"Sitcom" is often used as a bad word when critics review new stage comedies. Yet two Chicago theater troupes, The New Colony and The Inconvenience, are proudly collaborating on a brand new four-episode live stage sitcom series called B-Side Studio at the University of Chicago's Logan Center for the Arts.
According to The New Colony co-artistic director Evan Linder, the idea of making B-Side Studio into a sitcom came about when members from his company and The Inconvenience hung out together for some late-night Netflix binges of acclaimed 1970s sitcoms.
"We started talking about the format of them and just how easy the looked to do, and actually how hard they are to do," said Linder, who is collaborating with out playwright Ike Holter (Hit the Wall) on writing the B-Side Studio scripts. "Look how right they got it on those early shows and how quickly people perfected that style of writing. It also seemed like something great for a collaboration in terms that it would right up the alley of our ensembles to get into a room and to nestle into some characters in an episodic story structure."
B-Side Studio takes its biggest influences from sitcoms like Good Times and WKRP in Cincinnati, and is set in the 1970s at a Chicago South Side recording studio that is on the brink of bankruptcy. The studio workers are always coming up with schemes to keep the business afloat, in particular the idea of recording "Song Poems" submitted and paid for by the general public.
The sitcom idea also played well with The New Colony's video artist Nicholas J. Carroll, who filmed and directed a video version and documentary on Linder and Andrew Hobgood's hit play 5 Lesbians Eating a Quiche. Both companies liked the idea of uploading filmed and edited versions of the stage episodes online.
"We do want this to live beyond and presumably it will be available in perpetuity online," said director Gus Menary of The Inconvenience, who is co-directing the B-Side Studio episodes with The New Colony's Carroll and Hobgood. "What I'm looking forward is to having that sort of sitcom love song to exist forever toward something that I didn't realize, meant a lot to me and a big part of who I am in my upbringing in what it means to entertain people."
The Inconvenience and The New Colony's B-Side Studio plays Sept. 13 through Oct. 12 at the University of Chicago's Logan Center for the Arts, 915 E. 60th St. Performances are at 8 p.m. Fridays and Saturdays (no shows Sept. 20-21). Tickets are offered on a four-episode subscription pass of $40 ($20 students), or for single episodes at $20 ($10 students); call 773-702-2787 or visit www.theinconvenience.org or www.thenewcolony.org .
Women at work
Pride Films and Plays is presenting a weekend's worth of enhanced staged readings of six of the 12 finalists in its Women's Work Contest for Plays and Screenplays with Lesbian Themes or Characters Written by Women. The readings all take place at the Center on Halsted's Hoover-Leppen Theatre, 3656 N. Halsted St.
The six selected works are:
Let All Mortal Flesh by Pat Montley, which is about a troubled schoolgirl in 1955 whose views are challenged when she discovers that an adored teacher is a lesbian. Presented at 7 p.m. Friday, Sept. 13.
Sweetwater by Christina Hulen, which is a World War II romantic adventure about a farm girl who falls for a fellow recruit in the elite Women Air Force Service Pilots (WASPs). Presented at 2:30 p.m. Saturday, Sept. 14.
180 Degree Rule by M.E.H. Lewis and Barbara Lhota, which is a drama about a film professor in 1960 who seeks out the missing masterpiece of an obscure lesbian director killed before World War II. Presented at 7 p.m. Saturday, Sept. 14.
The Green Door by Gail Hackston, which is a 1960s-era British drama about a soon-to-be married woman who meets an unconventional woman who belongs to the Gateways Club in London. Presented at 1 p.m. Sunday, Sept. 15.
Semi-Circle by Eileen Tull, which is a stylized short focusing on two women confronting a tragic love from the past, present and future. Presented at 3:30 p.m. Sunday, Sept. 15.
Moon Dancers by Mary Steelsmith, which is a short work set at a church camp where two teenage girls meet in secret and try to reconcile the age-old question: "What would Jesus do?" Presented at 3:30 p.m. Sunday, Sept. 15.
Tickets to each performance are $10 and can be purchased through Brown Paper Tickets. Pride Films and Plays has also launched a Indiegogo campaign to expand and fund a full season of its Women's Work program. Call 773-250-3112 or visit www.pridefilmsandplays.com for more information.
And the Equity nominees are…
The Jeff Award nominees honoring excellence in professional theater produced in the immediate Chicago area were announced last week. The 166 nominations in 36 categories are for Equity productions that opened between Aug. 1, 2012, and July 31, 2013.
Coming out on top was Chicago Shakespeare Theater with 19 nominations, including eight for director Gary Griffin's acclaimed revival of Stephen Sondheim and James Lapine's Pulitzer Prize-winning musical Sunday in the Park with George. Next in nominations was the Marriott Theatre in Lincolnshire with 13 nominations, including six for its production of South Pacific. Porchlight Music Theater also had six nominations for its recent production of Rodgers and Hart's Pal Joey, which are part of the theater's overall 12 nominations.
The 45th Annual Jeff Awards ceremony, complete with musical numbers and video segments from the nominated productions, will be at 7:30 p.m. Monday, Nov. 4, at Drury Lane Theatre, 100 Drury Lane, Oakbrook Terrace. Tickets are $75. For a complete list of Equity Jeff Award nominees and to purchase tickets to the awards ceremony, visit www.jeffawards.org .
