Times Beach

An Irons in the Fire Project

By Liza Birkenmeier
Directed by Tara Ahmadinejad

Tuesday, September 29, 2026 @ 5:00pm
Actors Temple Theatre
339 W. 47th St. New York, NY 10036

Attendance is free but seating is extremely limited and by reservation only.

Performed By

Brooke Bloom
Craig Wesley Divino
Tim Liu
Erin Markey
Daniel Pearce
Nicole Rodenberg
Sophie Rossman
Jo Yang

Stage Manager: Kate Wellhofer & Jenny Kennedy
Music by Erin Markey

Synopsis

A real Missouri resort town flooded over the winter holidays in 1982. During the chaos, groundwater tests revealed that biproducts of Agent Orange had been misused or nefariously repurposed and had been used to treat the dirt roads, poisoning the citizens for years. Fictional evacuees find refuge from this real crisis in a fictional town in a fictional house that seems to be the center of the universe in this Christmas Comedy.

Playwright

LIZA BIRKENMEIER [she/her] is the author of Grief Hotel, which premiered in Summerworks at Clubbed Thumb in 2023, and was remounted at The Public Theater in 2024, directed by Tara Ahmadinejad. (Obie Award, Drama League Nomination for Outstanding Production of a Play.) She was the 2019-2020 Tow Playwright-in-Residence at Ars Nova where her playDr. Ride’s American Beach House premiered, directed by Katie Brook. (Finalist for the Lambda Literary Award in Drama, New York Times Critics Pick.) F*ck7thGrade, a musical collaboration with Jill Sobule, premiered at the Wild Project in October 2022, and was remounted in 2023 and 2024. (Drama Desk Nomination and finalist for The Lambda Literary Award in Drama.) She is currently commissioned by The Civilians, MTC, and Concord/Sam French. She is a Macdowell, Yaddo, Millay, and Hambidge fellow, and a New Georges Affiliated Artist. Instagram: @liza_dear_liza

Director

TARA AHMADINEJAD [she/her] is a NYC-based director, and co-founding member of the live arts collective Piehole. With Piehole (Jerome Finalist 2021), she has directed and co-authored boundary-pushing live art for theaters, galleries, and digital spaces, including collaborations with the LA-based Tender Claws in augmented reality and virtual reality: Tendar (Sundance 2018) and The Under Presents (Oculus, Sundance 2019, Emmy Finalist). Recent Piehole works include Disclaimer (2021 Drama League Award nominee; NYC Women’s Fund recipient), also written by Ahmadinejad (The Public's Under the Radar 2021) and Tread on Me, Tread Softly (audio-theater collaboration with writer Celine Song). Recent new play directing: Karen, I Said by Eliza Bent (bentertainment with New Georges), Underground Fairy by Satoko Ichihara (Japan Society), The Woman’s Party by Rinne Groff (Clubbed Thumb, NY Times Critic’s Pick), and Sarah Einspanier's Lunch Bunch (Clubbed Thumb's Summerworks, NY Times Critic's Pick; upcoming with PlayCo). Ahmadinejad has taught directing, generative theater process, and cross-disciplinary theater strategies at Harvard, Carnegie Mellon, NYU, Muhlenberg, University of Houston, and University of Tehran, among others. NYTW Usual Suspect; New Georges Affiliated Artist; MFA Columbia University.

Poster Sketch by Sean Devare