FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
January 23, 2006

SCRIPTS BY LOCAL WRITERS SOON TO TAKE THE STAGE!

Heads will turn and eyes will pop when four new, locally written plays hit the stage for the very first time this February. The Saint John Theatre Company: Second Stage will be mounting Script Happens, an evening of one-act plays, and audiences may be pleasantly surprised at the diversity of this year’s material.

"When you look at programming a set of shows, you want to give the audience a little taste of everything," says Jay Rawding, Chair of Second Stage. “Fortunately, last fall we received more submissions from local writers than ever before. This allowed us to run with all kinds of different subject matter.”

The plays will be "Fertilicorp" by Jon Forward, "Coelacanth", by David Brooks, “The Playwright” by M.C. Nini, and "Heaven Is Boring", by Anthony Stuart. The scripts were selected after an afternoon of public, dramatic readings held in December.

"People will get a few laughs, of course," says Chris Walsh, director of “Heaven Is Boring”, “but I also think that there’s a real chance to connect with the audience in a different way; there are elements that deal with life, death and spirituality.”

According to Walsh, the play is a comedy about a man who has to cope with a lacklustre paradise, while contending with a host of heavenly characters that are “more than a little bit strange.”

In contrast, “The Playwright” is about a trio of upper class British characters that discuss a myriad of topics, such as the nature of art, noted revolutionary leaders, and the world of theatre. It will be helmed by first-time Second Stage director Jennifer Mabey.

The third script, “Coelacanth”, features a boisterous American couple who visit the Saint John City Market and inadvertently purchase a fish long thought to be extinct. Veteran Second Stage director Andrea Arbour is impressed with her cast’s efforts to date.

“Once they figured out how to properly pronounce ‘coelacanth’ (see-la-kanth),” Arbour jokes, “they just dove right into the material.”

Scott Thomas, local actor and familiar media personality, will be directing the fourth show, “Fertilicorp”. The premise has a pitch-person selling a most unusual idea to a panel of business executives.

“Expect to see some well-timed social commentary humour with a sharp satirical edge,” says Thomas. “The Fertilicorp idea is to explore methods for profit using the world’s one true renewable resource – children.”

“Like the product packaging itself, the presentation of Fertilicorp will be clean, glitzy and painstakingly crafted,” Thomas adds.

Including the upcoming Script Happens, Second Stage will have mounted 26 plays penned by local writers in the last four years alone.

The plays will be staged Thursday, February 9th, Friday, February 10th, and Saturday, February 11th at 8:00 p.m. in the Mary H. Oland Theatre at the New Brunswick Museum, Market Square. Tickets are $10.00 and are available in advance beginning January 30th at the New Brunswick Museum lobby or at the door.

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