Mobtown Theater Hosts Benefit Performance of Chuck Spoler's BLOOD MEMORY Tonight

A benefit production of playwright Chuck Spoler's award-winning one act play Blood Memory will be performed for one night only tonight, August 24, 2013 at Mobtown Theater.

This new production reunites the two leads from the original cast (Tony Colavito and Mark Squirek) with the show's original director Rodney Bonds twelve years after the play first debuted in 2001.

One hundred percent of the proceeds from this show will benefit the Chuck Spoler Fund at Johns Hopkins. After Chuck's untimely passing the fund was set up to help The ALIVE study (AIDS Linked to the Intravenous Experience) at Johns Hopkins.

In addition, the study looks at many aspects of non-HIV illnesses such as cancer, liver and lung diseases. This study has produced a great number of publications and contributed greatly to the understanding of HIV infection.

Ticket prices are $25 and include beverages (including wine) and food after the show. They are available through Brown Paper Tickets.

In 2001Chuck Spoler's play Memorial Day won the Playwright of the Year Award from The Baltimore Playwrights Festival. In a rare double win for the festival the production, which was performed at Audrey Herman's Spotlighters Theater, also took "Best Production".

The original production (titled Memorial Day) was comprised of two one acts by Spoler, each devoted to the memories of war. They were linked by a mysterious veteran named Jerry.

In Blood Memory draft dodger Quinton is guilt stricken over the death of his best friend Ray who was killed in Vietnam. For over thirty years he has visitEd Ray's grave on Memorial Day.

It is while visiting his friend again on Memorial Day that a mysterious Vietnam vet named Jerry stops in.The connection between the two men is tenuous at best and even leads to combat. The ending will surprise everyone.

While the theme of Blood Memory is serious, it is lightened considerably by Chuck's wonderful sense of humor as well as his gift for highly engaging dialogue.

In their review of original production The Baltimore Sun said that Blood Memory "...truly shows off Spoler's plot-making skills...Spoler demonstrates that impressions can be misleading and that we often hide the truth from ourselves as well as each other. And, most impressively, he makes these points while playing the very same trick on the audience, i.e., toying with our perception of reality."

Blood Memory also won the prestigious "Arts and Letters Prize in Drama" in 2002, as judged by John Guare (Six Degrees of Separation, House of Blue Leaves and others).

Information about the Baltimore Playwrights Festival is at http://www.baltplayfest.org/.