Opens Saturday!

(The Best Of) 50 Plays

This looks like it will be the shows that will be representing "50 Plays" during our run at the Skybox. Your opportunity to see some of the shows you missed or see some of the ones you liked again. Click on the "50 Plays" image at the top of the right hand column for tickets and info.

50 Plays Skybox Shows

July 30
A Love That Lasts Forever – Jen Ellison
Baby Blue Sedan – Cody Spellman
Four Men – Jason Fleece
Burka Betty – Kyra Lewandowski

August 6
Suddenly Stupid – George Lyons
Peter Pain – Dina Klahn
Baby Blue Sedan – Cody Spellman
Beat Noir – Bina Martin

August 13
Breakfast with Burt and Birdie – Rebekah Walendzak
The Machine Breaks Down– Don Hall
Scratch’d– Hank Boland
Mango Mouth– Emily Darlington Cooke
Burka Betty - Kyra Lewandowski

August 20
The Saddest vacant Lot In The World – Jay Steigmann
Butterfly Jar – Sydney Chatman
Derek Is An Asshole – Jeff Bouthiette
Burka Betty - Kyra Lewandowski

August 27
Moving Box – Rob Colletti
Violent Femmes - Leitia Guillard
Belmont – Hank Hilbert
Rover from Dover – Rich Cotovsky
Burka Betty - Kyra Lewandowski

Sept 3
Moving Box – Rob Colletti
Express Yourself – Cassie Ahiers
Hogan’s Real Piesca – Megan Smith
Burka Betty - Kyra Lewandowski

Next

(Dana Black in "Burka Betty" directed by Kyra Lewandowski which will be in the Skybox shows.
Photo by Stephanie Douglass)

50 Plays went well. For an event that crammed 50 directors and their casts (of over 200) into two weekends at Strawdog's Hugen Hall, things could not have gone better. Next up will be the (The Best of) 50 Plays at Second City's Donny's Skybox July 30th- Sept 3rd. Saturdays at 7:30pm.

Many people asked me how this compared to 365 Sketches. Both had their challenges. 365 was certainly more grueling. The writing process was more grueling, at times, and when we presented the shows they were over 11 consecutive nights, including midnight shows on Friday and Saturdays. We were pretty loopy by the end of it. 50 Plays had its technical and logistical challenges simply because we bumped up from 26 directors to 50 and the number of actors increased. Scheduling techs and shows was a small nightmare. Creating theme-based evenings got thrown out the window quickly because there were too many scheduling conflicts to juggle. We (and by "we" I mean "I") screwed up scheduling the shows and it wasn't caught until we were between weekends. This resulted in an encore performance of Baby Blue Sedan on the second Thursday and the addition of Belmont to the second weekend's Friday 8pm show. It's all good, though. Both were great shows. I hope you get to catch some of the Skybox shows.

Don has a nice summation of the Strawdog weekends on his blog. Click here.