THE NEO-FUTURISTS ANNOUNCE THEIR 21st SEASON OF ORIGINAL WORK
CHICAGO – The Neo-Futurists announce their 21st Season to explore the experience of fright, the exposure of images and an exercise in competition. Also on the books is another great year of the smash hit, Too Much Light Makes The Baby Go Blind. PRIME-TIME SEASON Prime-Time shows run Thursdays through Saturdays at 8:00 p.m. at The Neo-Futurarium, 5153 N. Ashland (at Foster) in Andersonville. Tickets are $15, $10 for students/seniors with ID, or pay-what-you-can during previews and on Thursdays. For tickets or information, visit www.neofuturists.org or call The Neo-Futurist Hotline at 773-275-5255. Any exceptions to this information are noted below.
Fear Created and curated by Noelle Krimm September 24 – October 31, 2009 Opening Night: Saturday, September 26
Using their unique location above a funeral home to its full potential, the Neo-Futurists raise your blood pressure as they move you through terrifying literary-themed exhibits. Fear goes beyond typical haunted house methods to enter the deep, dark corners of your mind through the timeless works of Edgar Allen Poe. This Halloween event hits nerves of paranoia, dread and the macabre, discussing the anticipation and certainty of death.
Noelle Krimm has been a Neo-Futurist ensemble member since 1999 and this the third prime time show she has created. Her first was the musical, City Girl! in 2002 and then the neighborhood walking-tour production of Alice in 2004. In addition to writing and performing Too Much Light…, Noelle has performed in many Neo-Futurist prime time shows including Devolution, Missing Parts, and Poker Night at the White House. As a writer/performer, Noelle was in SEX! and Inside My Mouth.
I Am A Camera Conceived and directed by Greg Allen February 4 – March 13, 2010 Opening Night: Saturday, February 6
As a picture says a thousand words, this production tells a thousand stories and inspires a thousand ideas. Greg Allen taps his roots as a darkroom photographer with this inventive homage to the photo. A photography centered experiment with themes of vision, objectivity and identity, this physical history of photography and cinema uses active imagery to discuss how how we frame the world and ourselves.
Greg Allen is the Founding Director and award-winning creator of over 25 productions for The Neo-Futurists, including Too Much Light Makes The Baby Go Blind, Fluxus, The Last Two Minutes of the Complete Works of Henrik Ibsen, Boxing Joseph Cornell, H2O, evidence, and K.
A Very Neo-Futurist Game Show Created by John Pierson April 22 – May 29, 2010 Opening Night: Saturday, April 24
Come on down! Winners, losers and cash prizes play their part in this interactive spring show. Inspired by the styles of classic televised game shows, return contestants defend their titles and winners take home cash prizes up to a third of the night’s door sales. Games are mixed with short plays and a dash of local business appreciation. Come early to fill out the question and answer Scantrons that determine the players for the evening. Check The Neo-blog each day through the run to see clips of the previous shows and size up the competition. Game on!
John Pierson has been a Neo-Futurist for 13 years. Besides performing and writing for Too Much Light…, he has written many full length plays under the name Ian Pierce, including the critically acclaimed Living In The Present Tense and Simulticity. He was the creator of a controversial Neo-Futurist physical show called The Fool and has helped on such Neo projects as Daredevils and A Duchampain Rom. He was the guitarist and founding member of three fairly successful bands: Screeching Weasel, The Mopes, and Even In Blackout, having put out 22 records to date.
ONGOING SHOW Too Much Light Makes The Baby Go Blind: 30 Plays in 60 Minutes Every weekend except December 25, 2009 – January 3, 2010 Special 21st anniversary performances: December 11 – 20 Fridays and Saturdays at 11:30 p.m. (doors open 11:00 p.m.) Sundays at 7:00 p.m. (doors open at 6:30 p.m.) Tickets: $9 plus the roll of one six-sided die, or $10-15 No reservations accepted, except for groups of 10 or more on Sundays 20th Anniversary Special Ticket Price – only the roll of the die ($1-6) for the first Sunday of every month in 2009.
The Neo-Futurists’ signature show, performed since 1988, is the longest-running production in Chicago history. Too Much Light… is an ever-changing attempt to perform 30 plays in 60 minutes. Each week the ensemble adds between two and twelve new plays to the menu. Every performance creates an unreproducible, living-newspaper collage of the comic and tragic, the political and personal, the visceral and experimental.
THE NEO-FUTURISTS The Neo-Futurists, performers of Too Much Light Makes The Baby Go Blind and creators of over 60 other original, full-length productions, are a collective of wildly productive writer/director/performers who create immediate, non-illusory, interactive and head-slappingly affordable performances.
The Neo-Futurists are partially supported by the Illinois Arts Council, a state agency, Alphawood Foundation, the Chicago Community Trust, Gaylord and Dorothy Donnelly Foundation, The MacArthur Fund for Arts and Culture at The Richard H. Driehaus Foundation, a CityArts 3 grant, The Mayer and Morris Kaplan Family Foundation, The Prince Charitable Trust, National Endowment for the Arts, the Arts Work Fund for Organizational Development, and is a participant in the New Generations Program, funded by the Doris Duke Charitable Foundation/The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation and administered by TCG.
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