Open Forum

I am looking for some play ideas to perform in a small black box theater with about 15 students (more females than males).  I have read many of the recent posts, but the tech seems so huge to try to do in my space.  Any ideas?  Thank you for your help, in advance.

------------------------------
Meridith Stempinski
Corona CA
------------------------------

Are you looking for one-acts or full-length.

Two great one-acts - Cave Dream and Shuddersome:  Tales of Poe.  I had great success with both at competition.  Also, Fortress.  And one more, And.  All are very gender flexible.  

Full-length - Twelve Angry Men comes to mind, as does Inherit the Wind.  Also, any Shakespeare play would work well, they were designed for small theatres.  If you want to go comedy--The Complete Works of William Shakespeare Abridged.  Although designed for three, can be expanded exponentially.  

Just a few off the top of my head.

------------------------------
Jennifer Miguel
Franklin VA

Original Message:
Sent: 05-25-2016 02:02
From: Meridith Stempinski
Subject: Black box theatre

I am looking for some play ideas to perform in a small black box theater with about 15 students (more females than males).  I have read many of the recent posts, but the tech seems so huge to try to do in my space.  Any ideas?  Thank you for your help, in advance.

------------------------------
Meridith Stempinski
Corona CA
------------------------------

Snow Angel by David Lindsay-Abaire is one of my favorites and would be perfect in that space

https://www.playscripts.com/play/245

8f, 8m (but several would work as gender neutral if you get permission)

flexible abstract set

------------------------------
Barb Lachman
Drama Director (former)
Shoreline WA

Original Message:
Sent: 05-25-2016 02:02
From: Meridith Stempinski
Subject: Black box theatre

I am looking for some play ideas to perform in a small black box theater with about 15 students (more females than males).  I have read many of the recent posts, but the tech seems so huge to try to do in my space.  Any ideas?  Thank you for your help, in advance.

------------------------------
Meridith Stempinski
Corona CA
------------------------------

Original Message------

I am looking for some play ideas to perform in a small black box theater with about 15 students (more females than males).  I have read many of the recent posts, but the tech seems so huge to try to do in my space.  Any ideas?  Thank you for your help, in advance.

------------------------------
Meridith Stempinski
Corona CA
------------------------------

We did The Diary of Anne Frank (Kesselman version) in our black box and it was very memorable.  The black box makes it feel intimate, even claustrophobic--which is what we were going for in that production.  The Kesselman version is not as romanticized as the Goodrich script.  Technically, it was easy to stage with varying levels.  Actors were onstage the entire time except for intermission--but did well with the various costume changes.  

------------------------------
Robin Christopher
Geneva OH

Original Message:
Sent: 05-25-2016 02:02
From: Meridith Stempinski
Subject: Black box theatre

I am looking for some play ideas to perform in a small black box theater with about 15 students (more females than males).  I have read many of the recent posts, but the tech seems so huge to try to do in my space.  Any ideas?  Thank you for your help, in advance.

------------------------------
Meridith Stempinski
Corona CA
------------------------------

Our Town, I Never Saw Another Butterfly, Seusification of Romeo and Juliet, Emma, Play On, Book of Days, All I Really Need To Know I Learned in Kindergarten, Midsummer, MacBeth.  

These all worked well for us on a 17X20/30' (oddly shaped) black box stage with minimal set.  

------------------------------
Amy Learn
Ballwin MO

Original Message:
Sent: 05-25-2016 02:02
From: Meridith Stempinski
Subject: Black box theatre

I am looking for some play ideas to perform in a small black box theater with about 15 students (more females than males).  I have read many of the recent posts, but the tech seems so huge to try to do in my space.  Any ideas?  Thank you for your help, in advance.

------------------------------
Meridith Stempinski
Corona CA
------------------------------

Look at Mutually Assured Destruction by Don Zolidis.  We produced that this year in our Black Box with great success.  Simple tech.  Simple set...fun, but simple.  A variety of characters! 

------------------------------
Carolyn Cork Greer
Owensboro KY

Original Message:
Sent: 05-25-2016 02:02
From: Meridith Stempinski
Subject: Black box theatre

I am looking for some play ideas to perform in a small black box theater with about 15 students (more females than males).  I have read many of the recent posts, but the tech seems so huge to try to do in my space.  Any ideas?  Thank you for your help, in advance.

------------------------------
Meridith Stempinski
Corona CA
------------------------------

Check out Radium Girls

http://www.dramaticpublishing.com/p1235/Radium-Girls/product_info.html

http://www.dwgregory.com/plays/dramas/radium-girls.php

------------------------------
[William] [Myatt] [Drama Director]

[Pleasant Valley High School]

[myattw@pleasval.k12.ia.us][563-332-5151][Bettendorf][IA][USA]

Original Message:
Sent: 05-27-2016 10:03
From: Carolyn Greer
Subject: Black box theatre

Look at Mutually Assured Destruction by Don Zolidis.  We produced that this year in our Black Box with great success.  Simple tech.  Simple set...fun, but simple.  A variety of characters! 

------------------------------
Carolyn Cork Greer
Owensboro KY

In my experience, there is very little you can not do in a black box, (notable exception: musical spectaculars...but then again, Little Shop, Putnam Spelling Bee, Avenue Q, Into the Woods, and others with unit sets work fine. And no mics needed). We have put on numerous Shakespeare plays, comedies such as Noises Off (the set broke apart and re-arranged, instead of rotate during intermission), and many other shows.

The space is not the limitation. Imagination is. Any play written for a proscenium is adaptable to a black box, you just have to be careful blocking the thing.

My two cents.

------------------------------
JIm Gunn
Director of Theatre Arts
Madera High School
Madera CA

Original Message:
Sent: 05-25-2016 02:02
From: Meridith Stempinski
Subject: Black box theatre

I am looking for some play ideas to perform in a small black box theater with about 15 students (more females than males).  I have read many of the recent posts, but the tech seems so huge to try to do in my space.  Any ideas?  Thank you for your help, in advance.

------------------------------
Meridith Stempinski
Corona CA
------------------------------

Jim's comment on imagination being the limiting factor is right on the nose.

I love to design ginormous sets, even in black boxes, with projections and all the latest techno-gizmos that Broadway and opera audiences seem to expect nowadays. However, as an audience member, I'd much rather see a show focus on the story and the characters than have a bunch of stuff sitting there competing with them. Something as simple as black curtains all the way around, and the correct lighting, can do wonders to focus the audience on the story. It's almost like the movie and TV technique of closing in on the actors, or even on one face at a time, when they say something important.

It can be theatre at its best.  :-)

------------------------------
George F. Ledo
Set designer
www.setdesignandtech.wordpress.com
www.georgefledo.net

Original Message:
Sent: 05-25-2016 02:02
From: Meridith Stempinski
Subject: Black box theatre

I am looking for some play ideas to perform in a small black box theater with about 15 students (more females than males).  I have read many of the recent posts, but the tech seems so huge to try to do in my space.  Any ideas?  Thank you for your help, in advance.

------------------------------
Meridith Stempinski
Corona CA
------------------------------

Our high school theatre is essentially a black box. Non-musicals that we've done: Arsenic and Old Lace, You Can't Take It With You, Diary of Anne Frank, A Midsummer Night's Dream, and Kelly Feustel's Peter (the best non-musical Peter Pan origin story). Musicals that we've done: Fiddler on the Roof, Little Shop of Horrors, Scrooge the Musical, one of the first to do Andrew Lloyd Webber's Phantom of the Opera, My Fair Lady, Singin' In The Rain (with rain), Shrek, The Addams Family, and Mary Poppins.

Full scale Broadway type musicals (with big choreography) can be done in black box. Don't be put off by nay-sayers. 

A small cast, mainly female? Normal for most of us. The non-musicals I cited above worked very well for those parameters.

Break a leg!

------------------------------
Thomas Cole
Bay City MI

Original Message:
Sent: 05-25-2016 02:02
From: Meridith Stempinski
Subject: Black box theatre

I am looking for some play ideas to perform in a small black box theater with about 15 students (more females than males).  I have read many of the recent posts, but the tech seems so huge to try to do in my space.  Any ideas?  Thank you for your help, in advance.

------------------------------
Meridith Stempinski
Corona CA
------------------------------

I agree with almost all of the posts. There are some great play suggestions, but really you can do anything in a Black Box Theatre. We use ours for almost all of our plays. This year, we did A Year with Frog and Toad, Antigone, Comedy of Errors, The Haunting of Hannibal House, Twelve Angry Jurors, and Arsenic and Old Lace in our Black Box. Some were traditional sets, others were bare stage, and some were built to travel and required almost no set up.

We have done plays in the round, thrust, or basically proscenium style set up in the space. There really are no limits. 

Some of my favorite shows for our Black Box Theatre were A Midsummer Night's Dream, Almost Maine, S.P.A.R., Twelfth Night, Our Town, The Foreigner, and The Fantasticks. We also have done a lot of student written work in this space. It just gives you total freedom to do whatever you want.

You should check out Stephen Gregg's new play, Crush. It is in Dramatics Magazine this month. We performed it in a proscenium theatre, but I think it would play really well in a Black Box Theatre. It has a cast of 17 actors plus an ensemble of 5 that could be expanded or played by some of the 17 named roles. It has 12 female and 5 male roles. The show can easily be done with almost no set. 

------------------------------
David Tate Hastings
Kansas Thespians
Co-Chapter Director
dhastingsos@olatheschools.org
913-481-1868

Original Message:
Sent: 05-25-2016 02:02
From: Meridith Stempinski
Subject: Black box theatre

I am looking for some play ideas to perform in a small black box theater with about 15 students (more females than males).  I have read many of the recent posts, but the tech seems so huge to try to do in my space.  Any ideas?  Thank you for your help, in advance.

------------------------------
Meridith Stempinski
Corona CA
------------------------------