The Ruckus Adds Two World Premieres and Five Company Members

The Ruckus Theater hops into the teenage decade of the second millennium by announcing two additions to its 2009/2010 season: the world premiere of The Gay American by Kristian O'Hare, directed by Artistic Director Allison Shoemaker (May 2010), and a workshop of the world-premiere musical Escape from the Vienna Boys Choir, book Aaron Dean, music and lyrics by Jason Rico (June 2010); both are produced at The Side Project Theatre (1439 W Jarvis). These additions replace the previously announced Linear A by Ryan Dolley and the postponed 11-Detroit, developed by the company.

"As a theater company devoted to the development of new work and of theater artists, I'm very excited to announce the addition of these two world premieres to The Ruckus' season," said Artistic Director Allison Shoemaker. "Kristian, Aaron and Jason are very gifted artists who have each created some challenging, provocative pieces of theater."

THE GAY AMERICAN by Kristian O'Hare | Directed by Allison Shoemaker
May 2010

Farce meets docudrama in The Gay American, an unblinking and provocative investigation of the sexual politics of sex and politics. We follow the rise and fall of former New Jersey governor James McGreevey through the impact it has on those around him-an Everyman-like Congressional Page, his miserable daughter Morag, silently simmering wife Dina, and ambitious aide Golan-and watch his carefully-crafted rising star go supernova in the crucible that is the American political theater.

Playwright Kristian O'Hare's work has been produced or developed by such theaters as Abydos: The Directors Theatre (San Francisco), Whole Art Theatre (Kalamazoo), The Actors and Playwrights' Initiative Theatre (Kalamazoo), Zack L. York Arena Theatre (Kalamazoo), The Ruckus Theater (Chicago) and Boston Playwrights' Theatre. He has won a number of playwriting awards including top honors in Lamia Ink!'s Annual International One-Page Play Competition and a first-place Graduate Playwriting Award at the annual creative writing competition at Western Michigan University. He earned his PhD in English with an emphasis in playwriting at Western Michigan University. He received his MA in Creative Writing with an emphasis in playwriting from Boston University, where he worked with Nobel Laureate Derek Walcott and playwright Katherine Snodgrass.

Director Allison Shoemaker is the Artistic Director and a founding member of The Ruckus Theater. Directing credits for The Ruckus include Cartoon Graveyard and Play for Tell It & Speak It & Think It & Breathe It, Heist Play, Apple Frog Baseball, I Do Not Speak the Language and Three Lennon Fugue. Other directing credits include Private Eyes, Arbor Day and Am I Blue (York Arena Theatre). Allison also served as Producer for 365 Days/Plays at the Eugene O'Neill Theater Center. When not fighting for truth, justice and the right of the playwright to revise in the rehearsal room, Allison writes things that sometimes get published. Recent credits include admit2, The Pedestal and Chicago's own Contrary Magazine. She is overly fond of semicolons, 35mm film, science jokes, Walt Whitman and really excellent drummers.

ESCAPE FROM THE VIENNA BOYS CHOIR, book by Aaron Dean,
music and lyrics by Jason Rico
Workshop - June 2010

Escape from the Vienna Boys Choir is a coming-of-age story in the tradition of The Heart is a Lonely Hunter, The Chocolate War, and, most closely, Stand By Me. A world-premiere musical developed by The Ruckus, Escape... is created by two Chicago-based artists: playwright Aaron Dean and composer Jason Rico. Escape... sends us on a perilous journey with a group of boys on the verge of adulthood. While the boys are not unlike those you might meet on a Chicago street corner today, the world in which they exist is more akin to that of The Brothers Grimm. To our intrepid young escapees, the Tatzelwürm is nearly as terrifying as their heartless choirmaster, the Witch as mysterious as the first pangs of love and lust, and the sweet smell of freedom as lovely as a beautiful young face. Escape... combines the fantastical with the all-too familiar, and the result is a painfully honest, surprising, affecting and seriously funny portrayal of the pain and beauty of adolescence and the beginnings of sexual awakening. If that weren't enough, there's a sadistic groundskeeper, a hallucinogenic mountain-dwelling invertebrate, shape-shifters, kidnappers, and more testicular humor than you can shake a stick at.

Playwright Aaron Dean is a graduate of Michigan State University where he studied theater, and dabbled in Sociology and HIstory. He has worked as a screenwriter, actor, nanny, janitor, musician, salesman, groundskeeper, canvasser for green peace, baker, dishwasher, little league concession guy, tutor, cook, playwright, has unloaded many, many semi trucks and co-hosted shows displaying patio furniture. He enjoys reading, swimming, hiking, board games, most sports that involve balls, and is very interested in dinosaurs.

Born in 1978, Jason Rico is an American composer of instrumental, vocal and theater music. He has created a body of work in multiple genres including symphonic, wind ensemble, choral, art song, chamber music and opera. He studied composition with Michael Schelle at Butler University and with Andrey Kasparov and Adolphus Hailstork at Old Dominion University and completed the doctorate program in music at Manhattan School of Music. Rico's compositional style has been praised for it's complex and truly American style. His ability to pair the musical line with text was highlighted in his work This Land of Heroes for chorus, assorted instruments and electronics for which he was awarded the Old Dominion University Honors Grant. He also received several other awards for his Viola Concerto, Three American Elegies and the song cycle Nature Is Never Spent. As a performer, he has held seats in the horn and viola sections in many collegiate ensembles and was a joint winner of the Old Dominion University Concerto Competition performing with the university Wind Ensemble. Rico is currently Music Director for Quixotic, a sketch comedy troupe based in Chicago.

ABOUT THE NEW COMPANY MEMBERS

The Ruckus welcomes five Chicagoans to its company of theater artists: Timo Aker, Aaron Dean, Kate Holst, Byron Melton and Brian Ruby. This talented group of actors, directors, playwrights, designers and stage managers join the industrious group of Michigan ex-pats who founded the company in 2006: Artistic Director Allison Shoemaker, Associate Artistic Director Joshua Davis, Interim Managing Director Jeffrey Fauver, Casting Director Melissa Pryor, Artistic Associates Ghafir Akbar, Katie Dickinson, Joel Gelman, Seth Miller and Emeritus Company Members Ryan Dolley and Mitch Vermeersch.

"Chicago is home to a great many talented artists who challenge each other, better each other and are devoted to working together to make theater, and all art, an important part of this city," said Associate Artistic Director Joshua Davis. "We of The Ruckus have worked with a number of these extraordinary artists since our move to Chicago last year, and we are thrilled to be adding five of them to our company."

Timo Aker is excited to be in Chicago, and thrilled to be bringing The Ruckus. While originally from the delightful, bustling metropolis of Cleveland, OH, he has enjoyed living in such cities as Kalamazoo, Louisville, New York, Boise, Dublin and Istanbul. His parents forced him to play piano growing up, and he's now grateful for that. While at Kalamazoo College he brought his musical and theatrical talents as well as his obsession with Radiohead together to create a one-man show about Thom Yorke. It was a lot of work. Since college he has traveled, futzed, and taken this theatrical career thing seriously. He was an Acting Apprentice at Actors Theatre of Louisville, and has acted with The Cleveland Playhouse, Great Lakes Theater Festival, Idaho Shakespeare Festival, and in Chicago with American Theater Company, and of course, The Ruckus Theater. High points in life include a 23rd birthday in the New Zealand countryside; low points include developing High Altitude Pulmonary Edema on Mt. Kilimanjaro.

Aaron Dean (See photo and bio above)

Kate Holst currently works as the Audience Services Manager at Next Theatre Company in Evanston. Originally from Grand Rapids, MI, Kate moved to Chicago in September 2009 after completing her MFA in Theatre Management from Florida State University. As part of the three-year training program, she spent a year working as the Management Associate for ALLIANCE THEATRE in Atlanta, GA. Kate has also held positions at Lincoln Center Festival in New York City, Weston Playhouse in Vermont, and Chili's Bar and Grill in Wyoming, MI. Kate is also an avid baseball fan. Don't ask her Cubs or Sox, because she will answer Tigers.

A resident of Chicago for the last four years, Byron Melton has been fortunate to work with The Ruckus on their last two productions. In both Heist Play and Tell It & Speak It &Think It & Breathe It, Byron played Tommy, who is eerily similar to the real Byron. He has also worked with Brain Surgeon Theatre. He holds a 2005 BFA in Theatre from Southern Methodist University, and a doctorate in Rhyme from the mean spaces between the mic and the larynx. Catch him forming like Voltron with Albany Park's premier rap unit: Money Money Money (that's Mr. $$ to you). Byron got married to Bridget in 2009 and it's the best thing that ever happened to him. Byron is proud to be a member of The Ruckus Motorcycle Club.

Brian Ruby is a director who has worked with a range of companies in Chicago. His work with The Ruckus includes assistant directing the upcoming world premiere of The Gay American and directing The Gods are Crazy Blind and Last Date as part of Tell It & Speak It & Think It & Breathe It. Prior to joining The Ruckus, he directed the Chicago premiere of Phenomenon Of Decline at Gorilla Tango Theater and served as assistant director for productions of Evolution and Boston Marriage. In the past, his work has also been a part of The Mill Theatre's Et Cetera VI, MOB Productions Fan Fiction Festivals, and Suzan Lori Parks' 365 Days/365 Plays. Prior to his move to Chicago, Brian received a BA in Theatre Arts from Kalamazoo College where he directed productions of Cleansed and This Is A Chair. He also founded and served as Artistic Director of the Bay City, MI based Bay Area Recreational Drama mounting productions of No Exit and The Imaginary Invalid.

Additional information about The Ruckus can be found at ruckustheater.org, via e-mail at ruckus@ruckustheater.org or by calling 773.769.RCKS (7257).

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