This is a musical about the life of rock & roller DION DiMUCCI, featuring all his hit songs, including Runaround Sue, Abraham, Martin & John, and The Wanderer.
Portfolio Category: As a Playwright
A Room of My Own recounts the playwright’s adolescence growing up in a Greenwich Village studio apartment with his eccentric Italian-American family. Stars Ralph Macchio and Mario Cantone. Currently being developed for full stage production, tv series and feature film.
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World Premiere Production
In 2016, Abingdon Theatre presented the world premiere coming-of-age tale by playwright Charles Messina, set in Greenwich Village during the 70s. Starring Ralph Macchio and Mario Cantone.
Charles Messina’s semi-autobiographical comedy, ‘A Room of My Own,’ revolves around a writer who grows up in a wacky Italian-American family. Set in a small tenement apartment in late 1970s Greenwich Village, the play follows in the grand tradition of playwrights like Neil Simon, who used their own early family lives as inspiration to create indelible and uniquely American Broadway hits.
Production Photos (starring Ralph Macchio)
Other Projects
The life and death of rock legend Freddie Mercury.
It presents Mercury in the moments just after his death, during which he is confronted with self-examination as he “seeks redemption before a God unimpressed by his celebrity.”
Played two runs in NYC (at The Sanford Mesiner Theater in 1997-1998, then again at the Triad Theater in 2004-2005), then at The Art House in Provincetown in 2006, and is currently playing in Lima, Peru.
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Other Projects
Collection of 3 One Act plays, each one is centered on people living in Greenwich Village, the place where author Messina was born and raised.
In THE NEIGHBORHOOD, Messina tells the true story of the events behind the Washington Square Park Riot of 1976.
DEWEY, PHUKUM & HOWE tells the tale of three workers stuck in a dead end, debt collecting job and their wanderlust for another life.
THE WRECK is the story of a neurotic man trying to cope with his hypochondria and the recent break up with his girlfriend.
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Other Projects
Collected here for the first time are three major short plays: “Fugazy,” “Klepto,” and “Merging.”
Both “Klepto” and “Merging” are winners in The Players’ Theater’s Shortened Attention Span Theater Festival in Greenwich Village.
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Other Projects
Klepto tells the tale of a boy with an encyclopedic mind for baseball and his complex relationship with his overbearing, kleptomaniacal mother. Starring Gina Ferranti, John Barbieri and Lou Martini Jr.
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Other Projects
An estranged couple is reunited after their child’s disappearance, but their reunion resurrects old resentments about Frank’s past love affair and Cheryl’s resulting emotional breakdown as the two “revisit their relationship and try to unravel the painful mystery of their missing child.” Starring JASON CERBONE, GINA FERRANTI, ERNEST MINGIONE
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Other Projects
After Matty Petroselli’s estranged father dies, he and his wife, Lisa, rummage through the old man’s apartment and find a Rolex watch that may or may not be real.
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Other Projects
Comedy written by Messina and Vincent Gogliormella (based on a story by Gogliormella). A Christmas Carol meets The Sopranos, starring Michael Rispoli, Mario Cantone and Robert Cuccioli.