Black Box Theatre Announces 2010-2011 Season

No Strings Theatre Company in association with Black Box Theatre has announced their 2010-2011 season. The season will feature A DELICATE BALANCE, LONE STAR LAUNDRY & BOURBON, COCKEYED, CRIME AND PUNISHMENT, SPITFIRE GRILL, AND BOOM.

A Delicate Balance
By Edward Albee
Directed by Ceil Herman
July 23-August 8, 2010
In this 1967 Pulitzer Prize winner, wealthy middle-aged couple, Agnes and Tobias have their complacency shattered when Harry and Edna, longtime friends appear at their doorstep. Claiming an encroaching, nameless "fear" has forced them from their own home, these neighbors bring a firestorm of doubt, recrimination and ultimately solace, upsetting the "delicate balance" of Agnes and Tobias' household.

"A brilliant play."-New York Post

"An evening of theatrical fireworks."-The New York Times

Lone Star Laundry and Bourbon
By James McClure
Directed by Dale Pawley
September 24-October 10, 2010

Lone Star and Laundry and Bourbon are a pair of comic one acts set in Maynard, Texas and conceived as a single evening of theatre. Lone Star takes place behind a run down bar. The high good humor of the play never lapses, and all ends as breezily and happily as it began. Laundry and Bourbon shifts the scene to the front porch of Roy and Elizabeth's home on a hot summer afternoon. Elizabeth and her friend Hattie are whiling away the time folding laundry, watching TV, sipping bourbon and Coke, and gossiping about the many open secrets which are so much a part of small-town life. They are joined by Cletis' self-righteous wife Amy Lee, who, among other tidbits, can't resist blurting out some gossip about Roy.

Lone Star is an uproarious comedy about two bawdily rambunctious Texas brothers peppered with the playwright's own special brand of cascading, spontaneous wit." In Laundry and Bourbon, "Mr. McLure's strongest suit is dialogue salty comic banter that derives from colorful indigenous characters." -NY Times.

Cockeyed
by William Missouri Downs
Directed by Ceil Herman
November 19 - December 5, 2010

Phil, an average nice guy, is madly in love with the beautiful Sophia. The only problem is that she's unaware of his existence. He tries to introduce himself but she looks right through him. When Phil discovers Sophia has a glass eye, he thinks that might be the problem, but soon realizes that she really can't see him. Perhaps he is caught in a philosophical hyperspace or dualistic reality or perhaps beautiful women are just unaware of nice guys. Armed only with a B.A. in philosophy, Phil sets out to prove his existence and win Sophia's heart.

The St. Louis Post-Dispatch called Cockeyed a clever romantic comedy, Talkin' Broadway called it "hilarious," while Playback Magazine said that it was "fresh and invigorating."

Crime and Punishment
Adapted by Marilyn Campbell and Curt Columbus.
From the novel by Fyodor Dostoyevsky.
Directed by Shaun Hadfield
January 21-February 6, 2011

This "conversation on the nature of evil" is set in the mind of the murderer where he relives and explores, through the urging of Porfiry and Sonia, the thoughts, ideas and feelings that drove him to his horrible crime. The play becomes a psychological landscape which creates a thrilling journey into the mind of a killer and his search for redemption. Raskolnikov speaks directly to the audience at times, putting his case to them, so that the audience becomes another character in the telling. This is an intimate psychological and spiritual journey which seeks to unveil hidden dimensions of the human condition.

"Who would have thought that the novel no high school student has ever finished reading would make such engrossing theater?"
"Raskolnikov's journey may be, in essence, a 90-minute exercise in logic, but here it's a remarkably absorbing one."-New York Times

"Stunningly lean, taut and emotionally searing... a work of theatre that never feels like a condensation of a seminal 500-page novel, but rather has the swift, sharp impact of a blow from an ax." -Hedy Weiss, Chicago Sun-Times

Spitfire Grill
Music and Book by James Valcq.
Lyrics and Book by Fred Alley.
Based on the film by Lee David Zlotoff
Directed by Nikka Ziemer
April 8- 24, 2011

A feisty parolee follows her dreams, based on a page from an old travel book, to a small town in Wisconsin and finds a place for herself working at Hannah's Spitfire Grill. It is for sale but there are no takers for the only eatery in the depressed town, so newcomer Percy suggests to Hannah that she raffle it off. Entry fees are one hundred dollars and the best essay on why you want the grill wins. Soon, mail is arriving by the wheelbarrow full and things are definitely cookin' at the Spitfire Grill.

"A soul satisfying ... work of theatrical resourcefulness. A compelling story that flows with grace and carries the rush of anticipation. The story moves, the characters have many dimensions and their transformations are plausible and moving. The musical is freeing. It is penetrated by honesty and it glows." N.Y. Times.

"Soulful . The amiable country flavored tunes and lyrics are rendered with the kind of conviction and expertise that make them transcendent. What in normal times would be a joy is, in these troubled ones, sheer nourishment." N.Y. Magazine.

"Soaring melodies! ... Well before the show reaches its conclusion, many ... city slickers in the audience may be ready to enter Percy's raffle." Wall Street Journal.

boom
By Peter Sinn Nachtrieb
Directed by Ceil Herman
May 20-June 10, 2011

"Sex to Change the Course of the World"-A grad student's online personal ad lures a mysterious journalism student to his subterranean research lab under the pretense of an evening of "no strings attached" sex. But when a major global catastrophic event strikes the planet, their date takes on evolutionary significance and the fate of humanity hangs in the balance. Will they survive? What about the fish in the tank? And who is that woman pulling levers and playing the timpani? An epic and intimate comedy that spans over billions of years, boom explores the influences of fate versus randomness in the course of one's life, and life as we know it on the planet. Contains adult language

"Mr. Nachtrieb has a gift for darkly funny dialogue and an appealing way of approaching big themes sideways. [boom] winds up speaking, quietly and piquantly, to our enduring fascination with and need for myths about the beginning of life as well as its end." -NY Times.

"From pants-around-the-ankles comedy to hipster Twilight Zone takeoff...boom is imaginative and easy to like." -The New Yorker.

"A grandly whacked-out apocalypse fantasy...one of those charmed evenings." -Washington Post.

For more information, visit www.no-strings.org.