The Wabash College Theater Department has announced the College's 2004-2005 theater season and the audition schedules.
In 2004-2005, seating for Theater productions will be by general admission, though free tickets are required for Theater productions.
Tickets for Fall Semester events will be available September 1, 2004. Tickets for Spring Semester events will be available on January 26, 2005.
Contact the Fine Arts Center Box Office by email at boxoffice@wabash.edu; phone: 765-361-6411; or by mail at Fine Arts Center Box Office, Wabash College, P.O. Box 352, Crawfordsville, IN 47933-0352. Box Office hours are Monday through Friday, 8:30 a.m. to 12 noon and 1:30 to 4 p.m. The box office will open 90 minutes before curtain time for Visiting Artists events. Tickets not claimed at the Box Office 10 minutes prior to curtain will be released to the general public.
1776, book by Peter Stone, music and lyrics by Sherman Edwards, will start off the season at Wabash. Auditions will be held August 26-27 at 7 p.m. in Ball Theater. Performances will be October 7-9 at 8 p.m. with the exception of October 9 which will begin 2 p.m. The performance will be in Ball Theater in the Fine Arts Center.
1776, a legendary and unique Broadway musical, was first performed in 1969 (becoming a lavish screen musical in 1972) and received the Tony Award as Best Musical. 1776 is set in the Continental Congress in May, June, and July 1776 as the founding fathers struggle against congressional apathy, military disaster, personal pressures, and Philadelphia's blazing heat wave to establish the USA. Musical sequences and dialogue are drawn directly from contemporary accounts, minutes of the Congressional sessions, and the correspondence of John Adams and his wife, Abigail. A charming score, bold dramatic scenes, and memorable characters make 1776 one of the classics of the musical stage.
The second production of the season will be the Studio One-Acts, written and directed by Wabash College students. Performances will be presented November 12-13 at 8 p.m. each evening.
The Studio One-Acts provide an opportunity for theater students to showcase their skills. These projects emphasize the importance of the collaborative creative process and demonstrate the Wabash College Theater Department’s belief that powerful and imaginative theater can thrive in productions of limited scale.
The third production of the season will be The “Vaudevilles” of Chekhov, a collection of short plays by Anton Chekhov. Auditions for the play are scheduled for January 12-13 at 7 p.m. each evening in Ball Theater and performances will take place February 23-26 at 8 p.m. each evening in Ball Theater.
Anton Chekhov (1860-1904) is known principally for his full-length plays— The Cherry Orchard, Uncle Vanya, and The Seagull—but early in his career he wrote several farcical one-acts he dubbed "vaudevilles." Each of these short plays deals with a subject that Chekhov would continue to explore in his later, more famous work: love, in all its manifestations. In The Proposal, a heated property dispute derails a marriage proposal with outrageously funny consequences, and in The Bear, an enraged creditor falls spontaneously in love with his debtor's widow as she vehemently refuses to pay her deceased husband's debt. These short witty plays, rife with characteristically Chekhovian insight, will share a bill with Chekhov's The Anniversary, a play of explosive relationships and comic anarchy.
The fourth and final production of the season will be Take Me Out by Richard Greenberg, which will be presented April 20-23 with performances starting at 8 p.m. each evening in Ball Theater. Auditions are set for March 14-15 at 7 p.m. each evening in Ball Theater.
Darren Lemming is the star center fielder for the champion New York Empires. An extraordinary athlete, he fills both his fans and his teammates with awe at his abilities and his presence on and off the field. When he casually reveals a long hidden secret, his team and his life are thrown into turmoil and confusion. Take Me Out was the winner of the 2003 Tony Award, New York Drama Critics’ Circle Award, and Drama Desk Award for Best Play. "An enchanting and enchanted take on baseball...Both passionately personal and lyrically analytical...Take Me Out is an unconditional, all-American epiphany that, in these days of fretful ambivalence, is something to cherish."—Ben Brantley, The New York Times.