Three-Day Performance Competition MARSH MADNESS Announced at The Marsh

While college basketball teams are competing to see who is the best team in the nation during March Madness, local performers will play for glory in The Marsh's Marsh Madness. This three-day festival brings a wide variety of performers center stage, including storytellers, improv groups, comedians, actors, musicians, dancers, mimes, and monologists, allowing audiences to get a glimpse of new and developing works from the Bay Area's vast talent pool. Audiences of Marsh Madness also have the chance to help select future stars, as the team that wins first prize will receive $1,000 and the opportunity to perform a main stage run at The Marsh, one of the nation's leading performance houses for solo and new performances. Up to 32 teams will perform in Marsh Madness March 9 - March 11, 2018 at The Marsh San Francisco, 1062 Valencia St., San Francisco.

For tickets, (available Feb. 9 - $150 for festival passes, $10 for individual shows on March 9 & 10, $20 for individual shows on March 11), or to register ($50 per team) as a performer and schedule a time slot, the public may visit www.themarsh.org or call The Marsh box office at 415-282-3055 (open 1pm-4pm, Monday through Friday).

Teams of one to five performers will present 40-minute unplugged programs during the tournament. Audiences vote for their favorite teams and each team is scored based on votes and attendance. The top scoring teams will advance to the "Final Four Showdown" on Sunday, March 11, where a judging panel of Marsh VIPs and celebrities will crown a Marsh Madness champion. Along with $1,000 and a run at The Marsh, other prizes include $500 and $250, and a Marsh Rising slot. The performers may be any age, and must hold the rights to their materials.

The Marsh is known as "a breeding ground for new performance." It was launched in 1989 by Founder and Artistic Director Stephanie Weisman, and now annually hosts more than 600 performances of 175 shows across the company's two venues in San Francisco and Berkeley. A leading outlet for solo performers, The Marsh's specialty has been hailed by the San Francisco Chronicle as "solo performances that celebrate the power of storytelling at its simplest and purest." The East Bay Times named The Marsh one of Bay Area's best intimate theaters, calling it "one of the most thriving solo theaters in the nation. The live theatrical energy is simply irresistible."