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THE GREEN STREET ARTS CENTER PRESENTS
The Exonerated
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TRUE STORIES OF SIX WRONGFULLY CONVICTED SURVIVORS OF DEATH ROW

Middletown, Conn, May 30, 2008— Culled from interviews, case files and the public record, The Exonerated tells the true stories of six wrongfully convicted survivors of death row. Moving between first person monologues and scenes set in courtrooms and prisons, the interwoven stories paint a picture of an American criminal justice system gone horribly wrong—and of six brave souls who persevered to survive it. The Exonerated is directed by Michael Eck and written by Jessica Blank and Erik Jensen

The Exonerated is presented as part of Green Street Arts Center's In the Limelight series on Friday, June 20 at 8pm. The Green Street Arts Center will host a reception from 7pm to 8pm before the performance; light refreshments will be served. General admission for the reception and performance is $8; tickets for students, senior citizens and Green Street members are $5. Green Street is located at 51 Green Street in Middletown, CT. For more information, please visit: http://www.greenstreetartscenter.org or call (860) 685-7871.

"Artful and moving…pays tribute to the resilience of human hearts and minds."—Variety

About The Exonerated
In this 90 minute, intermission-less play, we meet Kerry, a sensitive Texan brutalized on Texas' death row for 22 years before being freed by DNA evidence; and Gary, a Midwestern organic farmer condemned for the murder of his own parents and later exonerated when two motorcycle gang members confess to the crime. We are introduced to Robert, an African-American horse groomer who spent seven years on Florida's death row for the murder of a white woman before evidence emerged that the victim was found clutching hair from a Caucasian attacker. We hear from David, a shy man with aspirations to the ministry, bullied into confessing at 18 to a robbery/murder he had nothing to do with, scarred from a youth spent in prison and struggling to regain his faith; and from Sunny, a bright-spirited hippie who spent 17 years in prison, along with her husband, for the murder of two police officers while another suspect had written a confession that was repeatedly discounted by authorities. And we meet Delbert, a poet who serves as the play's center, convicted of a rape/murder in the Deep South of the 1970s and later freed when evidence surfaced suggesting that he was not even in the state when the crime occurred.

In spring of 2002, authors Jessica Blank and Erik Jensen co-directed a critically acclaimed production of The Exonerated at the Los Angeles Actors' Gang Theater under the Artistic Direction of Tim Robbins. Under Bob Balaban's direction, The Exonerated played Off-Broadway (over 600 performances) and toured for 27 weeks across the country. The Exonerated has also been performed at the United Nations and for Washington audiences including Senator Patrick Leahy, Former Atty. General Janet Reno, Former U.S. Atty. Mary Jo White, Supreme Court Justice David Souter, and several members of the Justice Department.

For more information about The Exonerated, visit http://www.theexonerated.com

The Green Street Arts Center, which opened in January 2005, is an initiative of Wesleyan University developed in collaboration with the City of Middletown and the North End Action Team and serves as an anchor to the revitalization efforts currently underway in the North End. Programming in the former schoolhouse at 51 Green Street includes a vibrant after-school program and a wide range of affordable classes and workshops for children and adults in music, dance, visual arts, theater, sound recording, media arts and creative writing.