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Quantum Theatre continues its record-breaking season with radio island

 

treasure treasure as The Operator In Radio Island



Quantum Theatre will continue its 2026-27 season with radio island, written by Liza Birkenmeier and directed by Quantum’s incoming Artistic Director, Katie Brook.


October 23 - November 15, 2026 | Tuesday - Sunday at 8pm 

Sunday matinee October 25 at 2pm

Approximately 120 minutes 

Staged in Rockwell Park


What happens when your job is to negotiate with people holding lives in the balance – but the most complicated negotiations are happening within your own home? Quantum Theatre’s radio island introduces us to Ellen, an international hostage negotiator who returns to her remote childhood home expecting to balance caregiving responsibilities with her crumbling love life. But, in this gothic thriller, the story is anything but predictable.


Tensions rise and paranoia builds as Ellen becomes suspicious of a lurking figure she cannot name. Juxtaposing moments of familial humor against horrifying revelations, radio island invites a reckoning with home and where our sense of where safety can be found.


First workshopped in 2018 at Vassar College & New York Stage and Film’s Powerhouse Theatre, radio island was written by accomplished playwright Liza Birkenmeier. A longtime collaborator of Katie Brook’s and a graduate of Carnegie Mellon University with an MFA in Dramatic Writing, Birkenmeier is also the author of Dr. Ride’s American Beach House (Ars Nova) and Grief Hotel (Clubbed Thumb). She wrote the book for Jill Sobule’s musical F*ck7thGrade (City Theatre Company, Wild Project). Her piece Honestly Sincere premiered online with TiQ, and Please Welcome Our Guest was part of the MTC Snapshot Series.


This is far from Brook’s first time collaborating with Liza Birkemeier. Brook was one of many directors to help develop radio island in 2017/18, shortly before the pandemic shuttered so many productions. The dynamic duo also devised ISLANDER, premiered at HERE, and are currently developing The Conspiracy Project at LCT3. Together, they look forward to finally bringing radio island to the stage.


“I wrote the play in isolation with the feeling of starved space,” Birkemeier said. “I’m excited to see it come to life in a way that is actually scary and encourages the audience to feel that threat of violence.


A cast of six is led by Director Katie Brook, who is returning to Quantum for the first time since directing The Cherry Orchard in 2022. A producer and educator as well, Brook focuses on new plays and devised work. She has been presented at venues in New York City and beyond, including The Public Theater’s Under the Radar Festival, The Provincetown Tennessee Williams Theater Festival, Prelude NYC, Boston Playwrights Theatre, and Boom Arts in Portland. Brook will step in as Quantum’s Artistic Director on January 1, 2027.


“radio island is asking us where reality stands and how perspective—literally and figuratively—causes it to shift. It feels slippery and destabilizing at times as our characters try to understand each other and themselves,” said Brook. “I so trust in this cast to bring the production to life.”


Siovhan Christensen (familiar to Pittsburgh audiences from Chickens in the Yard and The River) leads radio island as Ellen with Anne J. McEvoy as her mother Paula and Melinda Nanovsky as her girlfriend Rory. Quantum welcomes treasure treasure back to the stage as Operator – guiding us through this haunting mystery and highlighting all of the details along the way. 


The design team includes Chelsea Warren (scenic), C. Todd Brown (lighting), Stewart Blackwood (sound), and Damian Dominguez (costumes).


Special evenings throughout the production include: 

Opening Night: October 23

Behind The Curtain: October 24

Sunday Q&A: October 25

AcQuired Insight: October 28


Purchase tickets online: QuantumTheatre.com/radio-island. 

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