Indy Theatre Habit

Yay! Today Gabe Gloden, Managing Director for  The Bloomington Playwrights Project, emailed me (amarylliswriter at gmail dot com) a press release with info about their upcoming season.  I love it when theatres do this!  So far, BPP is the only theatre in Indiana to do so this year.  Thanks very much, Gabe and BPP!  You can be sure I will be road-tripping south for as many of your shows as I can from now on.

Even if I weren’t trying to reward behavior that makes me feel taken seriously as a theatre reviews blogger, I would be planning trips to Bloomington based on the shows themselves.  Doesn’t this line-up look interesting:

(between the asterisks below is the press release Gabe sent me)

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Announcing the BPP’s 2009/2010 Season

Celebrating 30 Years

The Bloomington Playwrights Project is proud to announce its 2009/2010 Season featuring five great new Mainstage shows, three Dark Alley productions and a bevy of special events celebrating the theatre’s 30 year commitment to high impact theatre. 

The BPP will kick off its Pearl season this September with a special production of Lanford Wilson’s cherished romantic comedy, Talley’s Folly, which captured the Pulitizer Prize in 1980, the year of the BPP’s genesis. 

The Mainstage Series opens in October with the production of the 09/10 Season’s winner of the coveted Reva Shiner Full-Length Play Competition, Naked in the Kitchen by Lynda Martens.  The play examines the marital difficulties that arise after a couple’s only son Michael leaves home for University, laying bare the emotional residue from the husband’s recent battle with a disruptive medical condition.  Naked in the Kitchen is a warm hearted and respectful exploration of contemporary family relationships that will move and touch all audiences.

In November, the BPP offers up Donald C. Drake’s Candide Does America, a modern-day update of the original Voltaire classic.  Drake’s insightful satire invites the audience on Candide’s journey throughout the United States, Iraq and Antarctica as he attempts to answer the question: Is this the best of all possible countries?

In January, the BPP produces Cadillac by Bill Jepsen, an exploration of ethics and morality that erupts in the most unlikely of places: a used car lot. Howard Austin treats every customer at Lindy Motors as if they’re special-not at all the stereotypical used car salesman. Valuing loyalty and service, he has built his career on principles, in an industry mired with sharks and hucksters. But as the hours tick away on the last selling day of the month, those principles are challenged and he must choose between his own career and a customer’s life-long dream.

In April, the BPP will celebrate the 80s — the decade of its coming of age — with a specal production called 80s Shorts.  Ten favorite playwright alums have been commissioned to pen ten-minute plays depicting an 80s event.  The BPP invites audiences to revisit the era of Pac Man, Michael Jackson, the War on Drugs, Rubik’s Cubes, New Wave music, Live Aid, Reaganomics and more. 

The BPP concludes its 30th Anniversary Season with a celebration of new Hoosier plays, the 2010 BloomingPlays Festival.  Each play began as a seedling script, undergoing extensive revision and workshopping as part of the BloomingPlays Development Series at the BPP, blossoming into fully-formed works on our Mainstage theatre.  The BloomingPlays Festival is a co-production with the Indiana Theatre Association.

Subscribers to the BPP’s 30th Season will receive an 09/10 FlexPass for 7 tickets for the price of 4 (more on this below).  FlexPasses are $72 General, $60 Students and Seniors.  FlexPasses may be purchased at the Buskirk Chumley Box Office (formerly Sunrise Box Office) on Kirkwood or online at www.buskirkchumley.org.  Or call 812.323.3020 or email tickets@buskirkchumley.org for more information.

To thank them for their support and to increase the value of their FlexPasses, the BPP is offering subscribers exclusive discounts to several popular local eateries.  Participating restaurants are offering 10% off a subscriber’s table’s meal once during each Mainstage play’s production run.  Season subscribers can once again choose to use their FlexPasses this season to attend designated Special Event Fundraisers including The Blizzard, The PlayOffs and or David Baker’s special performance of Dodging Bullets. In addition, as a season subscriber, your FlexPass entitles you to a Festival Pass to the BloomingPlays Festival in May featuring 3 unique productions of new theatre (thus, you have an opportunity to see 7 Mainstage productions for the cost of only 4 regular tickets).

For a full schedule, visit www.newplays.org. 

The 2009/2010 Season is sponsored by World Arts Printing, the Indiana Arts Commission, Oliver Winery and WFHB.

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Congratulations, Bloomington Playwrights Project, on celebrating 30 years of “high impact theatre.”  Here’s wishing you 30 more!

Hope Baugh – www.IndyTheatreHabit

Email: amarylliswriter at gmail dot com

Twitter: IndyTheatre