Victory Gardens Theater 2011-2012 Fresh Squeezed Series Season Begins

Victory Gardens 2011-12 Fresh Squeezed Series season begins. The events include the late-night cabaret Literally Sexy 4 hosted by poet MarTy McConnell and G boutique's Tara Sissom; beatbox harmonica virtuoso Yuri Lane with his new production, Me Tube; Kevin Coval's one-man stage adaptation of his newest book L-vis Lives; and an all-new Chicago One-Minute Play Festival. Fresh Squeezed will also continue its new partnership with Louder Than A Bomb (LTAB), the world's largest youth poetry slam. All performances, unless otherwise noted, will be held in the Zacek-McVay Theater at the Victory Gardens Biograph Theater, 2433 N. Lincoln Avenue in Lincoln Park.

Throughout the season, the Fresh Squeezed Series will be exploring the impact of Hip-Hop and Spoken Word on contemporary culture as well a presenting special performances in conjunction with Mainstage programming and the return of some favorite events.

Tickets are currently on sale for Literally Sexy 4. Single tickets to other events and ticket packages will be announced soon. Tickets are $15-$20 and are available through the Victory Gardens Box Office, 773.871.3000 (tty: 773.871.0682), email tickets@victorygardens.org, or visit www.victorygardens.org.

"This year we wanted to mine the richness of the dialogues happening all over Chicago about topics as diverse as celebrity, politics, sex, artistic creation, and the city itself. Nowhere do these conversations vibrate with greater energy than in our spoken word and hip-hop communities. We are also very excited that this year's events will amplify and speak to the rich conversations happening in the work presented on our mainstage. We hope that engaging with these conversations happening across our theater will thrill and titillate while encouraging us all to be better citizens," comments associate producer Will Rogers.

The 2011-2012 Fresh Squeezed Series includes:
Literally Sexy 4: Going Deep
Saturday, October 1, 2011at 10:30pm, $20
In Sarah Ruhl's hit play In the Next Room, or the vibrator play, it's what happens behind locked doors that ignites a sexual awakening. These hidden intimate connections will be thrust out into the open when Victory Gardens' Fresh Squeezed presents this one-night only installment of the wildly popular late-night cabaret, Literally Sexy. Spoken word artist MarTy McConnell and G Boutique maven Tara Sissom will gather a group of Chicago's sexiest artist and performers to delve deep into the history of sex and the city's current carnal culture in this unforgettably entertaining and erotic spectacular. And audiences may just walk away with a few treasures for that bedside drawer courtesy of G Boutique.

MeTube written and performed by Yuri Lane
November 12-13, 2011 at 7:30pm, $20
What is it like to be an overnight Internet sensation? Chicago beatboxer Yuri Lane knows all about it. His Beatbox Harmonica video, featuring his extraordinary talent, went viral on YouTube, garnering millions of hits and making him an instant star in cyberspace. MeTube, his new multimedia beatbox show, reflects on this exhilarating and strange experience by turning virtual reality into theatrical fantasy. Created with Sharif Ezzat and Rachel Havrelock, Yuri lane brings Fresh Squeezed his unique brand of beatbox Theater.
This program is presented in partnership with Chicago Humanities Festival

L-vis Lives
written and performed by Kevin Coval, based on his book by the same name.
March 26-31, 2012, Times TBD, $20
In Jackie Sibblies-Drury's We Are Proud..., a group of actors - both African American and white - wrestles with contemporary issues of race and relevant questions: Can White actors portray Black Africans? Who has the right to draw from what experiences? Kevin Coval's new book, L-vis Lives, tackles these questions and more by exploring the archetype of a "whiteboy who uses and misuses Black cultural production." Drawing from the careers of Elvis Presley, Vanilla Ice, Eminem and the Beastie Boys, as well as his own, Coval's poetry grapples with white explorations of a Black form often seeing greater successes than the original, and if those successes come at the expense of Black originators. Coval's stage adaptation of his new work, like Sibblies-Drury's new play, both affirms the power of art to transcend categories of identity and is wary of it, recognizing that what connects can also obliterate.

Chicago One-Minute Play Festival
April 15-16, 2012 at 7:30pm, $20, a benefit for Victory Gardens Fresh Squeezed
After a hugely successful run at Victory Gardens last season-and festivals in New York, San Francisco, and Los Angeles-the One-Minute Play Festival returns to Chicago. Created in New York just 4 years ago by Dominic D'Andrea, the festival promotes the spirit of radical inclusion for writers and audiences. The one-minute play challenges the playwrights to expertly craft a theatrical moment, and dares audiences to keep up! Nearly one hundred one-minute plays by 50 established and emerging playwrights have been commissioned for the two-night only event. A One-Minute Play is a form of theatre that looks at the ten-minute play structure and distills it down to the most immediate story-telling event or core emotional content. The evening promises to be as quick as it is epic in its scope.

Louder Than A Bomb
This season, Victory Gardens will launch The Conservatory, an in depth playwriting curriculum for LTAB poets and alumni that will culminate in a devised performance. The return of English Class Heretics: Louder Than A Bomb in Concert will take place Summer 2012 and VG will host the semi-finals of the LTAB slam.

Louder Than A Bomb Semi-Finals
March 5, 2012, Times TBD, Ticketing will be available through WBEZ.org
The largest of its kind in the world, Louder Than A Bomb (LTAB) is Chicago's rapidly-growing teen poetry festival. These semi-final bouts will boast some of the brightest talent from the festival as they slam for a coveted spot on the LTAB Finals stage.

The Conservatory
June 8-10, 2012, Times TBD, $15
Poetry and theater collide and ignite the Biograph Theater in the premiere of this original work by VG's newest playwrights. Beginning with last season's English Class Heretics (August 2011), alumni of Louder Than A Bomb have embarked on a year-long collaborative artistic journey with playwright Aaron Carter, and directors Rachel Claff and Sean Kelly to channel their poetic voices into a theatrical form. The curriculum is designed to use their background in poetry, spoken word performance, and hip-hop as a foundation for exploring prose, dialogue and dramatic structure. This devised piece will rely on both modes of expression and promises to be an unforgettable evening of new and exciting work from our youngest hometown radicals.

English Class Heretics: Class of 2012
Louder Than A Bomb In Concert:
August 2012 (Dates Pending), $15

Join the best of next year's LTAB poets, alumni, and teachers and co-founder Kevin Coval in an electrifying evening that will light up the Biograph Theater. This sophomore class of heretics takes to the stage with new poetry to share their powerful stories in an evening filled with scintillating spoken word and hip-hop.

Logistics and Amenities
Performances are at the Victory Gardens Biograph Theater, 2433 N. Lincoln Avenue, in the heart of Chicago's Lincoln Park neighborhood. Tickets are $15-$20 and are available through the Victory Gardens Box Office, 773.871.3000 (tty: 773.871.0682), email tickets@victorygardens.org, or visit www.victorygardens.org.

Parking
Discounted parking is available one block south at Children's Memorial Hospital for all shows except weekday matinees (no overnights). Metered and street parking is available, but mind the neighborhood parking restrictions.

Public transit
By CTA train, take the Red, Purple or Brown lines to the Fullerton stop. Walk east on Fullerton to Lincoln, then north 1/2 block to the theater. The #8 Halsted, #11 Lincoln, #37 Sedgwick/Ogden, and #74 Fullerton CTA buses all stop at the corner of Fullerton and Halsted, 1/2 block south of the theater. See transitchicago.com for times and routes.

Pre- and post-show dining
See www.victorygardens.org for a list of Victory Gardens' neighborhood dining partners. Each is within walking distance of the Biograph, and all offer a special discount to patrons who present a Victory Gardens ticket stub.

About Fresh Squeezed
The Fresh Squeezed Series at Victory Gardens brings together provocative and exemplary artists in a series of special performances seeking out new, diverse audiences. Through language, music, poetry and history, Fresh Squeezed explores the varied ways theater is being performed today and surveys the performing arts medium to bring fresh new perspectives to the stage.

The Fresh Squeezed Series at Victory Gardens encourages new people to visit the theater and poke around. Not just new audiences - but also new writers and performers and cultures and ideas. We are a theater dedicated to tending new plays, and in our rapidly diversifying cultural landscape, Fresh Squeezed allows us to cast a wide net and find hidden treasures that are relevant to our community.

Victory Gardens Fresh Squeezed is sponsored in part by The Boeing Company. Victory Gardens Theater receives major funding from Alphawood Foundation, Chicago Community Trust, Shubert Foundation, Joyce Foundation, John T. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation, Allstate Insurance Company, Polk Bros. Foundation, National Endowment for the Arts, Leo S. Guthman Fund, Motorola Foundation, and REAM Foundation. Additional funding is provided by: Illinois Arts Council, Sara Lee Foundation, Edgerton Foundation, James S. Kemper Foundation, Charles and M.R. Shapiro Foundation, Wrightwood Neighbors Association, Exelon, The McVay Foundation, Charles H. and Bertha L. Boothroyd Foundation, Grant Thornton, John R. Halligan Fund, Illinois Tool Works, PNC Foundation, Elizabeth F. Cheney Foundation, CityArts Grant from the City of Chicago Department of Cultural Affairs and Special Events, The Saints, and The Irving Harris Foundation.

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