Jeff Swearingen rehearsing THE LAST CASTRATO. Show goes up Jan. 14, 2014.
Info HERE. Facebook stuff HERE.
Tuesday, December 31, 2013
CASTRATO rehearsals have begun
Jeff Swearingen rehearsing THE LAST CASTRATO. Show goes up Jan. 14, 2014.
Info HERE. Facebook stuff HERE.
Some nice mentions in 2013
Jeff Swearingen got mentioned as one of the "Best Acting Performances by Men" for DINOSAUR AND ROBOT STOP A TRAIN on local critic Alexandra Bonifield's Critical Rant Blog.
Mark Lowry of TheaterJones.com noted about Brad McEntire: "On a smaller scale, several performers and writers helped grow our city’s reputation by taking their work elsewhere... Local solo performer Brad McEntire of Audacity Theatre Lab did the national festival circuit (nothing new for him)."
In the same 2013 Year-In-Review article, Lowry cites Kate Mura's SUBURBAN TRIBE (hosted by Audacity in November) as one of the "Best Small Tours in Other Locations."
Lastly, the first several items on Mr. Lowry's "Wish-List for 2014" directly reflect ATL and the things we are trying to accomplish...
1. More regional collaboration and festival-sharing. WaterTower Theatre’s Out of the Loop Fringe Festival continues doing its part, but it would be nice to see more collaboration between artists in cities in this region of the country: DFW, Austin, San Antonio, Houston, Oklahoma City, Tulsa, New Orleans, Little Rock, etc. Yes, I realize there’s a distance and travel/cost issues—it’s not like the cities in the Northeast, where train travel is easy-peasy—but if someone could get financially behind a larger, regional performing arts festival, happening here, that’d be swell.
2. In that same vein, there is one solo festival planned this year: The Dallas Solo Performance Festival, produced by Brad McEntire’s Audacity Theatre Lab at the Margo Jones Theatre. Hoping for success. Solo shows are easier to travel.
3. That the folks at the Margo Jones Theatre figure out how to get more butts in seats. What’s happening there is important, we just need more people to understand that.
Congrats to casts of RASPBERRY FIZZ, SUBURBAN TRIBE and DINOSAUR AND ROBOT STOP A TRAIN!
Sunday, December 29, 2013
Last Castrato at Margo Jones Theatre
Coming Jan. 14, 2014... THE LAST CASTRATO
Audacity Theatre Lab teams up with Fun House Theatre and Film to present Jeff Swearingen in Andy Eninger's weird and wonderful one-man show THE LAST CASTRATO.
THE LAST CASTRATO centers on Joseph, who was born without a penis, and his love affair with Elena, who was born with her skin inside out. Elena, though, was blessed with a beautiful singing voice to balance her deformity, while Joseph has no talent whatsoever to make up for his missing member. "A penis," he muses, "in terms of artistic merit is worth nothing."
Last presented by Audacity from 2005 to 2007 in festivals from New York to Phoenix, THE LAST CASTRATO returns to the Dallas area for a proper run.
Featuring ATL member and Fun House Creative Director Jeff Swearingen
Written by Andy Eninger
Directed and designed by ATL Artistic Director Brad McEntire
Playing January 14 - 26, 2014
(Tuesdays thru Saturdays at 8:00 PM, Sundays at 3:00 PM)
At the Margo Jones Theatre,
1121 First Avenue in Fair Park, Dallas TX 75210
Info HERE
Sunday, December 1, 2013
Audacity's RASPBERRY FIZZ in TheaterJones.com
The Laboratory of Life
Audacity Theatre Lab keeps the spirit of experimentation alive at the Margo Jones Theatre, with a double bill of Grading on a Curve and Raspberry Fizz.
published Friday, November 29, 2013
 |
| Travis Stuebing and Tashina Richardson in RASPBERRY FIZZ at the Margo Jones Theatre |
Dallas — Just in case you’re curious how Audacity Theatre Lab has managed to fly under the radar in DFW for more than a decade, and still make some of the most consistently entertaining shows on a budget for which the term “shoestring” seems fancy, you’re not alone. The group, run by Brad McEntire and his wife Ruth Engel-McEntire, specializes in original work, often one-person shows—or at least with a small cast.
In the past month, it has presented three such shows in the new Margo Jones Theatre space in Fair Park, two of them still running on one bill. A.V. Phibes’ play Grading on a Curve, directed by McEntire and performed by Lauren Moore, begins the show as a 25-minute curtain raiser. That’s followed by McEntire’s play Raspberry Fizz.
One of the first shows presented there after the 2013 State Fair closed was under the Audacity banner, an import from Portland, Ore., Kate Mura’s one-person mask show Suburban Tribe. It was performed twice in early November. Mura, the Artistic Ambassador of Portland’s Fuse Theatre Ensemble, wrote the work as a thank you to a New Jersey community that rallied around a family after a “freak accident.” She’s been performing it on the festival circuit for several years. (McEntire also does that circuit.)
On a table behind her are group of commedia-style masks in dark-brown tones, some of which come with extra costumes or props, such as hats and scarves. She switches masks to change characters, including an elderly Polish woman who’s in line for the Pearly Gates but still has plenty to talk about before she gets there. There’s also a clergyman, people who show up to deliver casseroles after a death and various family members. A few of the characters don’t require masks, and it’s interesting to see how naked and raw those characters feel after you’re used to seeing a parade of masks.
Mura frequently references The Secret Garden and sings a few songs, including “Bride Over Troubled Water” and Nirvana’s “Come As You Are.” In 50 minutes, she switches voices and characterizations effortlessly, and offers vivid representations of people who exhibit compassion in a trying time. It gives you hope that people can be like this all the time, not just in the wake of tragedy.
Here’s a snippet of the show from Mura’s YouTube channel, from a performance two years ago. Upcoming dates include Los Angeles and Tacoma, Wash.; and according to the show’s Facebook page, 2014 will take it to festivals in Bali and Australia.
Audacity’s current offering, running on Saturday afternoons through Dec. 7, begins with Grading on a Curve. In the short work, Lauren Moore plays a woman in search for something to make her life have more meaning. She admits her love for gooey, orange nacho cheese, but even that can’t quash her desire to see what happens when she embarks on a hunger strike with another character she considers more interesting than her.
In her quest to not be consumed with ennui, she describes what happens to her body and mind at various points in the strike, all the way up to 170 hours.
The story comes back around to a man she meets who, while not physically perfect, could prove to be the person she needs in her life. Moore is engaging throughout, taking us through the twisty turns of this brief story with vivid imagery. A comical ending plays with the adage “life’s too short.”
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| Lauren Moore in A. V. Phibes' GRADING ON A CURVE at the Margo Jones Theatre |
In 2012, Raspberry Fizz was seen at WaterTower Theatre’s Out of the Loop Fringe Festival. McEntire again plays the carnival barker in 1949 small-town America who promises something amazing under a cardboard box, for anyone who will pay to take a peek. That’s interspersed with scenes between adolescents Samantha (Tashina Richardson) and Ellson (Travis Stuebing). He is clearly intrigued with her, and all she wants is to chew gum, tease and drink a soda called Raspberry Fizz. Ellson, always curious, takes up the Barker’s offer.
It’s short and sweet, with charming performances from Richardson and Stuebing. There’s a message about expectations versus reality, and the viewer can’t help but feel nostalgia for a more innocent time. Not just of childhood, but of a bygone era captured in Norman Rockwell paintings. Even as we know that will never return, there’s a big sigh in watching it represented through art.
The Margo Jones Theatre, which is dedicated to incubating small and/or emerging companies and isn’t averse to experimentation and risk, is the perfect place for such work. Audiences are small, shows are short and rewards are big.
Next up for Audacity is the return of the play The Last Castrato, starring Jeff Swearingen in the title role.
Monday, November 25, 2013
RASPBERRY FIZZ in the Stage Directions Blog
AUDACITY'S BRAD McENTIRE TALKS ABOUT THE NEW PRODUCTION OF HIS PLAY RASPBERRY FIZZ
by Christopher Taylor / Stage Directions Blog /
Brad McEntire is Artistic Director of Audacity Theatre Lab, a small company dedicated to the voices of a small group of individual artists. In the past few years, he has presented his solo show Chop at festivals and venues around the country, completed a commission for Denton’s Sundown Collaborative Theatre called Carter Stubbs Takes Flight, presented a festival piece about a vengeful Tiki god and cell phone etiquette called I Have Angered a Great God and the produced the scripted/improv hybrid Dinosaur and Robot Stop a Train at last summer’s Festival of Independent Theatres.
We cornered McEntire to ask about his current project Raspberry Fizz, playing on Saturday afternoons at the Margo Jones Theatre at Fair Park’s Magnolia Lounge in Dallas until December 7.
Q: Tell us about Raspberry Fizz?
A: Sure. Raspberry Fizz is about two adolescents hanging out on a street corner, a boy and a girl. It is 1949 and they are in a small town. Basically, the boy is working up his courage to ask the girl to a school dance. It is actually really charming and maybe the least weird play I’ve written in a while.
Q: Least weird? No robots and dinosaurs? No tigers fights or rocket packs? No amputation fetishists?
A: Well, it still has some weird sprinkled in. There is a mysterious carnival barker on a corner down the street from the kids. He keeps muttering this strange sideshow bally about expectations and possibilities.
Q: You play the Barker, right? Where’d he come from?
A: I play the Barker. He’s based a little on those Coney Island pitchmen and on Johnathon Pryce’s character in the movie “Something Wicked This Way Comes.” Which is a movie that scared the crap out of me when I was a kid.
Q: What prompted you to write Raspberry Fizz?
A: I had the idea of two 12 year olds talking on a street corner in mind, as an image, for a while. I went through a Norman Rockwell phase, too, and was just fascinated with his paintings. The idea to set it in the late 1940s seemed to fit. Originally, I envisioned it as a two-hander, kind of spinning out a simple dilemma into an interesting yearn. For thematic purposes, I put the Barker in and the play became what it is today.
Q: This is not the first production. This show premiered at the Out of the Loop Festival at Addison’s Water Tower Theatre is March 2012. Why remount it?
A: Yeah, the play premiered at the Out of the Loop. It went up a week after I got married. Usually, I direct my own plays, but at the time I was busy, uh, planning and being in a wedding. Andy Baldwin directed it. It had Jeff Swearingen, Natalie Young and Shane Beeson in it. They did a wonderful job. This past summer I was invited to the Houston Fringe Festival and I decided to take Raspberry Fizz. I recast it with Travis Stuebing and Tashina Richardson. I stepped in to play the Barker, a role I had originally written for myself to play anyway. This show, with different people and slight rewrites, came out different than Andy’s production. Since we had rehearsed it and put so much work into it, and I was proud of it, we thought it a shame just to do it for three shows in Houston and call it quits. Plus, Travis, Tashina and I have a great time working together. So, we are extending the production for these Saturday afternoon shows here in Dallas. Local audiences can get a chance to see the show.
Q: Saturday afternoons? That is not a traditional time for theatre.
A: Seemed to fit the tone of the shows. Plus, it means we can use the venue in the day time while other productions happen at night. Utilizing resources and all. I'll admit, the afternoon slot is a hard sell. That's why I'm trying to get the word out. Like a lot of theatre productions around the area, audiences that make it out usually end up really enjoying the stuff that gets put on the stage around DFW. It is just a matter of initially getting them through the front door.
Q: You’ve paired it with a curtain-opener, too, right? Tell us about that.
A: Yeah. I have this little 20 minute one-woman piece by Brooklyn-based artist A. V. Phibes called Grading On A Curve. It is about a nihilistic woman who goes on extreme fasts and develops cannibalistic tendencies, especially for fingers. Then one day, she meets a man with no fingers, but flashy lobster-claws, and falls in love. It is weird and wonderful and because it is so short, it is hard to present anywhere. The excellent Lauren Moore performs it before Raspberry Fizz. The two pieces go surprisingly well together as companion pieces. Together, the running time of the two shows is just over an hour.
Q: What’s next for you and Audacity Theatre Lab?
A: We’re taking a break during the holidays and will be back in January with Andy Eninger’s solo show The Last Castrato. Jeff Swearingen will perform it. It is a co-production between Audacity and his company Fun House Theatre. The show involves a man born without a penis who falls in love with a girl who was born with her skin inside out. That will also be at the Margo Jones Theatre. Then in the spring we are hoping to produce a solo performance festival, the first of its kind in Dallas. We have some other irons in the fire, too. We’ll see what materializes.
Q: Details on Raspberry Fizz please.
A: The show will be playing Saturdays at 2:00 PM, November 16, 23, 30 and December 7 at the historic Margo Jones Theatre at the Magnolia Lounge, Fair Park, 1121 First Avenue, Dallas, TX 75210. Tickets are $10 suggested donation at the door. More information at: www.AudacityTheatreLab.com
by Christopher Taylor / Stage Directions Blog /
 |
| RASPBERRY FIZZ at the 2013 Houston Fringe Festival |
Brad McEntire is Artistic Director of Audacity Theatre Lab, a small company dedicated to the voices of a small group of individual artists. In the past few years, he has presented his solo show Chop at festivals and venues around the country, completed a commission for Denton’s Sundown Collaborative Theatre called Carter Stubbs Takes Flight, presented a festival piece about a vengeful Tiki god and cell phone etiquette called I Have Angered a Great God and the produced the scripted/improv hybrid Dinosaur and Robot Stop a Train at last summer’s Festival of Independent Theatres.
We cornered McEntire to ask about his current project Raspberry Fizz, playing on Saturday afternoons at the Margo Jones Theatre at Fair Park’s Magnolia Lounge in Dallas until December 7.
Q: Tell us about Raspberry Fizz?
A: Sure. Raspberry Fizz is about two adolescents hanging out on a street corner, a boy and a girl. It is 1949 and they are in a small town. Basically, the boy is working up his courage to ask the girl to a school dance. It is actually really charming and maybe the least weird play I’ve written in a while.
Q: Least weird? No robots and dinosaurs? No tigers fights or rocket packs? No amputation fetishists?
A: Well, it still has some weird sprinkled in. There is a mysterious carnival barker on a corner down the street from the kids. He keeps muttering this strange sideshow bally about expectations and possibilities.
Q: You play the Barker, right? Where’d he come from?
A: I play the Barker. He’s based a little on those Coney Island pitchmen and on Johnathon Pryce’s character in the movie “Something Wicked This Way Comes.” Which is a movie that scared the crap out of me when I was a kid.
Q: What prompted you to write Raspberry Fizz?
A: I had the idea of two 12 year olds talking on a street corner in mind, as an image, for a while. I went through a Norman Rockwell phase, too, and was just fascinated with his paintings. The idea to set it in the late 1940s seemed to fit. Originally, I envisioned it as a two-hander, kind of spinning out a simple dilemma into an interesting yearn. For thematic purposes, I put the Barker in and the play became what it is today.
Q: This is not the first production. This show premiered at the Out of the Loop Festival at Addison’s Water Tower Theatre is March 2012. Why remount it?
A: Yeah, the play premiered at the Out of the Loop. It went up a week after I got married. Usually, I direct my own plays, but at the time I was busy, uh, planning and being in a wedding. Andy Baldwin directed it. It had Jeff Swearingen, Natalie Young and Shane Beeson in it. They did a wonderful job. This past summer I was invited to the Houston Fringe Festival and I decided to take Raspberry Fizz. I recast it with Travis Stuebing and Tashina Richardson. I stepped in to play the Barker, a role I had originally written for myself to play anyway. This show, with different people and slight rewrites, came out different than Andy’s production. Since we had rehearsed it and put so much work into it, and I was proud of it, we thought it a shame just to do it for three shows in Houston and call it quits. Plus, Travis, Tashina and I have a great time working together. So, we are extending the production for these Saturday afternoon shows here in Dallas. Local audiences can get a chance to see the show.
Q: Saturday afternoons? That is not a traditional time for theatre.
A: Seemed to fit the tone of the shows. Plus, it means we can use the venue in the day time while other productions happen at night. Utilizing resources and all. I'll admit, the afternoon slot is a hard sell. That's why I'm trying to get the word out. Like a lot of theatre productions around the area, audiences that make it out usually end up really enjoying the stuff that gets put on the stage around DFW. It is just a matter of initially getting them through the front door.
Q: You’ve paired it with a curtain-opener, too, right? Tell us about that.
A: Yeah. I have this little 20 minute one-woman piece by Brooklyn-based artist A. V. Phibes called Grading On A Curve. It is about a nihilistic woman who goes on extreme fasts and develops cannibalistic tendencies, especially for fingers. Then one day, she meets a man with no fingers, but flashy lobster-claws, and falls in love. It is weird and wonderful and because it is so short, it is hard to present anywhere. The excellent Lauren Moore performs it before Raspberry Fizz. The two pieces go surprisingly well together as companion pieces. Together, the running time of the two shows is just over an hour.
Q: What’s next for you and Audacity Theatre Lab?
A: We’re taking a break during the holidays and will be back in January with Andy Eninger’s solo show The Last Castrato. Jeff Swearingen will perform it. It is a co-production between Audacity and his company Fun House Theatre. The show involves a man born without a penis who falls in love with a girl who was born with her skin inside out. That will also be at the Margo Jones Theatre. Then in the spring we are hoping to produce a solo performance festival, the first of its kind in Dallas. We have some other irons in the fire, too. We’ll see what materializes.
Q: Details on Raspberry Fizz please.
A: The show will be playing Saturdays at 2:00 PM, November 16, 23, 30 and December 7 at the historic Margo Jones Theatre at the Magnolia Lounge, Fair Park, 1121 First Avenue, Dallas, TX 75210. Tickets are $10 suggested donation at the door. More information at: www.AudacityTheatreLab.com
Original posting HERE
Sunday, November 24, 2013
Pic of GRADING ON A CURVE in performance
 |
| Lauren Moore in A.V. Phibes' GRADING ON A CURVE at the Margo Jones Theatre |
Friday, November 15, 2013
GRADING ON A CURVE in Rehearsal
The Dallas production of RASPBERRY FIZZ opens tomorrow. It will include a curtain-opener presentation of A. V. Phibe's GRADING ON A CURVE, performed by the excellent Lauren Moore.
Below of some rehearsal pics of Lauren working on GRADING ON A CURVE.
The shows play Saturday afternoons at 2 PM from November 16 to December 7, 2013. Info HERE.
Below of some rehearsal pics of Lauren working on GRADING ON A CURVE.
The shows play Saturday afternoons at 2 PM from November 16 to December 7, 2013. Info HERE.
The Science of Chewing Bubble Gum
An Actress learns to navigate a sugary prop
 |
| Travis Steubing and Tashina Richardson in RASPBERRY FIZZ |
Actress Tashina
Richardson consumes lots of sugar while performing in the Audacity Theatre Lab
play Raspberry Fizz. Besides
consuming a bottle and half of raspberry soda during each and every show, she
chews a lot of bubble gum.
“The trick is to start
chewing it fifteen to twenty minutes before curtain so it has optimal popping
elasticity,” says Richardson.
During the show,
Richardson’s character Samantha blows and pops gum at key moments. This means
that Richardson has to juggle drinking the carbonated soda, saying the lines
and blowing those bubbles at the right time so it all looks effortless.
“It is akin to rubbing one’s
tummy and patting one’s head while reciting the Gettysburg Address,” says
director Brad McEntire, who also wrote Raspberry
Fizz and performs a small role in it as well. “It takes some focus. I’m
impressed at how she does it.”
“Each pack of gum has fifteen
sticks and I went through a whole pack outside of rehearsals just practicing
blowing really good bubbles,” says Richardson. “I averaged about three sticks
in every rehearsal.”
Raspberry Fizz involves an encounter between two adolescents as they explore
anticipation and expectations in 1949 small town America. The play premiered in
Addison, Texas in March of 2012 at the Water Tower Theatre's Out of the Loop
Fringe Festival directed by Andy Baldwin and featuring Jeff Swearingen and
Natalie Young.
The current production
featuring Travis Stuebing, Tashina Richardson and Brad McEntire recently returned
from a hit run at the Houston Fringe Festival.
The show will be playing Saturdays
at 2 PM, November 16, 23, 30 and December 7 at the historic Margo Jones Theatre
at the Magnolia Lounge, Fair Park, 1121 First Avenue, Dallas, TX 75210. Tickets
are $10 suggested donation at the door. More information at: www.AudacityTheatreLab.com
Friday, November 1, 2013
Suburban Tribe
Audacity teams up with Portland-based Fuse Theatre Ensemble. We're hosting solo performer Kate Mura. She is presenting her one-person mash show SUBURBAN TRIBE in Dallas before taking it to Albuquerque, New Orleans, Bali and then Adelaide, Australia.
SUBURBAN TRIBE is a mask, movement, improv and corporeal mime performance piece that tells the story of how a NYC suburban community came together to become a family for one young girl in her time of need.
November 3 at 5 PM and 7 PM.
At the Margo Jones Theatre, 1121 First Avenue, Dallas TX 75201
Tickets are P-W-Y-C ($10 donation)
Friday, October 25, 2013
Six Seconds Left by David Hopkins
A while back I read David Hopkins' short story "Six Seconds Left" for an audio fiction podcast. I'm love the story. Ms. Chris Humphrey worked her audio engineering awesomeness on it. The project was a co-production between my theatre company Audacity an the sci-fi and comics folks at Space-Gun Studios. The image above, that accompanies the podcast, is by Space-Gun co-founder Jake Ekiss. Jake is the one that brought me on board the project.
Have a listen... HERE.
Upload MP3 and download MP3 using free MP3 hosting from Tindeck.
Tuesday, October 15, 2013
Raspberry Fizz: The Recipe
 |
| The Raspberry Fizz [photo via: WI Cheesehead] |
In case you were wondering (and, of course, you were) there is an actual recipe for making a Raspberry Fizz.
The Raspberry Fizz
Courtesy low-cholesterol.food.com
Total time: 20 minutes (5 prep time, 15 cook time)
Ingredients:
300 g frozen raspberries
440 g caster sugar
2 cups water
60 ml lemon juice
1 liter soda water, chilled
Directions:
- Place raspberries, sugar and 2 cups of water into a saucepan. Bring to boil over medium heat, stirring occasionally.
- Simmer for 10 minutes and then remove from heat and add lemon juice.
- Cool and then strain through a fine sieve into a jug. Discard the solids.
- To serve, pour the Raspberry Fizz into a large jug. Add ice cubes and then top off with chilled soda water.
Makes 1.5 liters, serves 6-8.
Get this and other recipes HERE.
Monday, October 7, 2013
Thursday, September 26, 2013
RASPBERRY FIZZ promo pic
 |
| Travis Steubing as Ellson and Tashina Richardson as Samantha in RASPBERRY FIZZ |
RASPBERRY FIZZ by Brad McEntire. Playing at the Houston Fringe Festival, October 4-6, 2013. Info HERE
Also listed on BroadwayWorld.com
Tuesday, September 10, 2013
Saturday, September 7, 2013
DRIBBLE FUNK 380 is Dallas Morning News
 |
| Photo credit: Garett Fisbeck/The Dallas Morning News |
Brad McEntire performs “Dribble Funk 380″, a 380 minute solo improvisation at the Magnolia Lounge at Fair Park in Dallas, Aug. 31, 2013. McEntire is doing the performance as a challenge to himself as he is turning 38-years-old in September. (Garett Fisbeck/The Dallas Morning News)
Tuesday, September 3, 2013
Next up... RASPBERRY FIZZ at 2013 Houston Fringe
Audacity held the first reading of RASPBERRY FIZZ this evening, on the patio of Fuzzy's Taco's in Denton. Travis Stuebing, Tashina Richardson and Brad McEntire will be performing Brad's play at the 2013 Houston Fringe Festival.
 |
| First read-thru with Travis Stuebing and Tashina Richardson |
RASPBERRY FIZZ is an exploration of expectations and the potentialities of the future tied up in a tender and humorous coming-of-age encounter between two adolescents in 1949 small town America.
When:
Friday, October 4th at 8 PM
Saturday, October 5th at 9:30 PM
Sunday, October 6th at 3:30 PM
Where:
Bohemeo's Cafe and Theatre,
708 Telephone Road,
Houston, TX 77023
708 Telephone Road,
Houston, TX 77023
Tickets:
phone: 832-387-7440online: http://houstonfringefestival.org/tickets/
As part of the Houston Fringe Festival.
Ticket info coming soon...
DF380 pics
DF380 on TheaterJones.com
Double Dribble
Or maybe triple or quadruple. On Sept. 1, Brad McEntire will attempt six hours of solo improvisation at the Margo Jones Theatre. No, he's not crazy.
by Mark Lowry - published Saturday, August 31, 2013
Dallas — An ungodly amount of nonstop improvisation has been done before in North Texas, and although Brad McEntire isn't attempting to break any records (except his own) or a feat like his pal Jeff Swearingen managed two years ago *, McEntire is nonetheless gonna go for the long-haul.
He's attempting six-plus hours of solo improv on Sunday, Sept. 1 at the Margo Jones Theatre in the Magnolia Lounge. It's called, begins at 5 p.m., and the ticket is a suggest donation of $10. You can come and go as you please, and there will be two breaks, at the two and four hour marks.
But you're encouraged to go for the marathon. It's not like you haven't sat through almost-as-long and much less interesting performances before.
Here's more about the performance from the website of McEntire's performance company, Audacity Theatre Lab:
Since 2005 McEntire has been developing a solo improvisational format called Dribble Funk. The longest he has performed the piece to date has been 50 minutes. On September 1, 2013 he will stand alone on the stage and attempt to create nearly six and half hours of spontaneous theatre. From an audience suggestion he will play all the characters, create all the environments and drive the story forward—whatever it may be—single-handedly.
Artistic Director of Audacity Theatre Lab with a background in both traditional and experimental theatre, McEntire is one of a handful of pioneering performers in the sub-arcana of solo improvisation (there are only maybe a dozen or so consistent practitioners in the United States). He is the creator of the original solo improvisational story format Dribble Funk, a hybrid creation at the crossroads of longform improvisation, traditional theatre and storytelling. He is also a playwright, solo performer, visual artist, director, podcast host, webcartoonist and raconteur. More information at: www.BradMcEntire.com.
Audience members may come and go after initial admission, though are encouraged to stay for the entire performance. There will be two short breaks in the performance at the two and four hour marks. Food and drink will be available on site for the duration of the performance. Outside food and beverage are permitted (including alcohol...BYOB). Do not worry. You will be taken care of. It will be an adventure.
Original post HERE.
Sunday, July 28, 2013
Dribble Funk 380
Dallas-based playwright and performer Brad McEntire is turning 38 years of age in September and as a challenge to himself he will attempt a 380 minute solo longform improvisation. He is calling this experiment Dribble Funk 380.
Since 2005 McEntire has been developing a solo improvisational format called Dribble Funk. The longest he has performed the piece to date has been 50 minutes. On September 1, 2013 he will stand alone on the stage and attempt to create nearly six and half hours of spontaneous theatre. From a single audience suggestion he will play at the characters, create all the environments and drive the story forward... whatever it may be.
Tickets and details:
Sunday, September 1, 2013 starting at 6 PM
At the historic Margo Jones Theatre at Fair Park,
1121 First Ave., Dallas, TX 75210 [map link]
Tickets available at the door: $10 suggested donation
For more info, vist... HERE
Sunday, July 7, 2013
6IX CONFESSIONS in Dallas Advocate
 |
| Credit: Brandy Barham for the Lakewood/East Dallas Advocate |
Wednesday, July 3, 2013
Some pics from 6IX CONFESSIONS
 |
| Jeff Hernandez paints and contemplates |
 |
| Rhianna Mack talks to the Poets |
 |
| Artist Danny Sellers on the patio of the BHCC |
 |
| From stage during the final bows |
Sunday, June 30, 2013
Wednesday, June 26, 2013
Shadow puppet construction for 6IX CONFESSIONS
 |
| David Goodwin at ATL HQ |
 |
| Ruth Engel-McEntire and Kent Williams designing shadow puppets |
Monday, June 24, 2013
Friday, June 14, 2013
DINOSAUR AND ROBOT in TheaterJones.com
Trains, Ball-Change and Automobiles
Guns, too. The second set of shows at the Festival of Independent Theatres takes on heavy topics, light foot-action and two supercool characters.
by Kris Noteboom for TheaterJones.com, published Friday, June 14, 2013
DINOSAUR AND ROBOT STOP A TRAIN!! How is it even possible to see a play with that title and not excitedly yell it out like a 5-year-old might when asked to come up with the awesomest thing ever?
Let’s face it. FIT has been dominated by serious, heady, existential pieces this year.
John Michael gave audiences a delightful respite, but for the most part it’s been pretty heavy. Leave it to Brad McEntire, via his Audacity Theatre Lab, to lighten the mood a little as his ever-amazingly creative brain has brought forth unto the world Dinosaur and Robot Stop a Train.
It’s a super-simple setup. Dinosaur (Jeff Swearingen) and Robot (McEntire) have somehow been transported through time and space into a field where they subsequently save a stupid little girl from getting hit by a train. The play is the press conference held by Dinosaur and Robot as they attempt to explain their story.
With a combination of some pretty stellar physical humor, aided by the wonderfully creative costumes by Ruth Engel-McEntire, a bit of slapstick, satire, audience participation and vaudeville, DARSAT is a winner for all ages. It’s perfectly paced and when it’s over it feels all too soon.
Sure there isn’t really any deeper focus at play. This is a straightforward frivolity—which is pretty much what makes it so great. Because even though a general rule is that anything that’s good must have some sort of subtext, McEntire so thoroughly subverts that notion and distances himself from any inkling of commentary that he actually ends up creating something that’s more than some subliminal critique of the world. It’s the embrace of the inner child, the latent creativity present in everyone, the sense of wonder that is all too often forgotten. Dinosaur and Robot Stop a Train is the most essential iteration of fun. And that’s, well, fun.
◊ Dinosaur and Robot Stop a Train is performed in the following performance blocks: 8 p.m. Friday, June 14; 2 p.m. Saturday, June 15; 5 p.m. Saturday, June 22.
Wednesday, June 12, 2013
DINOSAUR AND ROBOT in the Dallas Observer
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| Brad McEntire and Jeff Swearingen in DINOSAUR AND ROBOT STOP A TRAIN at the 15th Annual Festival of Independent Theatres |
Start laughing now at Dinosaur and Robot Stop a Train at FIT
By ELAINE LINER\ Dallas Observer \ Thursday, Jun 13 2013
Dinosaur and Robot Stop a Train, also a FIT highlight, is total silliness from local playwright/actor/director Brad McEntire and his partner in comedy, Jeff Swearingen of Audacity Theatre Lab. But it's artful silliness, with moments of inspired improv between actors and with anyone brave enough to sit in the front row and agree to be dragged onstage.
McEntire, wearing a shiny silver fireproof suit and a silver-painted box on his head, is the emotionless robot. Swearingen is the dim-witted dinosaur, decked out in a lime-green ensemble with funny flat paws and waggly tail. They're holding a press conference to explain how the robot traveled back from the future and the dino from the distant past to end up rescuing "a stupid, stupid girl" (plucked from the audience) who'd wandered in front of a speeding locomotive. After considerable (and funny) physical shtick, the guys transition their dialogue into their version of the classic Abbot and Costello bit, "Who's on first?" With a robot Abbot and stego-Costello.
Like most of the FIT shows, this one uses minimal set dressing and few props. When one of those props was shattered by the "stupid girl" on opening night, Swearingen used it like a gift from the comedy gods. Sometimes the funniest moments are those they didn't plan.
Dinosaur and Robot Stop a Train, also a FIT highlight, is total silliness from local playwright/actor/director Brad McEntire and his partner in comedy, Jeff Swearingen of Audacity Theatre Lab. But it's artful silliness, with moments of inspired improv between actors and with anyone brave enough to sit in the front row and agree to be dragged onstage.
McEntire, wearing a shiny silver fireproof suit and a silver-painted box on his head, is the emotionless robot. Swearingen is the dim-witted dinosaur, decked out in a lime-green ensemble with funny flat paws and waggly tail. They're holding a press conference to explain how the robot traveled back from the future and the dino from the distant past to end up rescuing "a stupid, stupid girl" (plucked from the audience) who'd wandered in front of a speeding locomotive. After considerable (and funny) physical shtick, the guys transition their dialogue into their version of the classic Abbot and Costello bit, "Who's on first?" With a robot Abbot and stego-Costello.
Like most of the FIT shows, this one uses minimal set dressing and few props. When one of those props was shattered by the "stupid girl" on opening night, Swearingen used it like a gift from the comedy gods. Sometimes the funniest moments are those they didn't plan.
Original post HERE.
Monday, June 10, 2013
DINOSAUR AND ROBOT pic in DMNs
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| Photo credit: Steve Hamm, Special Contributor for the Dallas Morning News |
Sunday, June 9, 2013
One audience member weighs in on DINOSAUR AND ROBOT STOP A TRAIN
"Another day in Paradise, another night at Bath House Festival of Independent Theatres (FIT). As usual Brad McEntire and Jeff Swearingen rammed throttle through the fire wall with mad cap comedy.
Costumes are waaaaaaay better than their promo pic.
Dallas Morning News photog sat in, plus house full of reviewers.
All this and a message. Not pure fluff.
Lots of "Mature, Adult .. " warnings posted, for 2nd show. Brad n Jeff's show is kid-friendly.
Only hazard is sitting in reach of stage. You might be asked to play along and trip footlights. Resistance is .. possible.
Brad plays straight man Robot to Jeff's walnut-brain Dino insanity. They are fab on their own. When they collaborate, it brings house down with silly.
From Al Currie on Facebook.
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