San Francisco--Performing to sold-out houses three years running, GreenHouse returns to the Mission's Teatro de la Esperanza for workshop productions of three original full-length works and an evening of short plays penned by SFSU graduate playwrights, March 8 through April 12. Presented by SFSU’s Theatre Arts Department, the 4th Annual GreenHouse is a collaboration between students and professional actors and directors hailing from the Bay Area's theatre community. Featured playwrights are Karen Macklin, Popping the Cherry (directed by Christine Young, March 8-10); David Perry, County Lines (directed by Virginia Reed, March 15-17), and Mary Sullivan Roark, Heartmeat (April 19 and 20). Search and Rescue: An Evening of Original Short Plays runs April 26 though April 28. "GreenHouse is what its name implies: a place where emerging talent is nurtured and allowed to flourish," says Kent Nicholson, Director of New Works, TheatreWorks. "As an audience member, what a joy to discover talent in its earliest stages and watch it develop in front of your eyes."

In Popping the Cherry, founding GreenHouse member Karen Macklin reunites two sisters in Manhattan, where they find themselves struggling to connect with each other and to make peace with their dark and abusive past. Popping the Cherry receives three performances: Friday and Saturday, March 8 and March 9 at 8:30 pm and Sunday, March 10 at 2:30 pm. This supercharged production is directed by Christine Young, founding member of Forced Perspective Performance Ensemble and the PLAY Collective.

County Lines follows a shadowy driver who, bound by his own peculiar rituals and rules, heads north to strike a deal with the fates. Along the way, he picks up a not-so-unwilling passenger. The show runs Friday and Saturday, March 15 and March 16 at 8:30 pm through Sunday, March 17, at 8:00 pm. County Lines was written by David Perry and is directed by Virginia Reed, who will also direct the U.S. premiere of Anna Furse’s play, AUGUSTINE (Big Hysteria), at the Exit Theatre in July.

What do meat loaf, a butcher/artist, a psycho-psychologist and a lonely father have in common? Playwright Mary-Sullivan Roark serves up Heartmeat: a hilarious black comedy about a neurotic, self-starving romance novelist who solves the puzzle of her mother's mysterious death. Heartmeat receives two performances: Friday and Saturday, April 19 and April 20 at 8:30 pm.

In Search and Rescue: An Evening of Original Short Plays, GreenHouse playwrights present gripping drama, searing social commentary and raucous humor in original short works exploring the theme of search and rescue. Presented in El Teatro de la Esperanza's intimate black box theater, Search and Rescue debuts on Friday, April 26 at 8:30 pm. Additional performances run on Saturday, April 27 at 8:30 pm and Sunday, April 28 at 2:30 pm.

Tickets for all shows are $5 to $8 (sliding scale). Tickets sell out quickly and should be reserved one week in advance by calling the El Teatro box office at 415/255-2320. El Teatro de la Esperanza is located in San Francisco at 2940 16th Street (at Mission) on the 2nd Floor.

With graduates such as Tony Award-winning Director Daniel Sullivan [Proof] and Academy Award-nominee Annette Bening [American Beauty], the Department of Theatre Arts offers a comprehensive program of both practical and theoretical courses for undergraduate and graduate students whose interests center in various aspects of educational and professional theatre. The curricula provide students with background for advanced study in the dramatic arts, for teaching or for a career in professional theatre. As a center for the training of future theatre artists, the department is committed to introducing a plethora of theatrical traditions and cultures to students. To this end, the department employs its four theatre spaces as learning laboratories in which students collaborate with faculty and guest professionals. Studio workshops and advanced stage productions in those theatres are the culmination of the educational experience.

The College of Creative Arts has the only academic program primarily devoted to the creative arts in northern California. Under the direction of Dean Keith Morrison, an internationally acclaimed faculty directs over 3,000 undergraduate and graduate students in eight departments: Art, Cinema, Broadcast and Electronic Communication Arts, Music, Dance, Theatre Arts, Design and Industry, and Inter-Arts. The College of Creative Arts is part of San Francisco State University, one of the 23 member universities comprising the California State University, the largest system of higher education in the nation. SFSU is a highly diverse, comprehensive, public and urban university. For more information about the College of Creative Arts, visit the College's Web site. For an application, please call Admissions at 415/338-1113.