ten red hen

I have reviews of the three Bay Area plays on the sidebar and a longer update coming soon--but first:

365 Plays / 365 Days
In 2002, Pulitzer-Prize winning playwright Suzan-Lori Parks committed to writing a play a day for the next 365 days. The world premiere of these plays will be performed as a year-long festival in major cities and communities across the country, spearheaded by Suzan-Lori Parks and Super-Producer Bonnie Metzgar, with David Myers as National Coordinator, Carol Fineman as Press Rep and Rebecca Rugg as 365University Producer (see Bonnie's comment below). Hubs include the Public Theater in New York. From November 2006 to November 2007, over 700 theaters will simultaneously create the largest theater collaboration in U.S. History.

In the Bay Area, 52 unique companies (from big guns like Berkeley Rep to smaller groups like the Shotgun Players) will each stage one week of the cycle.

I am very excited to announce that Ten Red Hen is presenting Week 4 of 365 Plays/365 Days (December 4-10, 2007). We are using this project as a week-long meditation on the idea that Theater is Every Day, performing the plays in the intimate space of people's homes.

While theater sometimes seems like a form of decreasing relevance in American life, it is also the most elemental--people need to enact stories live for each other. More than any other art form, theater frames the world of beauty in action.

That being said, theater is one art form that has the hardest time breaching the home space--I mean, it doesn't really belong there, right? Yes it does! For one week, we will go to a different home every night and perform the plays, engaging with the home, existing technologies within that home, and our audience members in different ways.

The events are free and open to the public, of course. We will have more information on where the homes are and how you can come see them soon.