Sixteen Shows Enter – One Show Leaves as SERIAL KILLERS Playoffs Begin at Sacred Fools

After a regular season featuring over three dozen different serials, only one champion will emerge as the Serial Killers playoffs are set to begin at 11pm on Saturday, April 7 in the Black Box at The Broadwater Theater Complex. As each serial's story is told episodically, each week is another installment, but only two finalists will get to finish telling their tales and only one of those two will crowned the winner by audience vote.

About Serial Killers and the Playoffs

Sporting the tagline 'Five Shows Enter, Three Shows Leave,' Serial Killers is finishing its thirteenth season of late night blood sport (minus actual blood, audience votes are what kills a serial). The first two weeks of this year's playoffs will begin in the smaller Black Box Theater but later rounds will move on the set of Sacred Fools final mainstage show of its 21st Season, Akuma-shin (see press release here).

Over 300 storylines have premiered on the Serial Killers stage, some enduring a quick death after one episode, others enjoying long runs and, in several cases such as Watson, A Kind of Love Story and Absolutely Filthy, graduating from late-night to prime-time slots as mainstage plays in the Sacred Fools season and beyond.

During the fourth year of Serial Killers in 2009, playoffs were added at the end of the season, an annual tradition that has pits the longest-running storylines and audience favorites against each other in a March Madness-style elimination tournament. Last season's winner, Jane Austen's Emma Frankenstein, written and directed by Jenelle Riley, is returning as a full-length for the upcoming Hollywood Fringe Festival.

"Serial Killers is not just a great opportunity to get your work seen, it's literally been a huge asset to my career. Performing Emma Frankenstein last year was not only a joy, but provided invaluable feedback from a live audience," said Riley, won the 2011 playoffs with A Kind of Love Story. "I say it all the time, but there is no better place to workshop and get your material seen."

Playoffs Participants

Sixteen storylines out of nearly forty regular season participants make the playoffs. They are a combination of the longest-running serials and an additional number that are voted on by the greater Serial Killers community of audience and participants. These storylines have enough wins under their belts to have secured a berth:

Come Back - by Tony Foster, directed by Marisa O'Brien (15 episodes)

Stop the Truck - by Joe Jordan, directed by Jaime Robledo (9 episodes)

Renfield - by Bob DeRosa, directed by Ben Rock (7 episodes)

#instagay - Written and directed by Patrick Hurley (7 episodes)

Emu Wars - by Travis Snyder-Eaton, directed by Bryan Bellomo (4 episodes)

Stone Age Tools - by Bill Robens, directed by Pat Towne (4 episodes)

The remaining field of contenders will be announced the week leading up to the first week of playoffs on the Serial Killers Facebook page.

Playoffs Structure

During both the regular season and playoffs of Serial Killers, there's a time limit each serial must stay within or else they'll be penalized votes. In the regular season, if a storyline goes over 12 minutes, they lose a vote for every 15 seconds that elapses before the piece ends. For earlier rounds of the playoffs, time limits are reduced and then extended as the field narrows.

The first two weeks of the playoffs will take place Below is a listing of each round of the 2018 Serial Killers playoffs (each show is a Saturday night at 11pm):

Week 1 (4/7/18, Broadwater Black Box):

8 serials, 4 are eliminated, 6-minute limit

Week 2 (4/14/18, Broadwater Black Box):

8 other serials, 4 are eliminated, 6-minute limit

Week 3 (4/21/18, Broadwater Main Stage):

The 8 surviving serials compete, 2 are eliminated, 7-minute limit

Week 4 (4/28/18, Broadwater Main Stage):

6 serials, 2 are eliminated, 9-minute limit

Week 5 (5/05/18, Broadwater Main Stage):

4 serials, 2 are eliminated, 14-minute limit

Week 6 (5/12/18, Broadwater Main Stage):

The final two serials conclude their stories, 22-minute limit

Additional Programming at Sacred Fools

The Serial Killers Playoffs are taking place during the run of Sacred Fools' latest mainstage world premiere Akuma-shin (see previous press release). Also, coming to the Broadwater Black Box in April is the musical Disasteroid (late night Fridays), and a fresh installment of our ongoing show Ten Tops (Monday, April 9), press releases forthcoming on both. For more information on these and other upcoming performances, please visit www.sacredfools.org.

Akuma-shin Donate What You Can Performance - Friday, April 6

It's "Pay What You Can" with a twist! Half of all proceeds for this performance will be donated to Nature and Culture International, whose mission is to protect biologically diverse ecosystems in concert with local people in Latin America. Other recent beneficiaries have included ProjectQ, Direct Relief and The Center for Inquiry.