Revolution

Call it a rebirth. Call it an awakening. Call it whatever you want. I think I’m going to go with Revolution. Not that I’m starting one. I just suddenly feel a part of one.

Let me explain.

Back towards the beginning of the year, there were some fine folks in the theatre industry who started a discussion on Twitter at roughly 2 o’clock in the morning. They started sharing ideas. Ideas that could make things better. You can read all about that conversation over here.

So once people started talking about “That Conversation” this guy decided to set-up a website and on that website he talked about an idea he had for a community building event involving storytelling. He also challenged people to produce their own version of the event.

So I did.

360 Storytelling @ Strawdog. It was a multi-media event. Along with unprepared, unrehearsed stories from people who were in the room we used pre-recorded video and Skype to show stories from other people across the county. We streamed the event over the internet because I wanted to open it up to the online community so people from just about anywhere could log on and be a part of our storytelling. It was a mess; a beautiful successful mess.

We not only had a gathering of folks in our Hugen Hall Cabaret in Chicago, but also contributors from all across the nation…and Canada! We were able to broadcast the evening and had people watching from the east coast to the west coast and all the way down in Texas. Yep. They do theatre down there, too.

I know what you’re thinking: “This is all fine and good Kyle but what does this have to do with anything?” Well, I’ll tell ya.

If you are reading this, you are part of our community. You might have just stumbled into our community and are not really sure where you are. You might not know who we are and you might not know what we do.
OR
You might be a huge supporter of our theatre company but receive mail in a different state. You might be related to one of our company members but not really a fan of “plays” so you don’t come out to the theatre too much.
OR
You might be new to Chicago. You might be new to theatre. You might be new.
OR
You might be in town for the TCG conference.

Whatever the case may be, you are part of our community. And we would like to share something with you.

Our Strawdog Late Night Programming has really taken off in the last few years and we are quite proud of the work that we do in our Hugen Hall Cabaret. We’d like to think its namesake would be proud. But some of you haven’t seen that Late Night Programming because of…well, any number of reasons. And you might be saying: “I sure would like to see what goes on in that space.” Well, here’s your chance.

Strawdog Plea Circus: A Live Telethon from Hugen Hall
June 18 & 19
Broadcasting at 7, 9, & 11pm
Hugen Hall Cabaret
$10

That’s right. A telethon. Yes, we WILL be asking for money as you’ll be getting a great show. We’ll be performing the best of Strawdog Late Night and capping it off with a Theatre Wars each night. Ten bucks will get you into the whole evening or if you are one of our night owl friends and don’t wake up until 10:30, you can come just for Theatre Wars for $5.

We’re trying new things:Challenging ourselves and challenging the way others may view what we do. Literally and figuratively. We hope the community will join this revolution with us because we all want to change the world and, you know, it’s gonna be alright.

Kyle Hamman

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