City Lit Theater has announced the full cast and crew for the third production of its 2023-24 season: TWO HOURS IN A BAR. TWO HOURS IN A BAR is a double bill of one-acts comprising the world stage premiere of WAITING FOR TINA MEYER by Kristine Thatcher (with material by Larry Shue) and the world premiere of TEXT ME, a musical with book, music and lyrics by Kingsley Day. WAITING FOR TINA MEYER is the only collaboration between Thatcher, City Lit's resident playwright, and Shue, the late playwright of the farces THE NERD and THE FOREIGNER. Written while they were best friends and resident actors at Milwaukee Repertory Theater in the 1980s, it concerns a pair of best-friend actors--a man and a woman--sitting in a bar because the man is expecting to be met there by Tina Meyer, a woman he doesn't know who sent him a note backstage earlier that evening. Day's musical, TEXT ME, commissioned by City Lit as a companion piece to Thatcher and Shue's play, is a 21st Century look at the problem of meeting people. In this musical version of life at the bar, 21st Century dating patterns get tangled up in 21st Century technology, and the age-old questions of love and romance persist as two gay men who have previously met only online plan their first in-person meeting. McCabe will direct both pieces. TWO HOURS IN A BAR will run from March 8 through April 21, 2024. Press opening will be March 17, 2024.
McCabe’s cast of five, who will appear in both plays, includes Jimmy Hogan (The Bridegroom in City Lit’s TRIAL BY JURY, one-half of City Lit's evening of classic one-acts, TWO DAYS IN COURT), Freddy Mauricio (“The Chosen One” of City Lit’s AZTEC HUMAN SACRIFICE by Day and Philip LaZebnik), Kat Evans (Bridget in City Lit’s THE SAFE HOUSE by Thatcher, one of her many City Lit roles), Shraman Ghosh (of THE STEADFAST TIN SOLDIER at Lookingglass Theatre), and marssie* Mencotti (whose many roles at City Lit include her Jeff-nominated portrayal of Hannah in THE SAFE HOUSE). The production team includes Ray Toler (Set Design), Mike McShane (Lighting Design), Andres Mota (Costume Design), Shraman Ghosh (Music Director, and Hazel Flowers-McCabe (Stage Manager). (*lower case intentional).
Top row left to right: Kat Evans, Jimmy Hogan, Freddy Mauricio
Lower row left to right: Shraman Ghosh, marssie Mencotti
Both Thatcher and Day have been frequently produced at City Lit. Thatcher’s VOICE OF GOOD HOPE, produced by City Lit on stage in 2020 and via Zoom during the pandemic, was praised in a 4-star review by the CHICAGO SUN-TIMES as a “vivid, resonant portrait of Texas lawmaker Barbara Jordan,” who served in the U.S. House of Representatives from 1973-1979. NEW CITY STAGE said Day’s score for the musical AZTEC HUMAN SACRIFICE, produced at City Lit last year, was “unequivocally enchanting…sophisticated and haunting.”
Tickets for TWO HOURS IN A BAR are $30 for previews and $34 for regular performances and are on sale now at www.citylit.org. Senior prices are $25 for previews and $29 for regular performances. Students and military are $12.00 for all performances. Tickets may be ordered online at www.citylit.org or purchased over the phone by calling 773-293-3682.
LISTING INFORMATION
TWO HOURS IN A BAR
A double bill of one-acts:
WAITING FOR TINA MEYER
by Kristine Thatcher (with material by Larry Shue)
WORLD STAGE PREMIERE
TEXT ME
Book, Music, and Lyrics by Kingsley Day
WORLD PREMIERE
Directed by Terry McCabe
March 8 - April 21, 2024 (No performance Easter Sunday, March 31)
Previews March 8 -16, 2024
Preview ticket prices $30.00, seniors $25.00, students and military $12.00 (all plus applicable fees)
PRESS OPENING Sunday, March 17 - 3 pm
Regular run March 17– April 21, 2024
Fridays and Saturdays at 7:30 pm, Sundays at 3 pm. Mondays April 1, 8, 15 at 7:30 pm
No performance Easter Sunday, March 31
Regular run ticket prices $34.00, seniors $29.00, students and military $12 (all plus applicable fees)
Performances at City Lit Theater, 1020 W. Bryn Mawr Ave. Chicago 60660 (Inside Edgewater Presbyterian Church)
Info and tickets at www.citylit.org and by phone at 773-293-3682.
A double bill of one-acts. WAITING FOR TINA MEYER concerns a pair of best-friend actors--a man and a woman--sitting in a bar because the man is expecting to be met there by Tina Meyer, a woman he doesn't know who sent him a note backstage earlier that evening. The musical TEXT ME is a 21st Century look at the problem of meeting people. In this version of the bar, two gay men who have previously met only online plan their first in-person meeting at the bar.
BIOS
Kristine Thatcher (Playwright – WAITING FOR TINA MEYER) is City Lit’s resident playwright. Her 2017 City Lit commission THE SAFE HOUSE was Jeff-nominated for Best New Work. She was formerly a member of the Victory Gardens playwrights ensemble. She is an award-winning actress, director and playwright and began acting at age 16 with the BoarsHead Theatre in Michigan. She has since appeared on stages in New York and Chicago, and in regional theaters across the country from Seattle to Sarasota. Her published plays include NIEDECKER, UNDER GLASS, EMMA’S CHILD (winner of the 1995 Susan Smith Blackburn Prize; a 1997 Illinois Arts Council Fellowship, the 1997 RESOLVE Award for Excellence in the Arts; the 1997 Cunningham Prize for Playwriting from DePaul University; and the 1997 After Dark Award for Outstanding New Work), APPARITIONS, VOICE OF GOOD HOPE (nominated for the 2000 Joseph Jefferson Award for New Work), and AMONG FRIENDS (winner of the 2000 Scott McPherson Memorial Award). She also wrote THE BLOODHOUND LAW, the concluding play of City Lit’s Civil War Sesquicentennial Project.
Kingsley Day (Bookwriter, Composer, Lyricist – TEXT ME) has composed the scores for City Lit’s productions of AZTEC HUMAN SACRIFICE, PROMETHEUS BOUND, LONDON ASSURANCE, THE TEMPEST, and VOLPONE. With Philip LaZebnik, he cowrote the comedy TOUR DE FARCE, which premiered at the old Wisdom Bridge Theatre in Chicago starring Steve Carell and Hollis Resnik under the direction of Terry McCabe and has since been performed across the United States and Europe, and the book for the musical STATE STREET, premiered by City Lit as directed by Sheldon Patinkin. Day’s other collaborations with LaZebnik include writing the music and lyrics and cowriting the books for the musicals SUMMER STOCK MURDER, which ran for 18 months and won a record-setting eight Jeffs in its premiere production; DEAR AMANDA, which starred Alene Robertson at Pheasant Run Playhouse; BYRNE, BABY, BYRNE, which with its sequel ran a total of three years at Zanies Comedy Club; THE JOY OF SOCKS, premiered and revived by the Chicago Premiere Society; and AZTEC HUMAN SACRIFICE.
Terry McCabe (Producer, Artistic Director, Director) has been City Lit’s artistic director since February 2005 and its producer since July 2016 and is retiring from these positions at the end of the current season. He has directed plays professionally in Chicago since 1981. He was artistic director of Stormfield Theatre for four years, resident director at Wisdom Bridge Theatre for five years, and worked at Body Politic Theatre three separate times in three different capacities over a span of 14 years. His City Lit adaptations of HOLMES AND WATSON, GIDGET (co-adapted with Marissa McKown), THE HOUND OF THE BASKERVILLES, SCOUNDREL TIME, and OPUS 1861 (co-adapted with Elizabeth Margolius) were Jeff-nominated. He won two Jeff Citations for directing at Stormfield and has been thrice nominated for the Jeff Award for Best Director, for shows at Court Theatre, Wisdom Bridge, and Victory Gardens. He has directed at many Chicago theatres either long-gone or still with us, as well as off-Broadway at the Cherry Lane Theatre and at Vienna’s English Theatre. His book MIS-DIRECTING THE PLAY has been denounced at length in American Theatre magazine and from the podium at the national convention of The Literary Managers and Dramaturgs of the Americas but has been used in directing courses on three continents and is now available in paperback and Kindle e-book.
ABOUT CITY LIT THEATER COMPANY:
City Lit is the eighth oldest theatre company in Chicago, behind only Goodman, Court, Northlight, Oak Park Festival, Black Ensemble Theatre, Steppenwolf, and Pegasus theatres. It was founded in 1979 with $210 pooled by Arnold Aprill, David Dillon, and Lorell Wyatt. For its current season, its 43rd , it operates with a budget slightly over $200,000. It was the first theatre in the nation devoted to stage adaptations of literary material. There were so few theatres in Chicago at the time of its founding that at City Lit’s launch event, the founders were able to read a congratulatory letter they had received from Tennessee Williams.
For four decades and counting, City Lit has explored fiction, non-fiction, poetry, memoirs, songs, essays and drama in performance. A theatre that specializes in literary work communicates a commitment to certain civilizing influences—tradition imaginatively explored, a life of the mind, trust in an audience’s intelligence—that not every cultural outlet shares.
City Lit is located in the historic Edgewater Presbyterian Church building at 1020 West Bryn Mawr Avenue. Its work is supported in part by the Gaylord and Dorothy Donnelley Foundation, the Illinois Arts Council Agency, and the City of Chicago Department of Cultural Affairs and Special Events CityArts program. An Illinois not-for-profit corporation and a 501(c)(3) federal tax-exempt organization, City Lit keeps ticket prices below the actual cost of producing plays and depends on the support of those who share its belief in the beauty and power of the spoken written word.