NY LOVES MOUNTAINS FESTIVAL: May 29-31

2nd Annual 

NY Loves Mountains Festival

May 29th-31^st

landmark theatre production links NY to Big Coal controversy

 

For immediate release

Contact: Stephanie Pistello

spistello@gmail.com / 917-664-5511 

http://www.nylovesmountains.com

Brooklyn, NY-Headwater Productions, a New York-based theatre arts and community action production company, is pleased to announce the 2nd Annual NY Loves Mountains Festival, May 29-31, dedicated to raising awareness about the devastating operations of mountaintop removal coal mining in Appalachia, and natural gas drilling in the New York Catskills.

New York's connection between Appalachia and the Catskills dates back to Washington Irving's 1819 classic, Rip Van Winkle.   

The NY Loves Mountains Festival will call on New Yorkers to awaken to their connection to one of the "most egregious human rights and environmental violations in the nation--mountaintop removal." 

In the spirit of Irving's great tale, the NY Loves Mountains Festival features the first national-touring original theatre production based on a mountaintop removal family saga and Thomas Edison's first coal-fired plant in New York City, a concert with NPR acclaimed cellist Ben Sollee and special music guests, best-selling authors Silas House and Jeff Biggers, and an informational Union Square event on "What's Wrong with Fossil Fuels?"

The festival kicks off on Friday, May 29th, 7pm, at the Philip Coltoff Center in Greenwich Village, 219 Sullivan Street, with a wine reception and live music by cellist Ben Sollee.  At 8pm, there will be a special reading by the New Mummers Group of Light Comes, an original play written and directed by Steinberg-Award-winning playwright Sarah Moon, with a cast that includes actress-director Stephanie Pistello, founding artistic director of Headwaters Productions, and actors Jennifer Bowen, Carol Neiman, Byrne Davis, Jeff Biggers, among others.  Tickets are $10 in advance and $12 at the door.

Accompanied by cellist Ben Sollee, the Light Comes play is epic in scope, and a spellbinding and timely event in contemporary theatre--from the invention of eletricity in Edison's historic lab, to today's ravaged hills and hollows in eastern Kentucky, to the backroom deals on Wall Street, Light Comes untangles the web of our modern-day coal-fired electrical empire. Unpeeling the layers of truth behind why America runs on coal, and why the fathers of electricity never imagined its reckless duration, Light Comes explores the nightmare connection of mountaintop removal coal that fuels the bright lights of New York's big city. 

On Saturday, May 30th, 2 pm, at Union Square in Manhattan, an alliance of citizens groups and clean energy and environmental organizations will  celebrate New York's historic mountain range--from southern Appalachia to the Catskills.  Starting from the south end of the Square, four informational stations will guide walkers and participants through an informational journey about protecting our American mountain resources and historic communities from unchecked extraction industries, including catastrophic natural gas drilling in the Catskills, and mountaintop removal in central Appalachia.

Over 240,000 tons of coal stripmined through mountaintop removal operations are consumed by New Yorkers every year.  And every day in the lush green coalfields of the central Appalachian mountains, over 3 million pounds of ammonium nitrate and fuel-oil explosives are detonated to blow off the tops of mountains and topple the rocks and waste into valleys and streams.

 In the past three decades, an estimated 500 mountains have been destroyed by this mining technique; more than 1,200 miles of streams have been jammed with mining waste and fill, and scores of historic communities have been depopulated, left in ruin and saddled with unsparing poverty. Relying on heavy machinery and explosives, mountaintop removal operations have also stripped the region of needed jobs and any possibility of a diversified economy.

Citing the adverse effects on the rivers and upstate reservoirs that feed drinking water to nine million New Yorkers, New York City and state officials have called for a halt to natural gas drilling in the formation called the Marcellus Shale. The drilling process involves the use of hazardous chemicals and raises issues about how those fluids would be disposed of and how the environment would be protected against spills.

The festival wraps up on Sunday, May 31st, 7:30 pm, at the Bell House in Brooklyn, 149th 7th Street, with a special benefit "To Save the Land and People" concert and reading featuring cellist Ben Sollee, Kentucky author Silas House and the Public Outcry band, author Jeff Biggers and other special guests.  Tickets are $17 in advance and $20 at the door. For more information on Ben Sollee, visit: www.bensollee.com.  For information on the Bell House, visit:  http://www.thebellhouseny.com/home.php