Delta Center Stage’s next performance is set for July 16-19.
After COVID-19-related delays to the planned season, DCS is opening with multiple precautions and changes in normal practices.
The precautions include:
* No box office or ticket sales will be taken. This will be a special “Pay what you can” format. Proceeds will jointly benefit the E.E. Bass Foundation and Delta Center Stage;
* DCS will stage a series of eight Ten Minute plays under the title “Short & Sweet: eight, 10-minute plays from the Boston Theatre Marathon;”
* A maximum of 115 will be seated in the auditorium, safely social distanced in groups of two or four chairs;
* Reservations are requested and can be done by emailing timbixler@deltastage.com or text message to 662-820-5489 with name and number in your party and date you wish to attend. We will confirm your reservation by reply;
* For your safety and that of others, please arrive wearing a mask and keep it on when circulating in the room. Once seated and safely social distanced, mask will be optional. If you do not have a mask, one will be provided for you; and
* There will be no concession area for this event, self-serve bottled water will be available.
Curtain time for Thursday through Saturday evening is 7:30 p.m. Sunday matinee is at 2:30 p.m.
Delta Center Stage, at considerable expense, has installed active sanitizing technology in the HVAC system in the auditorium. Please call with any concerns or questions. Visit deltastage.com/announcements.html for downloadable information on this exciting protective technology or call Tim Bixler at 662-820-5489 with any concerns or questions.
Most of these short plays, all original and unpublished, will be staged for the first time for this event. All were originally selected from hundreds of script submissions to the Boston Theatre Marathon, an annual event usually held on the same weekend as the Boston Marathon running event.
Both Marathons suffered cancellation this year, so none of these winning scripts were produced live on stage. This event will be their premiere.
“We are extremely grateful and excited both to get our doors open again, and also to provide these talented playwrights a digital copy of their work after we close the event,” Bixler said. “The variety of content covers the full spectrum from hilarious, to deeply dramatic, and all spaces in between.” The plays do contain some mature content.
The titles and a short description of the plays follow:
* “A Few Adjustments” by Scott Malia: A hilariously fast paced duet between an auditioning young actress and a casting director who is making the young woman work way too hard
* “Black Jesus” by Fabiola Decious: A straight forwardly religious examination of a young black man’s encounter with his lord and savior while in a coma.
* “With Intent” by Steven Wrobleski: Based on a true story, we see a twenty-something couple and two of their friends as they describe the moment they fell in love during an argument. One never knows the strange events that can create an attraction. (Some mature content involving flatulence)
* “Just Listen” by Ken Green: An African-American woman in an office break room must defend a painted black Jack-O-Lantern as harmless to her overbearing virtue-signaling white co-worker.
* “Choices” by James McLinden: A post-graduate young woman burdened with crushing student loan debt is offered a way out by a debt counselor with a proposition that may just be too good to be true.
* “Santa’s Dolphins” by Patrick Gabridge: Set in the near future around the imagined apocalypse of global warming. A sweet and poignant observation on tolerance and diversity.
* “The Campaign” by Ken Green: A black advertising executive in a very white ad firm is challenged by a co-worker when he offers his opinion that a proposed ad campaign will be an offensive bombshell to the African-American community.
* “Room 221” by Michael Towers: A devastatingly honest gut-punch on the subject of High School shootings.
