinite Black Suitcase. U.S.I.A. guest artist in India and Bangladesh.

D. L. Coburn

Playwright

D.L. Coburn (1938-2025) was born in Baltimore, Maryland. He came to prominence in 1977 with The Gin Game, which was his first play. The Gin Game ran on Broadway for 516 performances and subsequently toured the nation with its original cast of Hume Cronyn and Jessica Tandy to sold-out houses in Los Angeles, Chicago, Boston, Philadelphia and a half dozen other cities before going on a tour of England and Russia. It has since had productions in virtually every country of the western world, including France, Germany, Italy, Greece, Belgium, the Netherlands, Austria, Romania, Israel, Hungary, Brazil, Chile, Argentina and South Africa, as well as heralded productions in Australia, Japan and China. In 1978, the play garnered four Tony nominations and won the Pulitzer Prize for Drama. Plays Mr. Coburn wrote after The Gin Game include Bluewater Cottage (1979), Guy (1983), Noble Adjustment (1985), Fear of Darkness (1995), Firebrand (1997), The Cause (1998) and Return to Bluefin (2009). Additionally, he wrote television pilots for CBS and ABC and several screenplays, including Flights of Angels (1987), A Virgin Year (1991) and Legal Access (1994). Mr. Coburn lived with his wife, Marsha, in Dallas, Texas. He had two children, Donn and Kimberly, and three grandchildren: Neil, Alexander and Ryan.

Our Ongoing Programs

INTERPLAY at YPAL
Young Performing Artist Lab
Where kids discover and explore their natural creativity!

Now in its 30th year, INTERPLAY brings young people together with trained theatre educators for a full-day, five-week day camp. For the past three years, INTERPLAY has been sponsored by the Los Angeles Department of Cultural Affairs Performing Arts Division at the Lankershim Arts Center.


interactla.org/programs/interplay

 

ITC PLAY LAB
Established playwrights and screenwriters present new works for public readings performed by the ITC Ensemble and guest artists. Lab Director Anita Khanzadian moderates audience discussion following the readings. Free and open to the public at the Lankershim Arts Center, no RSVP required.
View the Play Lab schedule at:
interactla.org/programs/playlab


ITC welcomes the submission of new plays written by established writers for consideration. Please submit a .PDF of the work along with playwright's bio and a detailed description of the play (including a breakdown of the characters) to:
submission@interactla.org


ITC MASTER CLASSES

Join Interact Theatre Company for inspiring acting and improv classes designed for professional actors. Deepen your craft, sharpen your instincts, and elevate your performance skills in a supportive and engaging environment. 

For more information, please visit:
interactla.org/itc-master-classes

 

ITC Free Play Readings
At Lankershim Arts Center



Interact began in late 1989 as a weekly play reading group created by Barry Heins consisting of 40 actors from New York City, leading regional theaters, and professional actor training conservatories, who wanted to keep their craft well-honed while seeking work in Los Angeles. 

Select Wednesday evenings at 7:30 PM.
Free and open to the public.
5108 Lankershim Blvd, North Hollywood, CA 91601

Titles of plays are announced in our email blasts.
To subscribe and receive an invitation to our play readings,
please email info@interactla.org and provide us
with your full name and email address.

ITC Staged Readings for UCLA School of Law

For 26 years, ITC has presented one staged reading each semester for UCLA School of Law. 
Sponsored by UCLA Law School, Interact Theatre Company's UCLA Law School Staged Readings Series was created in 1999 by our first Board President, UCLA Law Professor Daniel Lowenstein. The series consists of one staged play reading each semester pertaining to themes related to justice, government, and public responsibility. Audiences consist of students, faculty, staff, and alumni of the Law School and other UCLA departments. The purpose of the readings is to stimulate discussion of the ethical and societal issues raised in these excellent plays, to help stimulate interdisciplinary consideration of law and the humanities, and to entertain.
 

About ITC

"Invigorating...The ensemble is first-rate...."
“Exhilarating...”
"A delectibly versatile ensemble..."
- Charles McNulty, Los Angeles Times ("Life Sucks.")

"Together they form, in my view, the very best acting ensemble to be seen currently in Los Angeles."
- Cynthia Citron, Santa Monica Press

"A company of hard-hitting professionals, with a rare combination of heart and expertise."
-NoHo News

"Since its inception, INTERACT THEATRE COMPANY has become known as one of the most exciting theatrical hamlets in the urban forest." 
- F. Kathleen Foley, Los Angeles Times

HISTORY

In January of 1989, actor and director Barry Heins invited fifteen friends – all experienced stage actors homesick for the New York theatrical community – to a weekly play reading group held in a vacant apartment in Sherman Oaks. Before long, a pool of forty actors was involved in readings that consisted of everything from classic plays to new plays and screenplays. The quality of the work attracted other theatre professionals eager to collaborate. Directors came to hear plays, as well as playwrights and screenwriters who arranged to hear these talented actors breathe life into their new scripts. Ten months later, the group became the exclusive tenants of Theatre Exchange in North Hollywood, and Interact was born. On May 1, 1992, the company formally incorporated as a 501(c)(3) nonprofit theater.

Interact’s loyal and supportive audience has followed the company to various stages and venues in the San Fernando Valley, the Westside, and Downtown LA, enjoying more than forty full-scale productions of plays and musicals since its founding. Interact also presents high-quality free or low-cost community programming, such as its lauded summer arts education program for underserved youth, hundreds of workshops, fundraisers and special events, and, to date, over a thousand public play readings.

AWARDS

ITC has received 95 performance and production awards (175 nominations), including Los Angeles Drama Critics Circle, Ovation, Stage Raw, Garland, LA Weekly, Telly, and NAACP Awards.

Coming Attractions

Broadway News

	Photos: THE CHI Cast Visits CATS: THE JELLICLE BALL
	Joshua Bassett Says Live Theater 'Isn't His Thing' After LITTLE SHOP
	Sean Grandillo, Brian Flores, and Dean Maupin Share Backstage Scoop From THE LOST BOYS
	Video: Derek Klena Performs 'A Thousand Miles' with the Savannah Bananas
	Melissa Errico Unveils New Summer 2026 Performance Dates
	GIANT Starring John Lithgow Will Come to Cinemas This Fall
	Johanna Day to Star in HIGH RISK WARD 29-Hour Staged Reading
	FALLEN ANGELS Will Stream Upcoming Performance Live
	Meg Stalter Will Make Broadway Debut in OH, MARY! as 'Mary Todd Lincoln'
	Andrew Lloyd Webber's STARLIGHT EXPRESS Will Embark on World Tour