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When was the last time you went out and saw live theater?

Perhaps it will come as no surprise to hear that when we were in high school, we were in the drama club. We’re pretty sure we were the president or something. In the course of our four acned years, we performed in a dozen or more plays, more than a few by Christopher Durang: Sister Mary Ignatius Explains It All For You, The Actor’s Nightmare, etc. They were always fun to do because he’s a great playwright: witty wordplay, funny satire, accessible plots.

So it’s a bit of happy nostalgia to hear that the Stone Soup Theatre (4035 Stone Way N), the little one act theater on Stone Way, is opening a set of one acts by Durang this Friday, Oct 30th (with a preview on Thursday the 29th):

Stone Soup Theater invites you to experience one-acts by award-winning playwright, Christopher Durang, whose most current work, Why Torture is Wrong and the People Who Love Them played earlier this year to rave reviews at New York’s Public Theatre.

The selected pieces offer a retrospective of the playwright’s short theatrical parodies and absurdist social satires of the 80’s and 90’s.  Remaining true to Durang’s advice to “mix and match” among his one-acts by combining the “frenetic and loud” with “plays that have softer, quieter tones,” we have chosen seven short pieces that will take our six actors (and you!) on a virtuoso journey ranging from outrageous to sympathetic.

Few masters of the genre (including Euripides, Shakespeare, Noel Coward, Beckett, Williams and O’Neill) escape Durang’s affectionate lampooning in our production concluding with The Actor’s Nightmare, Desire, Desire, Desire and Medea. Representing Durang’s notoriously comic critiques of American society, our actors will also frolic through some of his best short social satires (DMV Tyrant, Funeral Parlor, Gym Teacher and Entertaining Mr. Helms) showcasing the domestic conundrums of life in late twentieth century America (beaurocracy, sex ed, family dynamics, politics) which remain hilariously relevant to life in 2009.

Please join us for this fast-paced romp through a variety of outrageously familiar situations peopled with recognizably ridiculous characters.  An evening guaranteed to bring laugh-a-minute therapy to our collective recession blues.

The production runs Thursdays – Sundays, October 30 through November 22 with a preview date on Thursday, October 29. Evening showtimes are 7:00 pm, Sunday matinees are at 2:00pm. General admission prices are $16 – 20; $13 for those under 30. All Thursday evening performances are pay-what-you-will. Tickets are available on-line or by phone (206-633-1883).