Free Staged Reading of "Ordinary Miracles" Nov 3rd

Free Staged Reading of Wilmette Playwright Joe Bendy’s

Religious Women’s Drama “Ordinary Miracles” on

November 3, 2008, at Apple Tree Theatre; Directed by Lisa Dodson

WHAT:               A free staged reading of the drama “Ordinary Miracles,” a Catholic nun's story that sets the sacred versus the profane, written by Wilmette playwright Joe Bendy and directed by Lisa Dodson.  Amidst her struggle to keep the venerable college she heads viable in the face of drastic cultural change, modern-day feminist Sister Felicity must deal with the brash ideas of the school's newly hired young publicist, an overbearing and unscrupulous businessman trustee, and, most daunting, the unwelcome visit of an apostate pop-music icon alumna whose global celebrity and surprise gift proposal force her to make a faith-testing moral choice.  Sister Felicity reflects the strength of other memorable religious women portrayed on stage and screen, such as Sister Helen Prejean in “Dead Man Walking,” Mother Superior Miriam Ruth in “Agnes of God,” and Sister Aloysius in “Doubt.”   “Ordinary Miracles” runs about two hours with one intermission, and there will be a pre-show reception, as well as refreshments during the brief post-show talk-back (facilitated by director Dodson). 

WHERE:            Apple Tree Theatre, 1850 Green Bay Road, #100, Highland Park, IL  60035

Directions, restaurant partners and other info at 847-432-4335 and www.appletreetheatre.com

WHEN:              Monday, November 3, 2008

                          Reception begins at 7 p.m.; reading begins at 7:30 p.m.

CAST:               CAST:                Equity actors Roz Alexander (Sister Philomena), Lisa Dodson (Karen Coogan), Abigail Misko (Sister Grace), Rob Riley (William Manion, Ken Atkins, Drexel Simpson), Jill Shellabarger (Sister Felicity), Dan Sullivan (Dr. Warren Gould), Jeff Trainor (James Brandon), David Turrentine (Dan Coogan), and Nancy Voigts (Magdalena). 

BIO:                   “Ordinary Miracles,” C. Joseph Bendy’s second play written in 2006, leans heavily on his experience working for the venerable college for Catholic women – Milwaukee’s Mount Mary College.   His most recently written play, “Hijacking the Northern Star,” will premiere in December 2009 in Hong Kong, where the 16-character, multi-lingual, multi-ethnic hostage drama is set, and follows the immediate aftermath of their 1968 cultural revolution.  Born and raised on Chicago’s “shadow-of-the-steel-mills” southeast side, Bendy attended St. Ignatius College Prep on Roosevelt Road, then Marquette University in Milwaukee, where he earned a B.S. in Journalism.  Bendy was accepted into the University of Iowa’s highly-reputed Writer’s Workshop, only to drop out to pursue a master’s degree in American Civilization. 

Bendy was the publicist and part-time instructor in English literature at Mount Mary College in Milwaukee, then became the editor of St. Louis University alumni magazine, and subsequently edited trade magazine based in Tokyo that covered the Far East consumer goods export trade.  He moved to Hong Kong as junior partner in, and editor-in-chief of, a start-up trade publishing company, and was among the first journalists to enter mainland China after the Nixon diplomatic breakthrough with that country. Now a leader in business to business on-line commerce, Bendy’s company Global Sources is listed as GSOL on the Nasdaq.  After seven years in the British Crown Colony, he moved to Winnetka to open the company’s U.S. office. 

After retiring from Global Sources, Bendy started a video production company, concentrating on documentaries.  One for a local children’s museum dealt with “The Power of Play.”  Another, covering a baseball team from Moscow that came to play in a tournament in Florida, was eventually shown to a country-wide audience on the Soviet Union’s government channel.  Bendy also wrote a second novel, based on his Marine Corps experience.  But the opposition to the opening of a McDonald’s restaurant in Winnetka by a group of the village’s determined preservationists, plus his experience in joining a country club there, inspired Bendy to write his first play, “The Usurper,” a social satire on the manners and mores of the North Shore.