ShPIeL Performing Identity

A dynamic new theatre and performance incubator project; producer of innovative works putting identity, culture and heritage into “play.”

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Congratulations to Noemi Schlosser on a successful staged reading of her show TRAKTORFABRIK

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If Pixar took on the Purim Story.

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Friend of ShPIeL, Rebecca Joy Fletcher will be performing her show "Cities of Light" on March 1st at Anshe Emet in Chicago, IL.

Tickets are $18 per person. Show is at 7:30pm. 

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How Theater for Young People Could Save the World

So much of toxicity in this world comes from a collective draining of empathy. We don't understand each other, and we don't want to. But theater forces us to empathize.

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Artistic Director David Chack and writer/actress Rosyln Alexander discuss Emma Goldman and why her story needs to be told.

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RIP, Pete Seeger

Pete Seeger, a man for whom the modifier "€œlegendary" seems hopelessly inadequate, had many Jewish associations in a career that spanned seven decades.

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ShPIeL Presents "The Passions of Emma Goldman" with Roslyn Alexander

EMMA GOLDMAN (1869-1940) lived in the “gilded age,” a time in America’s history when big bosses were in cahoots with government. They tried to control women, workers, the common people and their personal lives. Ahead of her time and vilified, Goldman’s strong compassion and her charismatic organizing set the stage for freedoms we take for granted today: women’s rights and the right to vote; workers and children’s rights in the workplace; sexual and reproductive autonomy. THE PASSIONS OF EMMA GOLDMAN shows how her political activism came from deeply felt passions inside of her and the price she paid for it.

*ROSLYN ALEXANDER, a Jeff award-winning actor for a lead female role and the “Grand Dame of Chicago Theatre,” researched the memoirs and biographies of Emma Goldman to create this extraordinary tour-de-force The Passions of Emma Goldman. The last play she was in directed by Dennis Zacek, was Jacob and Jack, having worked together in James Sherman’s God of Isaac. She also toured coast-to-coast with James Sherman’s Beau Jest, which culminated in a two-year engagement Off Broadway. Ms. Alexander was cast by Mike Nichols for the first National Company of Prisoner of 2nd Ave. and won a Jeff Award for Best Actress in Wings at Wisdom Bridge Theatre. Her Chicago credits include, among many others, The Family Gold at Victory Gardens, Endgame and The Importance of Being Earnest at Court Theatre, Steel Magnolias at the Royal George, Taking Care at Steppenwolf, Morning’s at Seven at Drury Lane Water Tower, Kimberly Akimbo at A Red Orchard, and recently, How I Became An Interesting Person at Chicago Dramatists, and End of the Tour at 16th Street Theatre. She has made countless commercials, many feature films and episodes for TV, and dramatized 10 novels for Recorded Books of New York. She was on WFMT, Chicago’s Fine Arts station for several years reading and interpreting classic literature.

**DENNIS ZACEK winner of numerous theatre awards and director of over 250 productions in his career, held the position of artistic director of Victory Gardens for 35 years. He received the Actor’s Equity Association’s (AEA) Spirit Recognition Award, the 2005 Jeff Award for Outstanding Achievement in Chicago Equity Theatre, the 2004 Artistic Leadership Award from the League of Chicago Theatres. He, his wife Marcelle McVay, and the theater are co-recipients of the 2001 Tony Award for Outstanding Regional Theatre. Mr. Zacek and Ms. McVay received the 1999 Rosetta Lenoire Award from Actors’ Equity and the 1998 Sidney R. Yates Arts Advocacy Award from the Illinois Arts Alliance Foundation.

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"Last night PBS aired Two Spirits, the season finale of their Independent Lens series, which detailed the traditional Navajo belief that there we are living in a many-gendered world, one that includes many more sexes that just male and female.

Filmmaker Lydia Nibley seeks to explain the Navajo idea of the nádleehí, which translates in English to "one who constantly transforms." Their culture, along with other Native American heritages, believe there's at least four genders: male, female, male with a feminine essence, and female with a masculine essence. Learn more in the short clip above, and for more information on the film, visit the official PBS website."

-This is reblogged from http://jezebel.com/5812179/the-navajo-cultures-four-different-genders

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Meyer Levin shares his stories, jokes, and pictures. A look into 94 years of a unique life.

More about Meyer Levin

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ShPIeL's artistic director reviews the many layered production of "Compulsion" by Rinne Groff, produced by NEXT Theatre.     

For tickets and more information, visit: http://www.nexttheatre.org/

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The Invasion of Skokie by Steven Peterson has its North Shore premiere at the Mayer Kaplan JCC of the Jewish Community Center of Chicago and plays through June 23, 2013

We made a splash!

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Hey there, artists of nerdfighteria! After the success of the Nerdfighter-made Art Tier of last year’s Project for Awesome, we’ve teamed up with the P4A team once again and need your help!

The P4A, as always, will be raising money to give to charities. However, some people have more time and talent to give than money (you know who you are) so we’d like to recruit you to provide creations for reward tiers in our IndieGoGo campaign. You create the artwork and it will be purchased via donation and sent to a fellow nerdfighter!

Ideally, you’d to be able to provide at least 20 of the item, and they need to be easy to ship. Additionally, you would have to ship them to Missoula, Montana to be shown off for the P4A.

We’re looking for small, easily shipped items. This can include jewelry, knitwear, small plushies, small drawings and paintings, etc.

If you’re interested, you need to email us at [email protected] by October 27th with an example of what you have/will be creating. We will let you know if it’s reasonable and provide additional information around November 1st, giving you about a month to complete your pieces.

We’re extremely excited to be working on this project again this year, we hope you’re excited too!

-Jay, Emma, Hank, and Laura

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Have more talent than money? Help out the Project for Awesome by submitting your creations for the “Nerdfighter-made Art” perk at our IndieGoGo page. Last year, this perk raised tens of thousands of dollars for the project.  

Thanks to all of those amazing artists!

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Signal boost.

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More on the controversy at Theatre J

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No Censorship at Theater J – Forward Thinking

A small group seeks to force Theater J, a Washington D.C. cultural treasure, to toe its line on Israel. That’s McCarthyism, pure and simple, David Y. Chack writes.

ShPIeL's Artistic Director writes on the importance of Motti Lerner's play, and that "theatre is meant to enlarge us, not constrain us."

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In Defense of Stage Managers - December 2012 issue of Equity News (Editor’s note: On November 5, 2012, the Goodman and Steppenwolf Theatres along with the Central Stage Manager Committee hosted a Chicago Stage Manager Pizza Night. The event was a celebration of the hard work and dedication of...